Her Weight in Gold | Page 2

only to the General, but to Mrs. Gamble herself.
Young Mr. Ten Eyck was the most impecunious spendthrift in Essex.
He lived by his wits, with which he was more generously endowed than
anything in the shape of gold or precious jewels. His raiment was

accumulative. His spending-money came to him through an allowance
that his grandmother considerately delivered to him at regular periods,
but as is the custom with such young men he was penniless before the
quarter was half over. At all times he was precariously close to being
submerged by his obligations. Yet trouble sat lightly upon his head, if
one were to judge by outward appearances. Beneath a bland, care- free
exterior, however, there lurked in Edward's bosom a perpetual pang of
distress over the financial situation.
What worried him most was the conviction that all signs pointed
toward the suspension of credit in places where he owed money, and,
Young Mr. Ten Eyck's sarcasm was inspired by a mind's-eye picture of
Miss Martha Gamble. To quote Jo Grigsby, she was "so plain that all
comparison began and ended with her." Without desiring to appear
ungallant, I may say that there were many homely young women in
Essex; but each of them had the delicate satisfaction of knowing that
Martha was incomparably her superior in that respect.
"I am not jesting, sir," said the General with asperity. "Martha may not
be as good-looking as--er--some girls that I've seen, but she is a jewel,
just the same. The man who gets her for a wife will be a blamed sight
luckier than the fellows who marry the brainless little fools we see
trotting around like butterflies." (It was the first time that Eddie had
heard of trotting butterflies.)
"She's a fine girl," was his conciliatory remark.
"She is pure gold," said the General with conviction. "Pure gold, sir."
"A nugget," agreed Eddie expansively. "A hundred and eighty pound
nugget, General. Why don't you send her to a refinery?"
The General merely glared at him and subsided into thoughtful silence.
He was in the habit of falling into deep spells of abstraction at such
times as this. For the life of him, he couldn't understand how Martha
came by her excessive plainness. Her mother was looked upon as a
beautiful woman and her father (the General's predecessor) had been a
man worth looking at, even from a successor's point of view. That

Martha should have grown up to such appalling ugliness was a source
of wonder, not only to the General, but to Mrs. Gamble herself.
Young Mr. Ten Eyck was the most impecunious spendthrift in Essex.
He lived by his wits, with which he was more generously endowed than
anything in the shape of gold or precious jewels. His raiment was
accumulative. His spending-money came to him through an allowance
that his grandmother considerately delivered to him at regular periods,
but as is the custom with such young men he was penniless before the
quarter was half over. At all times he was precariously close to being
submerged by his obligations. Yet trouble sat lightly upon his head, if
one were to judge by outward appearances. Beneath a bland, care- free
exterior, however, there lurked in Edward's bosom a perpetual pang of
distress over the financial situation.
What worried him most was the conviction that all signs pointed
toward the suspension of credit in places where he owed money, and,
as he owed without discrimination, the future seemed hard to
contemplate.
Prudent mothers stood defiantly between him and what might have
been prosperity. He could win the hearts of daughters with shameful
regularity and ease, but he could not delude the heads of the families to
which they belonged. They knew him well and wisely.
The conversation between him and General Gamble took place in the
reading-room of the Town and Country Club. There was a small table
between them, and glasses.
"What is the market price of gold to-day, General?" asked Eddie
impudently, after he had watched the old man's gloomy countenance
out of the corner of his eye for the matter of three minutes or more.
The General regarded him with deep scorn. "Gold? What do you know
about gold? You seldom see anything more precious than copper."
"That's no joke," agreed Eddie with his frank smile. "I am the only,
original penny limit. That reminds me, General. I meant to speak of it

before, but somehow it slipped my mind. Could you lend me--"
The General held up his hand. "I've been waiting for that, Eddie. Don't
humiliate yourself by asking for a small amount. I haven't the remotest
idea how much you already owe me, but it doesn't matter in view of the
fact that you'll never pay it. You were about to request the loan