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Bennett, Arnold, 1867-1931

"The Card, a Story of Adventure in the Five Towns"

Why, if forty _Hjalmars_ had been wrecked,
and their forty crews saved by forty different lifeboats, and Denry had
bought all the lifeboats, he could have filled them all!
Still, the regularity of his receipts was extremely satisfactory and
comforting. The thing had somehow the air of being a miracle; at any
rate of being connected with magic. It seemed to him that nothing could
have stopped the visitors to Llandudno from fighting for places in his
lifeboat and paying handsomely for the privilege. They had begun the
practice, and they looked as if they meant to go on with the practice
eternally. He thought that the monotony of it would strike them
unfavourably. But no! He thought that they would revolt against doing
what every one had done. But no! Hundreds of persons arrived fresh from
the railway station every day, and they all appeared to be drawn to that
lifeboat as to a magnet. They all seemed to know instantly and
instinctively that to be correct in Llandudno they must make at least
one trip in Denry's lifeboat.
He was pocketing an income which far exceeded his most golden visions.
And therefore naturally his first idea was to make that income larger
and larger still.


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