Without, a midwinter twilight, where wandering snowflakes eddied in the
bitter wind between a leaden sky and frost-bound earth.
Within, a garret; gloomy, bare, and cold as the bleak night coming down.
* * * * *
A haggard youth knelt before a little furnace, kindling a fire, with an
expression of quiet desperation on his face, which made the simple
operation strange and solemn.
A pile of manuscript lay beside him, and in the hollow eyes that watched
the white leaves burn was a tragic shadow, terrible to see,—for he was
offering the first-born of heart and brain as sacrifice to a hard fate.
Slowly the charcoal caught and kindled, while a light smoke filled the
room. Slowly the youth staggered up, and, gathering the torn sheets,
thrust them into his bosom, muttering bitterly, “Of all my hopes and
dreams, my weary work and patient waiting, nothing is left but this.
Poor little book, we’ll go together, and leave no trace behind.”
Throwing himself into a chair, he laid his head down upon the table,
where no food had been for days, and, closing his eyes, waited in stern
silence for death to come and take him.
Nothing broke the stillness but the soft crackle of the fire, which
began to flicker with blue tongues of flame, and cast a lurid glow upon
the motionless figure with its hidden face. Deeper grew the wintry gloom
without, ruddier shone the fateful gleam within, and heavy breaths began
to heave the breast so tired of life.
Suddenly a step sounded on the stair, a hand knocked at the door, and
when no answer came, a voice cried, “Open!” in a commanding tone, which
won instant obedience, and dispelled the deathful trance fast benumbing
every sense.
“The devil!” ejaculated the same imperious voice, as the door swung
open, letting a cloud of noxious vapor rush out to greet the
new-comer,—a man standing tall and dark against the outer gloom.
“Who is it? Oh! come in!” gasped the youth, falling back faint and
dizzy, as the fresh air smote him in the face.
“I cannot, till you make it safe for me to enter. I beg pardon if I
interrupt your suicide; I came to help you live, but if you prefer the
other thing, say so, and I will take myself away again,” said the
stranger, pausing on the threshold, as his quick eye took in the meaning
of the scene before him.
“For God’s sake, stay!” and, rushing to the window, the youth broke it
with a blow, caught up the furnace, and set it out upon the snowy roof,
where it hissed and glowed like an evil thing, while he dragged forth
his one chair, and waited, trembling, for his unknown guest to enter.
“For my own sake, rather: I want excitement; and this looks as if I
might find it here,” muttered the man with a short laugh, as he watched
the boy, calmly curious, till a gust of fresh air swept through the
room, making him shiver with its sharp breath.
“Jasper Helwyze, at your service,” he added aloud, stepping in, and
accepting courteously the only hospitality his poor young host could
offer.
The dim light and shrouding cloak showed nothing but a pale, keen face,
with dark penetrating eyes, and a thin hand, holding a paper on which
the youth recognized the familiar words, “Felix Canaris.”
“My name! You came to help me? What good angel sent you, sir?” he
exclaimed, with a thrill of hope,—for in the voice, the eye, the hand
that held the card with such tenacious touch, he saw and felt the
influence of a stronger nature, and involuntarily believed in and clung
to it.
“Your bad angel, you might say, since it was the man who damned your
book and refused the aid you asked of him,” returned the stranger, in a
suave tone, which contrasted curiously with the vigor of his language.
“A mere chance led me there to-day, and my eye fell upon a letter lying
open before him. The peculiar hand attracted me, and Forsythe, being in
the midst of your farewell denunciation, read it out, and told your
story.”
“And you were laughing at my misery while I was making ready to end it?”
said the youth, with a scornful quiver of the sensitive lips that
uttered the reproach.
“We all laugh at such passionate folly when we have outlived it. You
will, a year hence; so bear no malice, but tell me briefly if you can
forget poetry, and be content with prose for a time. In plain words, can
you work instead of dream?”
“I can.”
“Good! then come to me for a month. I have been long from home, and my
library is neglected; I have much for you to do, and believe you are the
person I want, if Forsythe tells the truth. He says your father was a
Greek, your mother English, both dead, and you an accomplished,
ambitious young man who thinks himself a genius, and will not forgive
the world for doubting what he has failed to prove. Am I right?”
“Quite right. Add also that I am friendless, penniless, and hopeless at
nineteen.”
A brief, pathetic story, more eloquently told by the starvation written
on the pinched face, the squalor of the scanty garments, and the despair
in the desperate eye, than by the words uttered with almost defiant
bluntness.
The stranger read the little tragedy at a glance, and found the chief
actor to his taste; for despite his hard case he possessed beauty,
youth, and the high aspirations that die hard,—three gifts often
peculiarly attractive to those who have lost them all.
“Wait a month, and you may find that you have earned friends, money, and
the right to hope again. At nineteen, one should have courage to face
the world, and master it.”
“Show me how, and I _will_ have courage. A word of sympathy has already
made it possible to live!” and, seizing the hand that offered help,
Canaris kissed it with the impulsive grace and ardor of his father’s
race.
“When can you come to me?” briefly demanded Helwyze, gathering his cloak
about him as he rose, warned by the waning light.
“At once, to-night, if you will! I possess nothing in the world but the
poor clothes that were to have been my shroud, and the relics of the
book with which I kindled my last fire,” answered the youth, with eager
eyes, and an involuntary shiver as the bitter wind blew in from the
broken window.
“Come, then, else a mightier master than I may claim you before dawn,
for it will be an awful night. Put out your funeral pyre, Canaris, wrap
your shroud well about you, gather up your relics, and follow me. I can
at least give you a warmer welcome than I have received,” added Helwyze,
with that sardonic laugh of his, as he left the room.
Before he had groped his slow way down the long stairs the youth joined
him, and side by side they went out into the night.
A month later the same pair sat together in a room that was a dream of
luxury. A noble library, secluded, warm, and still; the reposeful
atmosphere that students love pervaded it; rare books lined its lofty
walls: poets and philosophers looked down upon their work with immortal
satisfaction on their marble countenances; and the two living occupants
well became their sumptuous surroundings.
Helwyze leaned in a great chair beside a table strewn with books which
curiously betrayed the bent of a strong mind made morbid by physical
suffering. Doré’s “Dante” spread its awful pages before him; the old
Greek tragedies were scattered about, and Goethe’s “Faust” was in his
hand. An unimpressive figure at first sight, this frail-looking man,
whose age it would be hard to tell; for pain plays strange pranks, and
sometimes preserves to manhood a youthful delicacy in return for the
vigor it destroys. But at a second glance the eye was arrested and
interest aroused, for an indefinable expression of power pervaded the
whole face, beardless, thin-lipped, sharply cut, and colorless as ivory.
A stray lock or two of dark hair streaked the high brow, and below shone
the controlling feature of this singular countenance, a pair of eyes,
intensely black, and so large they seemed to burden the thin face.
Violet shadows encircled them, telling of sleepless nights, days of
languor, and long years of suffering, borne with stern patience. But in
the eyes themselves all the vitality of the man’s indomitable spirit
seemed concentrated, intense and brilliant as a flame, which nothing
could quench. By turns melancholy, meditative, piercing, or
contemptuous, they varied in expression with startling rapidity, unless
mastered by an art stronger than nature; attracting or repelling with a
magnetism few wills could resist.
Propping his great forehead on his hand, he read, motionless as a
statue, till a restless movement made him glance up at his companion,
and fall to studying him with a silent scrutiny which in another would
have softened to admiration, for Canaris was scarcely less beautiful
than the Narcissus in the niche behind him.
An utter contrast to his patron, for youth lent its vigor to the
well-knit frame, every limb of which was so perfectly proportioned that
strength and grace were most harmoniously blended. Health glowed in the
rich coloring of the classically moulded face, and lurked in the
luxuriant locks which clustered in glossy rings from the low brow to the
white throat. Happiness shone in the large dreamy eyes and smiled on the
voluptuous lips; while an indescribable expression of fire and force
pervaded the whole, redeeming its beauty from effeminacy.
A gracious miracle had been wrought in that month, for the haggard youth
was changed into a wonderfully attractive young man, whose natural ease
and elegance fitted him to adorn that charming place, as well as to
enjoy the luxury his pleasure-loving senses craved.
The pen had fallen from his hand, and lying back in his chair with eyes
fixed on vacancy, he seemed dreaming dreams born of the unexpected
prosperity which grew more precious with each hour of its possession.
“Youth surely _is_ the beauty of the devil, and that boy might have come
straight from the witches’ kitchen and the magic draught,” thought
Helwyze, as he closed his book, adding to himself with a daring
expression, “Of all the visions haunting his ambitious brain not one is
so wild and wayward as the fancy which haunts mine. Why not play fate,
and finish what I have begun?”
A pause fell, more momentous than either dreamed; then it was abruptly
broken.
“Felix, the time is up.”
“It is, sir. Am I to go or stay?” and Canaris rose, looking
half-bewildered as his brilliant castles in the air dissolved like mist
before a sudden gust.
“Stay, if you will; but it is a quiet life for such as you, and I am a
dull companion. Could you bear it for a year?”
“For twenty! Sir, you have been most kind and generous, and this month
has seemed like heaven, after the bitter want you took me from. Let me
show gratitude by faithful service, if I can,” exclaimed the young man,
coming to stand before his master, as he chose to call his benefactor,
for favors were no burden yet.
“No thanks, I do it for my own pleasure. It is not every one who can
have antique beauty in flesh and blood as well as marble; I have a fancy
to keep my handsome secretary as the one ornament my library lacked
before.”
Canaris reddened like a girl, and gave a disdainful shrug; but vanity
was tickled, nevertheless, and he betrayed it by the sidelong glance he
stole towards the polished doors of glass reflecting his figure like a
mirror.
“Nay, never frown and blush, man; ‘beauty is its own excuse for being,’
and you may thank the gods for yours, since but for that I should send
you away to fight your dragons single-handed,” said Helwyze, with a
covert smile, adding, as he leaned forward to read the face which could
wear no mask for him, “Come, you shall give me a year of your liberty,
and I will help you to prove Forsythe a liar.”
“You will bring out my book?” cried Canaris, clasping his hands as a
flash of joy irradiated every lineament.
“Why not? and satisfy the hunger that torments you, though you try to
hide it. I cannot promise success, but I _can_ promise a fair trial; and
if you stand the test, fame and fortune will come together. Love and
happiness you can seek for at your own good pleasure.”
“You have divined my longing. I do hunger and thirst for fame; I dream
of it by night, I sigh for it by day; every thought and aspiration
centres in that desire; and if I did not still cling to that hope, even
the perfect home you offer me would seem a prison. I _must_ have it; the
success men covet and admire, suffer and strive for, and die content if
they win it only for a little time. Give me this and I am yours, body
and soul; I have nothing else to offer.”
Canaris spoke with passionate energy, and flung out his hand as if he
cast himself at the other’s feet, a thing of little worth compared to
the tempting prize for which he lusted.
Helwyze took the hand in a light, cold clasp, that tightened slowly as
he answered with the look of one before whose will all obstacles go
down,—
“Done! Now show me the book, and let us see if we cannot win this time.”
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