The Destroyer

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Although engaged to Helen, Dick falls a victim to the wiles of Cherie, a dancer. Helen desperately strives to break the woman's influence. For a while her efforts are successful. Then she and Dick visit a fashionable restaurant. There they meet Cherie. The woman monopolizes Dick and Helen goes home alone. To make sure of her hold upon Dick, Cherie flatters the boy and gives aim a sum of money to invest for her. Dick loses this money in an unfortunate speculation. His father learns of Dick s intimacy with Cherie and orders him to have nothing further to do with the woman. When Dick calls upon Cherie, he finds that his father has already spoken to her. In a bad humor. Cherie demands her money. Promising to return it the boy returns to his father's office and steals money from the safe. Later, when Wentworth learns what Dick has done, he disowns him. Dick hastens to Cherie to seek consolation. He finds Macklyn, a rival for her favor, present. When the woman hears Dick has been disinherited, she scornfully orders him to leave her apartment. With this evidence of the woman's character. Dick vows never to see her again. He eventually tries to get back into Helen's graces, but the girl's love for him has died. Dick drifts lower down life's ladder. Months later, Cherie and Macklyn alight in front of a fashionable jeweler's. A beggar accosts them just as they leave their automobile and whines a request for money. Macklyn scornfully drops a coin into the man's hand. Cherie, however, recognizes the wretch. She contemptuously draws away from him. It is Dick.