Diary of a Drug Fiend

The Glitter on the Snow 87 air of a Worshipful Master calling the Lodge to order, “TI said to myself when I met you last night, ‘it’s better to be born lucky than rich, and there’s a man who was born lucky.’ ” It was perfectly true. I had never been able to do anything of my own abilities, and after all I had tumbled into a reasonably good fortune. ‘ You’ve got the touch, Pen,’ he said, with animation. “* Any time you're out of a job, I'll give you ten thousand a year as a mascot.” Lou and I were both intensely excited. We could hardly find the patience to listen to the details of our friend’s plan. The figures were convincing; but the effect was simply to dazzle us. We had never dreamed of wealth on this scale. I got the vision for the first time in my life of the power that wealth confers, and I realised equally for the first time how vast were my real ambitions. The man was right, too, clearly enough, about my being lucky. My luck in the war had been prodigious. Then there was this inheritance, and Lou on the top of that; and here I’d met old Feccles by a piece of absolute chance, and there was this brilliant investment. That was the word—he was careful to point out that it was not a speculation, strictly speaking—absolutely waiting for me. We were so overjoyed that we could hardly grasp the practical details. The amount required was four thousand nine hundred and fifty pounds. Of course, there was no difficulty in getting a trifle like that, but as I told Feccles, it would mean my selling out some beastly stock or something which might take two or three days. There was no time to lose; because the option would lapse if it weren’t taken up within the week, and it was now Wednesday. However, Feccles helped me to draft a wire to Wolfe to explain the urgency, and Feccles was to call on Saturday at nine o'clock with the papers. Meanwhile, of course, he wouldn’t let me down, but D.D.F. G