resembling his own was pronounced, and waiting in miserable
suspense for the time to come when it would be his humiliat
ing privilege to rise with Mary and finish his plea, which he
was intending; to word thus : l . . . for until now we have

O

never done any wrong thing, but have gone our humble
way unreproached. We are very poor, we are old, and
have no chick nor child to help us ; we were sorely
tempted, and we fell. It was my purpose when I got up
before to make confession and beg that my name might not
be read out in this public place, for it seemed to us that we
could not bear it ; but I was prevented. It was just ; it
was our place to suffer with the rest. It has been hard for
us. It is the first time we have ever heard our name fall
from any one s lips sullied. Be merciful for the sake or
the better days ; make our shame as light to bear as in your
charity you can. At this point in his reverie Mary nudged
him, perceiving that his mind was absent. The house was
chanting, You are f-a-r, etc.

* Be ready, Mary whispered. Your name comes
now ; he has read eighteen.

The chant ended.

Next ! next ! next ! came volleying from all over
the house.

Burgess put his hand into his pocket. The old couple,
trembling, began to rise. Burgess fumbled a moment, then
said :

* I find I have read them all.

Faint with joy and surprise, the couple sank into their
seats, and Mary whispered :

1 Oh, bless God, we are saved ! he has lost ours
I wouldn t give this for a hundred of those sacks !

The house burst out with its Mikado travesty, and



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 45

sang it three times with ever-increasing enthusiasm, rising to
its feet when it reached for the third time the closing line

But the Symbols are here, you bet !

and finishing up with cheers and a tiger for Hadleyburg
purity and our eighteen immortal representatives of it.

Then Wingate, the saddler, got up and proposed cheers
c for the cleanest man in town, the one solitary important
citizen in it who didn t try to steal that money Edward
Richards.

They were given with great and moving heartiness ;
then somebody proposed that Richards be elected sole
Guardian and Symbol of the now Sacred Hadleyburg
Tradition, with power and right to stand up and look the
whole sarcastic world in the face.

Passed, by acclamation ; then they sang the Mikado
again, and ended it with

And there s one Symbol left, you bet !

There was a pause ; then -

A Voice. Now, then, who s to get the sack ?

The Tanner (with bitter sarcasm]. That s easy. The
money has to be divided among the eighteen Incorruptibles.
They gave the suffering stranger twenty dollars apiece
and that remark each in his turn it took twenty-two
minutes for the procession to move past. Staked the
stranger total contribution, $360. All they want is just
the loan back and interest forty thousand dollars alto
gether.

Many Voices [derisively.] That s it ! Divvy ! divvy !
Be kind to the poor don t keep them waiting !

The Chair. Order ! I now offer the stranger s re
maining document. It says : " If no claimant shall appear
[grand chorus of groans ]^ I desire that you open the sack and



46 THE MAN

count out the money to the principal citizens of your town,
they to take it in trust [Cries of Oh ! Oh ! Oh / ], and
use it in such ways as to them shall seem best for the
propagation and preservation of your community s noble
reputation for incorruptible honesty [more cries ] a reputa
tion to which their names and their efforts will add a new
and far-reaching lustre." [Enthusiastic outburst of sarcastic
applause.] That seems to be all. No here is a postscript :
" P.S. CITIZENS OF HADLEYBURG : There is no
test-remark nobody made one. [Great sensation.] There
wasn t any pauper stranger, nor any twenty-dollar contribu
tion, nor any accompanying benediction and compliment
these are all inventions. [Genera! buzz and hum of astonish
ment and delight.] Allow me to tell my story it will take
but a word or two. I passed through your town at a
certain time, and received a deep offence which I had not
earned. Any other man would have been content to kill
one or two of you and call it square, but to me that would
have been a trivial revenge, and inadequate ; for the dead
do not suffer. Besides, I could not kill you all and, any
way, made as I am, even that would not have satisfied me-
I wanted to damage every man in the place, and every
woman and not in their bodies or in their estate, but in
their vanity the place where feeble and foolish people are
most vulnerable. So I disguised myself and came back and
studied you. You were easy game. You had an old and
lofty reputation for honesty, and naturally you were proud
of it it was your treasure of treasures, the very apple of
your eye. As soon as I found out that you carefully and
vigilantly kept yourselves and your children out of temptation,
I knew how to proceed. Why, you simple creatures, the
weakest of all weak things is a virtue which has not been
tested in the fire. I laid a plan, and gathered a list of



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 47

names. My project was to corrupt Hadleyburg the Incor
ruptible. My idea was to make liars and thieves of nearly
half a hundred smirchless men and women who had never
in their lives uttered a lie or stolen a penny. I was afraid
of Goodson. He was neither born nor reared in Hadley
burg. I was afraid that if I started to operate my scheme
by getting my letter laid before you, you would say to your
selves, Goodson is the only man among us who would give
away twenty dollars to a poor devil and then you might
not bite at my bait. But heaven took Goodson ; then I
knew I was safe, and I set my trap and baited it. It may be
that I shall not catch all the men to whom I mailed the
pretended test-secret, but I shall catch the most of them,
if I know Hadleyburg nature. \Volces. Right he got
every last one of them. ] I believe they will even steal
ostensible gamble-money, rather than miss, poor, tempted,
and mistrained fellows. I am hoping to eternally and
everlastingly squelch your vanity and give Hadleyburg a
new renown one that will stick and spread far. If I
have succeeded, open the sack and summon the Committee
on Propagation and Preservation of the Hadleyburg Reputa
tion."

A Cyclone of Voices. Open it ! Open it ! The Eighteen
to the front ! Committee on Propagation of the Tradition !
Forward the Incorruptibles !

The Chair ripped the sack wide, and gathered up a
handful of bright, broad, yellow coins, shook them together,
then examined them.

* Friends, they are only gilded disks of lead !

There was a crashing outbreak of delight over this
news, and when the noise had subsided, the tanner called
out :

1 By right of apparent seniority m this business, Mr.



48 THE MAN

Wilson is Chairman of the Committee on Propagation of
the Tradition. I suggest that he step forward on behalf of
his pals, and receive in trust the money.

A Hundred Voices. < Wilson ! Wilson ! Wilson !
Speech ! Speech !

Wilson [in a voice trembling with anger\. * You will
allow me to say, and without apologies for my language,
damn the money !

A Voice. Oh, and him a Baptist !

A Voice. * Seventeen Symbols left ! Step up, gentle
men, and assume your trust !

There was a pause no response.

The Saddler. Mr. Chairman, we ve got one clean man
left, anyway, out of the late aristocracy ; and he needs
money, and deserves it. I move that you appoint Jack
Halliday to get up there and auction off that sack of g\h
twenty-dollar pieces, and give the result to the right man
the man whom Hadleyburg delights to honour Edward
Richards.

This was received with great enthusiasm, the dog
taking a hand again ; the saddler started the bids at a dollar,
the Brixton folk and Barnum s representative fought hard
for it, the people cheered every jump that the bids made,
the excitement climbed moment by moment higher and
higher, the bidders got on their mettle and grew steadily
more and more daring, more and more determined, the
jumps went from a dollar up to five, then to ten, then to
twenty, then fifty, then to a hundred, then

At the beginning of the auction Richards whispered in
distress to his wife : Oh, Mary, can we allow it ? It it
you see, it is an honour-reward, a testimonial to purity of
character, and and can we allow it ? Hadn t I better
get up and Oh, Mary, what ought we to do ? what do



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 49

you think we [Halliday s voice. < Fifteen Vm bid I
fifteen for the sack ! twenty ! ah, thanks ! thirty thanks
again ! Thirty, thirty, thirty \do I hear forty ? forty it
is ! Keep the ball rolling, gentlemen, keep it rolling ! fifty !
thanks, noble Roman ! going at fifty, fifty, fifty ! seventy !
ninety ! splendid I a hundred ! pile it up, pile it up !
hundred and twentyforty ! just in time ! hundred and
fifty /TWO hundred ! superb ! Do I hear two h thanks !
two hundred and fifty ! ]

It is another temptation, Edward I m all in a tremble
but, oh, we ve escaped one temptation, and that ought to
warn us, to [< Six did I hear ? thanks ! six fifty, six f
SEVEN hundred! } And yet, Edward, when you think
nobody susp [< Eight hundred dollars ! hurrah ! make it
nine! Mr. Parsons, did I hear you say thanks! nine!
this noble sack of virgin lead going at only nine hundred dollars,
gilding and all come ! do I hear a thousand! gratefully
yours ! did some one say eleven ? a sack which is going to be
the most celebrated in the whole Uni ] Oh, Edward
(beginning to sob), we are so poor ! but but do as you
think best do as you think best.

Edward fell that is, he sat still ; sat with a conscience
which was not satisfied, but which was overpowered by
circumstances.

Meantime a stranger, who looked like an amateur
detective gotten up as an impossible English earl, had been
watching the evening s proceedings with manifest interest,
and with a contented expression in his face ; and he had
been privately commenting to himself. He was now
soliloquising somewhat like this : None of the Eighteen
are bidding ; that is not satisfactory ; I must change that
the dramatic unities require it ; they must buy the sack
they tried to steal ; they must pay a heavy price, too





50 THE MAN

some of them are rich. And another thing, when I make
a mistake in Hadleyburg nature the man that puts that
error upon me is entitled to a high honorarium, and some
one must pay. This poor old Richards has brought my
judgment to shame ; he is an honest man : I don t
understand it, but I acknowledge it. Yes, he saw my
deuces-and with a straight flush, and by rights the pot is his.
And it shall be a jack-pot, too, if I can manage it. He
disappointed me, but let that pass.

He was watching the bidding. At a thousand, the
market broke : the prices tumbled swiftly. He waited
and still watched. One competitor dropped out ; then
another, and another. He put in a bid or two, now.
When the bids had sunk to ten dollars, he added a five ;
some one raised him a three ; he waited a moment, then
flung in a fifty-dollar jump, and the sack was his at $1,282.
The house broke out in cheers then stopped ; for he was
on his feet, and had lifted his hand. He began to speak.

* I desire to say a word, and ask a favour. I am a specu
lator in rarities, and I have dealings with persons interested
in numismatics all over the world. I can make a profit on
this purchase, just as it stands ; but there is a way, if I can
get your approval, whereby I can make every one of these
leaden twenty-dollar pieces worth its face in gold, and
perhaps more. Grant me that approval, and I will give
part of my gains to your Mr. Richards, whose invulnerable
probity you have so justly and so cordially recognised to
night ; his share shall be ten thousand dollars, and I will
hand him the money to-morrow. [Great applause from the
house. But the * invulnerable probity made the Rich-
ardses blush prettily ; however, it went for modesty, and
did no harm.] If you will pass my proposition by a good
majority I would like a two-thirds vote I will regard



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 51

that as the town s consent, and that is all I ask. Rarities
are always helped by any device which will rouse curiosity
and compel remark. Now if I may have your permission
to stamp upon the faces of each of these ostensible coins the
names of the eighteen gentlemen who

Nine-tenths of the audience were on their feet in a
moment dog and all and the proposition was carried
with a whirlwind of approving applause and laughter.

They sat down, and all the Symbols except * Dr. Clay
Harkness got up, violently protesting against the proposed
outrage, and threatening to

I beg you not to threaten me, said the stranger calmly.
* I know my legal rights, and am not accustomed to being
frightened at bluster. [Applause."] He sat down. * Dr.
Harkness saw an opportunity here. He was one of the two
very rich men of the place, and Pinkerton was the other.
Harkness was proprieter of a mint ; that is to say, a popular
patent medicine. He was running for the Legislature
on one ticket, and Pinkerton on the other. It was a close
race and a hot one, and getting hotter every day. Both
had strong appetites for money ; each had bought a great
tract of land, with a purpose ; there was going to be a new
railway, and each wanted to be in the Legislature and help
locate the route to his own advantage ; a single vote might
make the decision, and with it two or three fortunes. The
stake was large, and Harkness was a daring speculator. He
was sitting close to the stranger. He leaned over while one
or another of the other Symbols was entertaining the house
with protests and appeals, and asked, in a whisper,

What is your price for the sack ?

Forty thousand dollars.

4 I ll give you twenty.

No.

E2



52 THE MAN

* Twenty-five.
No.

* Say thirty.

The price is forty thousand dollars ; not a penny less.
All right, I ll give it. I will come to the hotel at ten

in the morning. I don t want it known ; will see you

privately.

* Very good. Then the stranger got up and said to
the house :

I find it late. The speeches of these gentlemen are
not without merit, not without interest, not without grace ;
yet if I may be excused I will take my leave. I thank you
for the great favour which you have shown me in granting
my petition. I ask the Chair to keep the sack for me until
to-morrow, and to hand these three five-hundred-dollar
notes to Mr. Richards. They were passed up to the Chair.

1 At nine I will call for the sack, and at eleven will
deliver the rest of the ten thousand to Mr. Richards in
person at his home. Good-night.

Then he slipped out, and left the audience making a
vast noise, which was composed of a mixture of cheers, the
1 Mikado song, dog-disapproval, and the chant, * You are
f-a-r from being a b-a-a-d man a-a-a a-men !

IV

At home the Richardses had to endure congratulations
and compliments until midnight. Then they were left to
themselves. They looked a little sad, and they sat silent
and thinking. Finally Mary sighed and said :

* Do you think we are to blame, Edward much to
blame ? and her eyes wandered to the accusing triplet of big
bank-notes lying on the table, where the congratulators had



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 53

been gloating over them and reverently fingering them.
Edward did not answer at once ; then he brought out a
sigh and said, hesitatingly :

* We we couldn t help it, Mary. It well it was
ordered. All things are.

Mary glanced up and looked at him steadily, but he
didn t return the look. Presently she said :

1 1 thought congratulations and praises always tasted
good. But it seems to me, now Edward?

< Well ?

Are you going to stay in the bank ?

N-no.

* Resign ?

* In the morning by note.*

* It does seem best.

Richards bowed his head in his hands and muttered :
Before I was not afraid to let oceans of people s money

pour through my hands, but Mary, I am so tired, so

tired

* We will go to bed.

At nine in the morning the stranger called for the sack
and took it to the hotel in a cab. At ten Harkness had a
talk with him privately. The stranger asked for and got
five cheques on a metropolitan bank drawn to Bearer,
four for $1,500 each, and one for $34,000. He put one of
the former in his pocket-book, and the remainder, represent
ing $38,500, he put in an envelope, and with these he added
a note which he wrote after Harkness was gone. At
eleven he called at the Richards house and knocked. Mrs.
Richards peeped through the shutters, then went and
received the envelope, and the stranger disappeared without
a word. She came back flushed and a little unsteady on her
legs, and gasped out :



54 THE MAN

* I am sure I recognised him ! Last night it seemed to
me that maybe I had seen him somewhere before.

* He is the man that brought the sack here ?
4 1 am almost sure of it.

* Then he is the ostensible Stephenson too, and sold every
important citizen in this town with his bogus secret. Now
if he has sent cheques instead of money, we are sold too,
after we thought we had escaped. I was beginning to feel
fairly comfortable once more, after my night s rest, but the
look of that envelope makes me sick. It isn t fat enough ;
$8,500 in even the largest bank-notes makes more bulk than
that.

1 Edward, why do you object to cheques ?

Cheques signed by Stephenson ! I am resigned to take
the $8,500 if it could come in bank-notes for it does seem
that it was so ordered, Mary but I have never had much
courage, and I have not the pluck to try to market a
cheque signed with that disastrous name. It would be a
trap. That man tried to catch me ; we escaped somehow
or other ; and now he is trying a new way. If it is
cheques

1 Oh, Edward, it is too bad ! And she held up the
cheques and began to cry.

Put them in the fire ! quick ! we mustn t be tempted.
It is a trick to make the world laugh at us, along with the
rest, and Give them to me, since you can t do it ! He
snatched them and tried to hold his grip till he could get to
the stove ; but he was human, he was a cashier, and he
stopped a moment to make sure of the signature. Then he
came near to fainting.

* Fan me, Mary, fan me ! They are the same as
gold !

Oh, how lovely, Edward ! Why ?



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 55

Signed by Harkness. What can the mystery of that be,
Mary ? %

* Edward, do you think

Look here look at this ! Fifteen fifteen fifteen
thirty-four. Thirty-eight thousand five hundred ! Mary,
the sack isn t worth twelve dollars, and Harkness apparently
has paid about par for it.

4 And does it all come to us, do you think instead of the
ten thousand ?

Why, it looks like it. And the cheques arc made to
" Bearer, too.

Is that good, Edward ? What is it for r

A hint to collect them at some distant bank, I reckon.
Perhaps Harkness doesn t want the matter known. What
is that a note ?

Yes. It was with the cheques.

It was in the Stephenson handwriting, but there was
no signature. It said :

( / am a disappointed man. Your honesty is beyond the
reach of temptation. I had a different idea about zY, but I
wronged you in that, and I beg pardon^ and do it sincerely. I
honour you and that is sincere too. This town is not worthy
to kiss the hem of your garment. Dear 5/r, / made a square
bet with myself that there were nineteen debauchable men in
your self-righteous community. I have lost. Take the whole
pot, you are entitled to it.

Richards drew a deep sigh, and said :
It seems written with fire it burns so. Mary I am
miserable again.

I, too. Ah, dear, I wish

To think, Mary he believes in me.

Oh, don t, Edward I can t bear it.

* If those beautiful words were deserved, Mary and God



56 THE MAN

knows I believed I deserved them once I think I could
give the forty thousand dollars for them. And I would put
that paper away, as representing more than gold and jewels,
and keep it always. But now We could not live in the
shadow of its accusing presence, Mary.*

He put it in the fire.

A messenger arrived and delivered an envelope.
Richards took from it a note and read it ; it was from
Burgess :

You saved me, in a difficult time. I saved you last night.
It was at cost of a He, but I made the sacrifice freely, and out
of a grateful heart. None in this village knows so well as I
know how brave and good and noble you are. At bottom you
cannot respect me, knowing as you do of that matter of which
I am accused, and by the general voice condemned ; but I beg
that you will at least believe that I am a grateful man ; it will
help me to bear my burden.

[Signed] BURGESS.

Saved, once more. And on such terms ! He put
the note in the fire. { I I wish I were dead, Mary, I wish
I were out of it all !

* Oh, these are bitter, bitter days, Edward. The stabs,
through their very generosity, are so deep and they come
so fast !

Three days before the election each of two thousand
voters suddenly found himself in possession of a prized
memento one of the renowned bogus double-eagles.
Around one of its faces was stamped these words : THE

REMARK I MADE TO THE POOR STRANGER WAS

Around the other face was stamped these : * GO, AND
REFORM. [SIGNED] PINKERTON. Thus the entire
remaining refuse of the renowned joke was emptied upon
a single head, and with calamitous effect. It revived the



THAT CORRUPTED HADLEYBURG 57

recent vast laugh and concentrated it upon Pinkerton ; and
Harkness s election was a walk-over.

Within twenty-four hours after the Richardses had
received their cheques their consciences were quieting down,
discouraged ; the old couple were learning to reconcile
themselves to the sin which they had committed. But
they were to learn, now, that a sin takes on new and real
terrors when there seems a chance that it is going to be
found out. This gives it a fresh and most substantial and
important aspect. At church the morning sermon was of
the usual pattern ; it was the same old things said in the
same old way ; they had heard them a thousand times and
found them innocuous, next to meaningless, and easy to sleep
under ; but now it was different : the sermon seemed to
bristle with accusations ; it seemed aimed straight and specially
at people who were concealing deadly sins. After church
they got away from the mob of congratulators as soon as
they could, and hurried homeward, chilled to the bone at
they did not know what vague, shadowy, indefinite fears.
And by chance they caught a glimpse of Mr. Burgess as he
turned a corner. He paid no attention to their nod of
recognition ! He hadn t seen it ; but they did not know
that. What could his conduct mean ? It might mean
it might mean oh, a dozen dreadful things. Was it
possible that he knew that Richards could have cleared him
of guilt in that bygone time, and had been silently waiting
for a chance to even up accounts ? At home, in their
distress they got to imagining that their servant might have
been in the next room listening when Richards revealed
the secret to his wife that he knew of Burgess s innocence ;
next Richards began to imagine that he had heard the swish
of a gown in there at that time ; next, he was sure he had
heard it. They would call Sarah in, on a pretext, and



$8 THE MAN

watch her face ; if she had been betraying them to Mr.
Burgess, it would show in her manner. They asked her
some questions questions which were so random and in
coherent and seemingly purposeless that the girl felt sure
that the old people s minds had been affected by their
sudden good fortune ; the sharp and watchful gaze which
they bent upon her frightened her, and that completed the
business. She blushed, she became nervous and confused,
and to the old people these were plain signs of guilt guilt
of some fearful sort or other without doubt she was a
spy and a traitor. When they were alone again they began
to piece many unrelated things together and get horrible re
sults out of the combination. When things had got about
to the worst Richards was delivered of a sudden gasp and
his wife asked :

1 Oh, what is it ? what is it ?

The note Burgess s note ! Its language was sar
castic, I see it now. He quoted : " At bottom you
cannot respect me, knowing^ as you do, of that matter of
which I am accused " oh, it is perfectly plain, now, God
help me ! He knows that I know ! You see the ingenuity
of the phrasing. It was a trap and like a fool, I walked
into it. And Mary !

Oh, it is dreadful I know what you are going to say
he didn t return your transcript of the pretended test-
remark.

No kept it to destroy us with. Mary, he has exposed