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Davis, Richard Harding, 1864-1916

"Gallegher and Other Stories"


"Now," said young Harringford, determinedly, "you come with me." The
Frenchman tried to argue and resist, but the Plunger pushed him on
with the silent stubbornness of a drunken man. He handed the woman
into a carriage at the door, shoved her husband in beside her, and
while the man drove to the address she gave him, he told the
Frenchman, with an air of a chief of police, that he must leave Monte
Carlo at once, that very night.
"Do you suppose I don't know?" he said. "Do you fancy I speak without
knowledge? I've seen them come here rich and go away paupers. But you
shall not; you shall keep what you have and spite them." He sent the
woman up to her room to pack while he expostulated with and browbeat
the excited bridegroom in the carriage. When she returned with the bag
packed, and so heavy with the gold that the servants could hardly lift
it up beside the driver, he ordered the coachman to go down the hill
to the station.
"The train for Paris leaves at midnight," he said, "and you will be
there by morning. Then you must close your bargain with this old
Carbut, and never return here again."
The Frenchman had turned during the ride from an angry, indignant
prisoner to a joyful madman, and was now tearfully and effusively
humble in his petitions for pardon and in his thanks.


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