Gilded Needles (Valancourt 20th Century Classics) by Michael McDowell Read Free Book Online Page A

five?”
    “Five houses!” cried Marian. “Where have you been, Benjamin?”
    “Where did you spend the day, Benjamin?” asked his father quietly, noting with distaste the manner in which his son slouched against the papered wall.
    “Benjamin, I am sure we are all happy to hear, refused to become inebriated on the New Year. Instead,” Duncan went on carelessly, “he hid himself in a brownstone on Twenty-fourth Street—I saw him coming out of it—where he drank hardly at all. Is that not right, Benjamin?”
    Benjamin nodded, his features twisted and wry on his eggshaped head.
    “Whose house was that, Benjamin?” demanded his father. “At Twenty-fourth Street and Fifth Avenue. I visited the Hettingers early in the afternoon and their home is near there. Were you at the Hettingers’ all afternoon, Benjamin?” It was apparent that Edward Stallworth believed that his son might have been anywhere on earth but at the Hettingers’.
    “Benjamin spent the afternoon with the Morrisseys,” said Duncan Phair lightly.
    “I believe,” said Edward Stallworth, “that we are not acquainted with any Morrisseys. We have a servant by that name, but I think that the sixteen dollars a week that I pay her is insufficient for the purchase of a house on Twenty-fourth Street. Who are the Morrisseys, Benjamin, and what had you to do with them?”
    Benjamin stared into the hallway, hoping vainly that his sister would appear.
    “There is only one Morrissey, Edward,” said Judge Stallworth, “and I do not know his given name. He runs a gambling establishment. You may know the place by the yellow shades on the windows, and by the negro servants at the doorway, also in yellow, and by the number of well-to-do gentlemen who go in—and by the number of impoverished gentlemen who come out.”
    “I see,” said Edward Stallworth, and tugged at his whiskers. “Benjamin has made a professional acquaintanceship with this gentleman, I take it. It was not a social call, Benjamin?”
    Miserably, Benjamin shook his head no.
    “Let me ask you, Benjamin,” said his father coldly, “did you leave Mr. Morrissey any token of your fraternal esteem? Such as a bank draught, or a promise of payment?”
    Beyond misery now, Benjamin nodded his head yes.
    Edward Stallworth stalked past his son into the parlor, and sat in a chair that faced the front shuttered windows.
    “You’re an imbecile, Benjamin,” said his aunt. “How much money did you lose?”
    “Eight hundred and fifty-six dollars,” said Benjamin in a low shaking voice.
    “Had you so much money at the beginning of the New Year?” asked his grandfather with feigned surprise.
    “I owe most of it,” Benjamin mumbled.
    “You’ll never go back, I hope,” said Marian.
    “He can’t go back,” said Duncan Phair easily. It was impossible to tell that his mouth moved at all behind his thick beard. “He won’t be allowed in by the negro gentlemen in the yellow coats. He played and lost what he had, and continued to play—”
    “I thought I might recover—” began Benjamin.
    “—but Benjamin did not recover,” said Duncan Phair, “and hadn’t the money to make up his further losses. It’s too fashionable an establishment to take his watch and his coat and his three little diamond studs, so it took his I.O.U. and simply wrote his name off its lists. It reflects on the family in the first place that he would be found in such a house, but it is a disaster that he should be turned out of it.”
    “How much of the loss was not paid, Benjamin?” said his grandfather in a light, almost conversational tone.
    “About seven hun—”
    “Six hundred and eighty-three dollars had to be paid. Of course I went back with him immediately, and left a draught with the banker there. It was accepted without question, and they did not need to be asked by me to have the doors barred against him in the future.”
    “There is no way to win money at such places,” said Marian. “I can’t believe