The Colossus

The Colossus

The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Colossus, by Opie Read This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: The Colossus A Novel
Author: Opie Read
Release Date: February 15, 2005 [EBook #15073]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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THE COLOSSUS
A NOVEL BY OPIE READ
Author of "The Carpetbagger," "Old Ebenezer," "The Jucklins," "My Young Master," "On The Suwanee River," "A Kentucky Colonel," "Emmett Bonlore," "A Tennessee Judge," "The Wives of the Prophet," "Len Gansett," "The Tear in the Cup and Other Stories".
CHICAGO LAIRD & LEE, PUBLISHERS 1893.
[Illustration]
CONTENTS.
Chapter.
I. LOOKING BACK AT EARLY LIFE II. A SLEEPY VILLAGE AND A FUSSY OLD MAN III. ALL WAS DARKNESS IV. A STRANGE REQUEST V. DISSECTING A MOTIVE VI. WAITING AT THE STATION VII. A MOTHER'S AFFECTION VIII. THE DOMAIN OF A GREAT MERCHANT IX. THE INTERVIEWERS X. ROMPED WITH THE GIRL XI. ACKNOWLEDGED BY SOCIETY XII. A DEMOCRACY XIII. BUTTING AGAINST A WALL XIV. A DIFFERENT HANDWRITING XV. TOLD HIM HER STORY XVI. AN AROUSER OF THE SLEEPY XVII. AN OLD MAN WOULD INVEST XVIII. THE INVESTMENT XIX. ARRESTED EVERYWHERE XX. CRIED A SENSATION XXI. A HELPLESS OLD WOMAN XXII. TO GO ON A VISIT XXIII. HENRY'S INCONSISTENCY XXIV. WORE A ROSE ON HIS COAT XXV. IMPATIENTLY WAITING XXVI. TOLD IT ALL XXVII. POINTS OUT HER BROTHER'S DUTY XXVIII. THE VERDICT XXIX. A DAY OF REST XXX. A MOTHER'S REQUEST XXXI. A MOMENT OF ARROGANCE XXXII. A MOST PECULIAR FELLOW XXXIII. THE TIME WAS DRAWING NEAR XXXIV. TOLD HIM A STORY XXXV. CONCLUSION

CHAPTER I
.
LOOKING BACK AT EARLY LIFE.
When the slow years of youth were gone and the hastening time of manhood had come, the first thing that Henry DeGolyer, looking back, could call from a mysterious darkness into the dawn of memory was that he awoke one night in the cold arms of his dead mother. That was in New Orleans. The boy's father had aspired to put the face of man upon lasting canvas, but appetite invited whisky to mix with his art, and so upon dead walls he painted the trade-mark bull, and in front of museums he exaggerated the distortion of the human freak.
After the death of his mother, the boy was taken to the Foundlings' Home, where he was scolded by women and occasionally knocked down by a vagabond older than himself. Here he remembered to have seen his father but once. It was a Sunday when he came, years after the gentle creature, holding her child in her arms, had died at midnight. The painter laughed and cried and begged an old woman for a drink of brandy. He went away, and after an age had seemed to pass the matron of the place took the boy on her lap and told him that his father was dead, and then, putting him down, she added: "Run along, now, and be good."
The boy was taken by an old Italian woman. In after years he could not determine the length of time that he had lived in her wretched home, but with vivid brightness dwelled in his memory the morning when he ran away and found a free if not an easy life in the newsboys' lodging-house. He sold newspapers, he went to a night school, and as he grew older he picked up "river items" for an afternoon newspaper. His hope was that he might become a "professional journalist," as certain young men termed themselves; and study, which in an ill-lighted room, tuned to drowsiness by the buzzing of youthful mumblers, might have been a chafing task to one who felt not the rowel of a spurring ambition, was to him a pleasure full of thrilling promises. To him the reporter stood at the high-water mark of ambition's "freshet." But when years had passed and he had scrambled to that place he looked down and saw that his height was not a dizzy one. And instead of viewing a conquered province, he saw, falling from above, the shadows of trials yet to be endured. He worked faithfully, and at one time held the place of city editor, but a change in the management of the paper not only reduced him to the ranks, but, as the saying went, set him on the sidewalk. Then he wrote "specials." His work was bright, original and strong, and was reproduced throughout the country, but as it was not signed, the paper alone received the credit. Year after year he lived in this unsettled way--reading in the public library, musing at his