such confession may come grotesquely enough from one of education and substance, yet all the day long i’ve been thinking on omens and on prophecies. it was my servant who brought it about. he, poor wretch! appeared in my chamber this morning with brows of terror and eyes of gloom. he had consulted a gypsy sorceress, whom the storm drove to cover in this tavern, and crossed the palm of her greed with a silver dollar to be told that he would die within the year. information hardly worth the fee, truly! and the worst is, the shrinking fool believes the forebode and is already set about mending his lean estates for the change. what is still more strange, i, too, regard the word of this snow-blown witch—whoever the hag may be—and can no more eject her prophecies from my head than can the scared victim of them.
this business of superstition—a weakness for the supernatural—belongs with our bone and blood. reason is no shield from its assaults. look at sir thomas more; chopped on tower hill because he would believe that the blessed wafers became of the savior’s actual flesh and blood! and yet, sir thomas wrote that most thoughtful of works, “utopia,” and was cunning enough of a hard-headed politics to succeed wolsey as chancellor.
doubtless my bent to be superstitious came to me from my father. he was a miner; worked and lived on tom’s run; and being from wales, and spending his days in gloomy caverns of coal, held to those fantastic beliefs of his craft in elves and gnomes and brownies and other malignant, small folk of demonland. however, it becomes not me to find fault with my ancestor nor speak lightly of his foibles. he was a most excellent parent; and it is one of my comforts, and one which neither my money nor my ease could bring, that i was ever a good son.
as i say, my father was a miner of coal. each morning while the mines were open, lamp in hat, he repaired deep within the tunneled belly of the hill across from our cottage and with pick and blast delved the day long. this mine was what is called a “rail mine,” and closed down its work each autumn to resume again in the spring. these beginnings and endings of mine activities depended on the opening and closing of navigation along the great lakes. when the lakes were open, the mines were open; when november’s ice locked up the lakes, it locked up the mines as well, and my father and his fellows of the lamp were perforce idle until the warmth of returning spring again freed the keels and south breezes refilled the sails of commerce. as this gave my father but five to six months work a year; and as—at sixty cents a ton and pay for powder, oil, fuse and blacksmithing—he could make no more than forty dollars a month, we were poor enough.
even the scant money he earned we seldom really fingered. the little that was not cheated out of my father’s hands by the sins of diamond screens and untrue weights and other company tricks, was pounced on in advance by the harpies of “company store” and “company cottage,” and what coins came to our touch never soared above the mean dignity of copper. poor we were! a family of groats and farthings! poor as lamb’s “obolary jew!”
it is not worth while for what i have in mind to dwell in sad extent on the struggles of my father or the aching shifts we made in my childhood to feed and clothe the life within our bodies. and yet, in body at least, i thrived thereby. i grew up strong and muscular; i boxed, wrestled and ran; was proficient as an athlete, and among other feats and for a slight wager—which was not made with my money, i warrant you!—swam eighteen miles in fresh water one sunday afternoon.
while my muscles did well enough, our poverty would have starved my mind were it not for the parish priest. the question of books and schools for me was far beyond my father’s solution; he was eager that i be educated, but the emptiness of the family fisc forbade. it was then the good parish priest stepped forward and took me in earnest hand. father glennon deemed himself no little of an athlete, and i now believe that it was my supremacy in muscle among the boys of my age that first drew his eyes to me. be that as it may, he took my schooling on himself; and night and day while i abode on tom’s run—say until my seventeenth year—i was as tightly bound to the priest’s books as ever prometheus to his rock. and being a ready lad, i did my preceptor proud.
the good priest is dead now; i sought to put a tall stone above him but the bishop refused because it was too rich a mark for the dust of an humble priest. i had my way in part, however; i bought the plot just across the narrow gravel walk from the grave that held my earliest, best friend, and there, registering on its smooth white surface my debt to father glennon, stands the shaft. i carved on it no explanation of the fact that it is only near and not over my good priest’s bones. those who turn curious touching that matter may wend to the bishop or to the sexton, and i now and then hear that they do.
no; i did not go into the coal holes. my father forbade it, and i lacked the inclination as well. by nature i was a speculator, a gambler if you will. i like uncertainties; i would not lend money at five hundred per cent., merely because one knows in advance the measure of one’s risks and profits. i want a chance to win and a chance to lose; for i hold with the eminent gamester charles fox that while to win offers the finest sensation of which the human soul is capable, the next finest comes when you lose. congenitally i was a courtier of fortune and a follower of the gospel of chance. and this inborn mood has carried me through a score of professions until, as i tell you this, i have grown rich and richer as a stock speculator, and hang over the markets a pure gambler of the tape. i make no apology; i simply point to the folk who surround me.
my vocation of a gambler—for what else shall one call a speculator of stocks?—has doubtless fattened my tendencies towards the superstitious. i’ve witnessed much surely, that should go to their strengthening. let me tell you a story somewhat in line with the present current of my thoughts; it may reach some distance to teach you with horatio that there be more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in our philosophy. after all, it is the cold record of one of a hundred score of incidents that encourage my natural belief in the occult.
there is a gentleman of stocks—i’ve known him twenty years—and he has a weakness for the numeral three. just how far his worship of that sacred number enters into his business life no one may certainly tell; he is secretive and cautious and furnishes no evidence on the point that may be covered up. yet this weakness, if one will call it so, crops up in sundry fashions. his offices are suite three, in number thirty-three blank street; his telephones are 333 and 3339 respectively; his great undertakings are invariably deferred in their commencements until the third of the month.
his peculiar and particular fetich, however, is a chain of three hundred and thirty-three gold beads. it is among the wonders of the street. this was made for him and under his direction by tiffany, and cost one workman something over a year of his life in its construction. it is all hand and hammer work, this chain; and on each bead is drawn with delicate and finished art a gypsy girl’s head. under a microscope this gypsy face is perfect and the entire jewel worthy the boast of the tiffany house as a finest piece of goldbeater’s work turned out in modern times.
it is a listless, warm evening at the fifth avenue hotel. our believer in “three” is gathered casually with two of his friends. there is no business abroad; those missions which called our gentleman of the gypsy chain up-town are all discharged; he is off duty—unbuckled, as it were, in cheerful, light converse over a bottle of wine. let us name our friend of the three, “james of the beads;” while his duo of comrades may be reed and rand respectively.
such is man’s inconsistency that james of the beads is railing at reed who has told—with airs of veneration if not of faith—of a “system,” that day laid bare to him, warranted to discover in excellent rich advance, the names of the winning horses in next day’s races. james of the beads laughs, while reed feebly defends his credulity in lending the countenance of half belief to the “system” he describes.
then a sudden impulse takes james of the beads. his face grows grave while his eye shows deepest thought.
“to-morrow is the third of the month?” observes james of the beads. now with emphasis: “gentlemen, i’ll show you how to select a horse.” then to reed, who holds in his hands the racing list: “look for to-morrow’s third race!” reed finds it.
“what is the third horse?”
“roysterer.”
“roysterer!” repeats james of the beads. “good! there are nine letters in the name; three syllables; three r’s!”
then james of the beads seizes with both hands, in a sort of ecstatic catch as catch can, on the gypsy chain of magic. he holds a bead between the thumb and fore-finger of each hand. softly he counts the little yellow globes between.
“thirty-three!” ejaculates james of the beads. deeper lights begin to shine in his eye. one test of the chain, however, is not enough. he must make three. a second time he takes a bead between each fore-finger and thumb; on this trial the two beads are farther apart. again he counts, feeling each golden bullet with his finger’s tip as the tally proceeds.
“sixty-six!”
there arrives a glow on the brow of james of the beads to keep company with the gathering sparkle of his eye. the questioning of the witch-chain goes on. again he seizes the beads; again he tells the number.
“ninety-nine!”
the prophecy is made; the story of success is foretold. james of the beads is on fire; he springs to his feet. rand and reed regard him in silence, curiously. he walks to a window and sharply gazes out on the lamp-sprinkled evening.
“twenty-third street! fifth avenue! broadway!” he mutters. “still three—always three!”
unconsciously james of the beads seeks the window-shade with his hand. he would raise it a trifle; it is low and interrupts the eye as he stands gazing into the trio of thoroughfares. the tassel he grasps is old and comes off in his fingers. james of the beads turns his glance on the tassel.
“that, too, has its meaning,” says james of the beads, “if only we might read it.”
the tassel is a common, poor creature of worsted yarns and strands wrapped about a clumsy mold of wood. james of the beads scans it narrowly as it lies in his hand. at last he turns it, and the fringe falls away from the wooden mold. there is a little “3” burned upon the wood. james of the beads exhibits this sacred sign to reed and rand; the while his excited interest deepens. then he counts the strands of worsted which constitute the fringe. there are eighty-one!
“three times three times three times three!” and james of the beads draws a deep breath.
who might resist these spectral manifestations of “three!” james of the beads turns from the window like one whose decision is made. without a word he takes a slip of paper from his pocket book and going to the table writes his name on its back. it is a pleasant-seeming paper, this slip; and pleasantly engraved and written upon. no less is it than a new york draft drawn on the city national bank by a leading chicago concern for an even one hundred thousand dollars. james of the beads places it in the hands of rand.
“to-morrow should be the luckiest of days,” says james of the beads. “i must not lose it. i must consider to-morrow and arrange to set afoot certain projects which i’ve had in train for some time. as to the races, rand, take the draft and put it all on roysterer.”
“man alive!” remonstrates the amazed rand; “it’s too much on one horse! moreover, i won’t have time to get all that money down.”
“get down what you can then,” commands james of the beads. “plunge! have no fears! i tell you, so surely as the sun comes up, roysterer will win.”
“the wise ones don’t think so,” urges rand, who is not wedded to the mystic “three,” and beholds nothing wondrous in that numeral. “this roysterer is a seven for one shot.”
“and the better for us,” retorts james of the beads. “roysterer is to win.”
“but wouldn’t it be wiser to split this money and play part of it on roysterer for a place?”
“never!” declares james of the beads. “do you suppose i don’t know what i’m about? i’m worth a million for each year of my life, and i made every stiver of it by the very method i take to discover this horse. can’t you see that i’m not guessing?—that i have reason for what i do? roysterer for a place! never! get down every splinter that roysterer finishes first.”
“let me ask one question,” observes the cautious rand. “do you know the horse?”
“never heard of the animal in my life!” remarks james of the beads, pouring himself a complacent glass. this he tastes approvingly. “you must pardon me, my friends, i’ve got to write a note or two. i’ve not too much time for a man with twenty things to do, and who must be in the street when business opens to-morrow. take my word for it; get all you can on roysterer. if we win, we’re partners; if we lose, i’m alone.”
rand shakes sage, experienced head, while his face gathers a cynical look.
reed and rand take james of the beads by the hand and then withdraw.
“what do you make of it?” asks rand.
“the man’s infatuated!” replies reed.
“and yet, you also believe in systems,” remarks rand.
it is the next afternoon. the brighton course is rampant with the usual jostling, pushing, striving, guessing, knowing, wagering, winning, losing, ignorant, exulting, deploring, profane crowd. the conservative rand has so far obeyed the behest of james of the beads that he has fifteen thousand dollars on roysterer straight.
“to lose fifteen thousand won’t hurt him,” says rand, and so consoles himself for a mad speculation whereof he has no joy.
reed and rand, as taking life easily, are in a box; the race over which their interest clings and clambers is called.
the horses are at the post. roysterer does not act encouragingly; he is too sleepy—too lethargic! starlight, the favorite, steps about, alert and springy as a cat; it should be an easy race for her if looks go for aught.
they get the word; they are “off!” the field sweeps ’round the curve. a tall man in a nearby box follows the race with a glass.
“at the quarter,” sings the tall man. “starlight first, blenheim second, roysterer third!” there is a pause. then the tall man: “at the half! starlight first, blenheim second, roysterer third!” rand turns to reed. “he must better that,” says rand, “or he’ll explode the superstition of our friend.” there is a wait of twenty-five seconds. again the tall, binoculared man: “three-quarter post! starlight first, blenheim second, roysterer third—and whipping!”
“it’s as good as over,” observes rand. “i wonder what james of the beads will say to his witch-chain when he hears the finish.”
“it’s surprising,” remarks reed peevishly, “that a man of his force and clear intelligence should own to such a weakness! all his life he’s followed this marvelous ‘three’ about; and having had vast success he attributes it to the ‘three,’ when he might as well and as wisely ascribe it to captain kidd or trinity church. to-day’s results may cure him; and that’s one comfort.”
there is a sharp click as the tall man in the nearby box shuts up his glasses.
“roysterer wins!” says the tall man.
“got down fifteen thousand. won one hundred and five thousand,” reads james of the beads from rand’s telegram sent from the track. james of the beads is in his offices; he has just finished a victorious day, at once heavy and tumultuous with the buying and the selling of full three hundred thousand shares of stocks. “they should have wagered the full one hundred thousand and let the odds look after themselves,” he says. then james of the beads begins to caress the gypsy chain. “you knew,” he murmurs; “of course, you knew!” there is a note of devotion in the tones. the bead-worship goes on for a silent moment. “only one hundred and five thousand!” ruminates james of the beads. “i suppose rand was afraid!”
“that is indeed a curious story,” observed the jolly doctor, when the red nosed gentleman, being done with james of the beads, was returning to his burgundy; “and did it really happen?”
“of a verity, did it,” returned the red nosed gentleman. “i was rand.”
conversation fluttered from one topic to another for a brief space, but dealt mainly with those divers superstitions that folk affect. when signs and omens were worn out, the jolly doctor turned upon the old cattleman as though to remind that ancient practitioner of cows how it would be now his right to uplift us with a reminiscence.
“no, i don’t need to be told it none,” said the old cattleman. “on the principle of freeze-out, it’s shore got down to me. seein’ how this yere snow reminds me a heap of christmas, i’ll onload on you-all how we’re aroused an’ brought to a realisin’ sense of that season of gifts once upon a time in wolfville.”
