Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 4 February 1886 — VALENTINE WAGSTAFFS DOWNFALL. [ARTICLE]

VALENTINE WAGSTAFFS DOWNFALL.

The Sad History of the Young Han Who Gazed Not Wisely But Too Long in the Pawnbroker’s Window. It was hanging .in, the window of a pawnbroker’s sales store, attached to a card which read Tlfis fine, 18-karat, gold, hunting case chronnometer balance, full jewelled, stem winding, patent lever, Puffengruntz of Geneva maker, warranted fur ten years, price only $lO. What diabolical influence directed Valentine Wagstaff’s attention to this object he could not, for the life of him, explain. He had never dreamed of owning a watch before. It was the first time in his existence that he had even looked at a pawnshop. But here he stood, gloating upon the glittering bauble and feeling his month’s salary in his pocket, and as he gloated it seemed to him that a human instinct began to animate and give expression to the object of his scrutiny. The hurrying little second hand whirled around with a dazzling activity which quite bewildered him, and the big minute hand appeared to beckon him. It beckoned him to his doom. Before he knew it he had the watch in his pocket and was $lO short of his salary. And from the moment he set foot upon the street again he was an altered man. He timed himself every five minutes on his way home, and compared notes with every clock he passed; he looked at the hour seven times during his dinner, and pulled his chronometer balance out so often during the Rev. Howler’s lecture that a young gentleman in the next row audibly expressed his fear that he would wear the case out before he got to bed. But sarcasm fell as lightly from the plumage of Mr. Wagstaff’s new fledged vanity as rain drops from a duck’s wing. Nor was pride the only curse his purchase had already imposed on him. It had perverted his moral instincts to that extent that he assured Miss Crook, as lie worked the stemwinding apparatus for the fourth time in two hours, that the watch was an heirloom which had been among his family jewels a century or so. At the mention of family jewels Miss Crook’s eye lighted up, and it was noticeable that her treatment of Mr. Wagstaff M as characterized by more than usual fervor till they parted at her door. For the the first time in their acquaintance Mr. Wagstaff dared squeeze her hand that night, after which he drank two glasses of soda, M r ound the Avatch up again, and -went to bed as placidly as if he had never told a lie in his'life. The descent of the wretched youth from this time forth ivas steady and swift. Within a week lie drew upon his bank account for a chain to completed his horological equipment. The chain made Iris clothes look so shabby that he set aside his rule of two suits a year, and patronized a tailor three months ahead of time. Then a friend who had got hold of a pin at ja, bargain and M’antecl to realize sold it to him dirt cheap. A week later he bought a $22 solitaire at a Grand street secondhand shop. In brief, by the Fourth of July Valentine Wagstaff was the owner of a watch, chain, Brazilian crystal pin, Parisian diamond, studs* and cuff buttons, a solitaire and a.cane with a gilt knob, his bank account had been reduced to seven cents, and Miss Crook had renounced him as entirely too worldly and carnal in his tastes to do oredit to herself IDE' the tabentaole. Valentine Wagstaff accepted, his renunciation with the abandon of confirmed depravity, and the same night took the young woman who attended the lunch counter at the Gowanns Dairy to hear “The Mascot, ” and wound up with oysters and lager beer and a kiss on the doorstep.— To-Day.