"HIS UNLUCKY STAR."

New Zealand Illustrated Magazine, Volume 1, Issue 10, 1 July 1900, Page 48

"HIS UNLUCKY STAR."

By C. A. "Wilkins

Illustrated by U. B. Vaughan,

1000, Hereford-street, Christchurch, December 12th, 1899. Mr. Reginald Temple, Dear Sib, — We regret to inform you that, owing to impending changes in the office arrangements, we shall not require your services after thiß day fortnight. Trusting to hear of your speedily obtaining another appointment. — We remain, faithfully yours, Pepper & Salt. This letter was handed to Reginald Temple, together with his week's salary, one Saturday at 1 p.m. hy the cashier of the firm, John Dixon, who. knowing- the contents of the communication, had considerately waited until the other fellows had gone before giving poor Reginald his "walkingticket.' The latter opened the envelope and read the contents as he stood at the counter. " I'm awfully sorry, old man," said Dixon, when Reginald had finished reading. " I only g«>t to hear of what was in the wind an hour atro. What will you do?" Temple bit his lip moodily. " Don't know, old chap. Can't get my thinking-apparatus to work for the moment. This is what Dick Swiveller would call ' an unmitigated staggerer.' Of course there are no impending changes. Have you heard of any ?" Dixon was sileut. He knew as well as the other that the firm had employed a polite fiction to get rid of .Reginald. " No ; of course you haven't. It's only another specimen of my infernal hick. I'm beginning to feel about full up of everything. If I were only fit I'd go to Africa and help fight the Boers. There's going to be trouble with the beggars, you mark my words. But I'm not fit. I'm all run

down. I'm one of life's failures. One of the ' not wanteds.' " "Don't talk rot, Eeggie," said Dixon, who was the despondent man's only intimate friend in Christchurch." You are naturallyknocked all of a heap by old Pepper's letter. Wait for me while I finish up, and come and have some lunch. You'll feel better afterwards, take my word. Then we'll have a smoke and talk things over a bit. As good fish in the sea, old chap, as ever came out of it. Why, I only wish I had your expectations." " I suppose you refer to my Uncle Gregory ?" "Of course I do ! Isn't he a kind of Crcesus, rolling in riches. Isn't he sixty, and aren't you his heir ? Why, you'll be able to buy up Pepper and Salt, lock, stock and barrrel one of these days. Never say die, man !" '• My dear Dixon it's all jolly fine for you to talk ! But a chap can't live on his expectations ! As for Uncle Gregory, his is what insurance men call a better life than mine, by long odds. Although he's sixty he has the health of a ploughman, and is as likely to see a hundred as any man I know. I'm sure I hope he may, although he hates me. Your successful self-made man has precious little sympathy with an unfortunate chap like myself. And its quite on the cards that he'll alter his will before he pegs out and leaves his money to found a home for lost dogs, or something of the sort. It would be just like him." At this juncture old Pepper, upstairs in his room, getting through arrears of corres. pondence, rang his call-bell sharply, and with an "excuse me half a moment, old man," Dixon bounded away to obey the summons. When he returned Reginald Temple had gone.

A fortnight later the discharged clerk walked out of Pepper and Salt's for the last time, his last week's salary in his pocket. Eefusing another invitation of Dixon's he wandered moodily back to Ms lodgings in Grloueester-street, Linwood. During his fortnight's " notice " he had answered several advertisements. But all in vain. Today he was feeling terribly "hipped,'' regularly down upon his luck. The feeling was a painfully familiar one. This young fellow (he was but thirty) was one of those people that astrologers declare are " born under an unlucky star. 1 ' His whole life, as he had told Dixon, had proved a failure. Left an orphan at ten years of age he had been adopted by his rich Uncle Gregory and his wife, his only living relations. What they did for him was prompted solely by a feeling of duty. They never took to him or he to them. At five-and-twenty he had been packed off to New Zealand, and landed at Lyttelton with a meagre outfit ami a ten pound note. Gregory Temple, the retired contractor, in presenting him with the latter, had not failed to remind him (for the thousandth time) that he (Gregory) had started life with half-a-crown, and found it amply sufficient as the nucleus of his handsome fortune. Reginald, who hated his dependent position, was glad enough to leave England, where he had had far from a happy time. He was anxious to see whether a change of climate would bring a change of luck. It did not. The young fellow was steady enough. He was certainly no fool. He was not bad looking ; his manners were pleasant and those of a gentleman, but he was unlucky. Before his ten pound was all spent he had secured a good berth in a Christchurch shipping-house. A few weeks later a severe attack of rheumatic fever laid him low — and severed his connection with the firm. Eecovering he securod, with great trouble, a billet as traveller for a wholesale house — which went through the court shortly afterwards. Every step he made seemed to lead to disaster, just as had been the case ere he had quitted England. When, after a long series of ups and downs — the downs

very much preponderating — ho secured a post with Pepper and Salt (threo months before this story opens) he hoped he was all right at last. With Salt, the junior partner, he got on well enough. But when crusty old Pepper retuniod from England he seemed to take a dislike to the now clerk at once. His early dismissal followed, as we have seen. It was, as ho had said, "just his infernal luck, that was all."

Reginald's first cave on reaching his lodgings on the day ho loft his billet was to

settle with his landlady, Mrs Nipper, for his week's board. Then- ho paid one 01 1 two other trifling debts, and found his totaj available capital reduced to the sum of fivo shillings. He went to bed early that Satur. day night, and tried to find fort etf Ulricas in sleep. But in vain. Throughout the long night the young fellow lay thinking. The outlook was far from cheering. Ho had never thoroughly recovered from the attack of rheumatic fever. His doctor, with the irony for which his profession is celebrated,

recommended a generous diet and a long sea voyage. He might as well have prescribed a trip to the moon to the unfortunate man who was called upon to face the world afresh with a couple of half-crowns in his pocket. Towards morning an idea came to him— and not for the first time. He smiled as the familiar thought returned, and rolling over on his side fell into an uneasy slumber, which lasted till it was time to get up and face another day.

After eating an apology for a breakfast that fateful Sunday morning, Reginald Temple went out and sauntered aimlessly, pipe in mouth, into Hagley Park. Here he sought the quietest spot he could find, and threw himself upon the grass beneath the pleasant shade of a spreading tree. For two hours he lay there striving to find a way out. And he could see none. Bitter experience had warned him to avoid borrowing money, and he had, months before, registered a solemn vow that he would never run seriously into debt again. Therefore he could not borrow, and he would have been at a loss to know to whom to apply for a loan even, had he felt himself free to do so. His few acquaintances, including Dixon (a- married man), were pretty nearly as needy as himself. He thought of his uncle Gregory rolling in money, as Dixon had said, and amused himself in speculating on the result of despatching a cable to that gentleman — supposing he had the wherewithal to pay for it. He smiled a little bitterly as he thought of Gregory Temple's virtuous indignation on receipt of his wire. "He wouldn't advance another copper if he knew I was dying," said Reginald to himself. So, ;as billets do not grow on gooseberry-bushes, and he had no money to pay his way till he got one, and as he was physically unfit for manual labour there seemed to the brokenspirited man absolutely no way outsave one. And as he thought again of that way he smiled once more. "So be it," he said rising, and consulting his cheap metal watch. " And, in the meantime— lunch. I will eat, drink, and be merry, though to-

morrow ." He didn't finish the sentence, hut set off at a hrisk walk in the direction of Warner's, where he treated himself to a half-crown lunch, and a decent cigar after it. Then he strolled out into Cathedral Square. A Sunnier tram was on the point of leaving. He scrambled on top of one of the cars, and after paying for his ticket had just one solitary shilling left. He sawDixon near the Cave Rock, walking on the sands with his wife and children — and envied them. But he carefully avoided meeting them. He had no desire for any company but his own. Apparently he had much to think of. Early in the evening he returned to town. When the tram was passing the City Hotel — and owing to being a little behind time, it was travelling very fast — Eeginald Temple did a strange thing for a man of his cautious habits. He descended, and without waiting for the cars to reach the terminus, swung himself off the platform. Then there was a sudden shout, a bump, a jolt, the tram stopped. A great crowd gathered — and all that was mortal of Reginald Temple was lifted on a shutter and conveyed to the hospital. The housesurgeon said death must have been instantaneous. The coroner's jury returned a verdict of " Accidental death." Tears were in honest John Dixon's eyes as he read the report of the inquest. He had been standing on the next platform of the crowded tram when Reginald swung himself off, and he alone had noticed what he was thankful to be spared from telling to the jury. * # # * The morning following Reginald's death a cablegram arrived at Pepper and Salt's for him. Dixon ventured to open it. It briefly announced that G-eoffrey Temple (who had been for some months a widower) was dead. Apoplexy. The family solicitors desired Reginald to come Home at once and enter upon his inheritance. And they directed him to draw on the Bank of New Zealand, at Christchurch, for whatever money he might require.