The Duplicity of Hargraves The Duplicity of Hargraves "The Duplicity of Hargraves" is a short story by the American writer William Sydney Porter, better known by his pen name: O. Henry. The story was featured in "The Junior Munsey", February 1902, and republished in the volume "Sixes and Sevens" (1911). Sixty-eight-year-old Major Pendleton Talbot and his practical spinster daughter Lydia move to Washington D.C. The Talbots have fallen from their aristocratic past in the South before the American Civil War and are now quite poor. The pair stay at a boarding house in the nation's capital. There they become acquainted with Henry Hopkins Hargraves,
William T. Porter literature, especially the "tall tale" form of humor. Porter encouraged Southwestern authors to write and publish their short stories in the "Spirit", and was involved in getting their works published in book form. He was the editor for two of these collections: "The Big Bear of Arkansas", published in 1846, and "A Quarter Race in Kentucky and Other Sketches", published in 1847. Porter was instrumental in encouraging the career of Johnson Hooper. Another writer who contributed to the "Spirit" was Henry William Herbert, who wrote under the pen name "Frank Forester". The Panic of 1837 hurt the "Spirit's" circulation, but