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The Secrets of the Great City by Edward Winslow Martin
page 59 of 524 (11%)
and after the marriage handed the Baron bills of exchange on Paris and
Vienna for the five hundred thousand. Herr Von Storck, on his part,
formally delivered to his father-in-law a deed, drawn up in German,
(and which bore a wonderful likeness to the letter of recall he had
shown Mrs. Swigg,) in which he said he settled a handsome estate near
Vienna upon his bride. He apologized for not making her the usual
present of diamonds, by saying that his family jewels were more
magnificent than any thing that could be found in New York, and that he
was afraid to risk their being sent across the ocean. They awaited his
bride in his ancestral home. The parents expressed their entire
satisfaction, and begged that he would not mention "such trifles."

The "young couple" were to sail on the second day after their marriage;
and, at the appointed time, the new baroness awaited her husband, with
packed trunks. He had gone out early in the morning to wind up his
business at the Austrian Consulate. The steamer was to sail at noon,
and as the hour drew near, and the Baron did not appear, the fears of
Papa Swigg began to be aroused. Two, three, four o'clock, and yet no
Baron Von Storck. Terror and dread reigned in the hearts of the Swigg
family.

Towards five o'clock, a policeman, accompanied by a coarse-looking
German woman, arrived at the mansion. He informed Mr. Swigg that he had
orders to arrest Conrad Kreutzer, alias the Baron Von Storck. The
_denouement_ had come at last. The policeman informed the old gentleman
that the supposed Baron was simply a German barber, who had been
released from the penitentiary but a short time, where he had served a
term for bigamy, and that the woman who accompanied him was Kreutzer's
lawful wife.

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