ly awed and deeply
impressed by the solemnity with which he conducted the brief services;
while, despite her prejudice, his grave courtesy toward her, and the
subdued tenderness that marked his treatment of his sister, commanded
her involuntary respect. When she stood before the mirror in her own
room, unbraiding her heavy hair, a dissatisfied expression robbed her
features of half their loveliness, and discontent ploughed distorting
lines about the scarlet lips which muttered,--

"I wonder if, in one of his evil fits, my father sold and signed me
away to Satan? I certainly am _bon gre mal gre_ in bondage to him;
for, from my inmost heart I hate 'good, pious, sanctified souls,' such
as that marble man upstairs, who has come back to usurp my kingdom,
and lord it over this heritage. After to-day a new regime. The
potter's hands are fair and shapely, courteous and deft, but potter's
hands nevertheless. Tough kneading he shall find it, and stiffer clay
than ever yet was moulded, or my name is not Salome Owen. After all,
how much better are we than the lower beasts of prey? In the race for
riches there is but one alternative,--to devour, or be devoured;
consequently that was an immemorial and well tested rule in the
warfare that commenced when Adam and Eve found themselves shut out of
Eden. 'Each for himself,' etc., etc., etc. Since I must _ex
necessitate_ prey or be preyed upon, I shall waste no time in
deliberation."

CHAPTER II.

When fifty-two years old, Daniel Grey amassed a handsome fortune
by speculating in certain gold and coal mine stocks, which not
only relieved him from the necessity of daily toil in his dusty
counting-room, but elevated him to that more than Braminical caste,
dubbed in Mammon-parlance--capitalists; whose decrees outweigh
legislative statutes, and by feeling the pulse of stock-boards and
all financial corporations, regulate the fiscal currents of the
State. A few months subsequent to this sudden accession of wealth,
his meek and devoted wife--who had patiently shared all the trials
and hardships of his early impecunious career, and brightened an
humble home which boasted no treasure comparable to her loving,
unselfish heart,--was summoned to the enjoyment of a heritage beyond
the stars; and Daniel Grey, capitalist, found himself a florid
handsome widower, with two children, Enoch and Jane, to remind him
continually of the pale wife over whose quiet ashes rose a costly
mausoleum, where