He had
done this at a time when it seemed doubtful whether even his adroitness
could make the scheme a success; and it somewhat mars the lustre of his
generosity to record that he afterward regretted his impulsive open-
handedness. He had been able to prevent Mrs. Sampson from realizing on
her stock, very reasonably feeling that he was making philanthropic
endeavors to benefit an ungrateful world rather against its will, and
he did not mean that she should make a stumbling-block for him of his
own generosity by putting this gift on the market when he wished to
supply all buyers himself.
When it was quoted at three, the high-water mark so far, he had
beguiled the widow with a cock-and-bull story about the formalities of
transferrence on the books of the company of stocks which had been
given away; and by the time Mrs. Sampson had cleared her mind from the
entanglements of this ingenious fiction the bottom had dropped out of
the market.
In the midst of her disappointment in seeing what to her would have
been almost a fortune melting into thin air, the fertile brain of Mrs.
Sampson had given birth to what was nothing less than an inspiration,
She had gone to see Alfred Irons, and delicately but firmly insinuated
that it was high time she received substantial tokens of the gratitude
of the Wachusett Syndicate, for her efforts in their behalf with the
Hon.
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