FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165  
166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   >>   >|  
l you wish. And suppose you had taken out all the gold you say is there, and you were rich. What would you do?" "What I do?" Bird struck the table with his fist. "Leave Haha Bay to-morrow morning!" "And where would you go?" "Go? To Quebec, to London, to Paris, to Rome, to the devil! Keep going!" The young father laughed a laugh as innocent as his looks, and turned with a sudden appeal to Northwick. "Tell me a little about the rich men in your land of millionnaires! How do they find their happiness? In what? What is the secret of joy that they have bought with their money?" "I don't know what you mean," said Northwick, with a recoil deeper into himself after the first flush of alarm at being addressed. "Where do they live?" Northwick hesitated, and the priest laid his hand on Bird's shoulder, as if to restrain a burst of information from him. "I suppose most of them live in New York." "All the time?" "No. They generally have a house at the seaside, at Newport or Bar Harbor, for the summer, and one at Lenox or Tuxedo for the fall; and they go to Florida for the winter, or Nice. Then they have their yachts." "The land is not large enough for their restlessness; they roam the sea. My son," said the young priest to the old hunter, "you can have all the advantage of riches at the expense of a gypsies' van!" He laughed again in friendly delight at Bird's supposed discomfiture; and touched him lightly, delicately, as before. "It is the same in Europe; I have seen it there, too." Bird was going to speak, but the priest stayed him a moment. "But how did your rich people get their millions? Not like those rich people in Europe, by inheritance?" "Very few," said Northwick, sensible of a remnant of the pride he used to feel in the fact, hidden about somewhere in his consciousness. "They made it." "How? Excuse me!" "By manufacturing, by speculating in railroad stocks, by mining, by the rise in land-values." "What causes the land to rise in value?" "The demand for it. The necessity." "Oh! The need of others. And when a man gains in stocks, some other man loses. No? Do the manufacturers pay the operatives all they earn? Are the miners very well paid and comfortable? I have read that they are miserable. Is it so?" Northwick was aware that there were good and valid answers to all these questions which the priest seemed to be asking rather for the confusion of Bird than as an expression of his own
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   141   142   143   144   145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165  
166   167   168   169   170   171   172   173   174   175   176   177   178   179   180   181   182   183   184   185   186   187   188   189   190   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
Northwick
 

priest

 

people

 

Europe

 

stocks

 
suppose
 
laughed
 

millions

 
confusion
 

inheritance


remnant

 

stayed

 
supposed
 

discomfiture

 
touched
 

lightly

 
delight
 
friendly
 

gypsies

 

delicately


expression

 

moment

 

hidden

 

miserable

 

comfortable

 

expense

 

miners

 

operatives

 

manufacturers

 

Excuse


manufacturing

 
speculating
 

questions

 

consciousness

 

railroad

 
demand
 

necessity

 
mining
 

answers

 
values

millionnaires
 

happiness

 
appeal
 
innocent
 

turned

 

sudden

 
secret
 

recoil

 
deeper
 

bought