MR. SIMNEL AT THE DEN.
Two days after the events recorded in the last chapter, Mr. Simnel
left the Tin-Tax Office a couple of hours earlier than his usual time
of departure, and taking a cab, hurried off to his apartments in
Piccadilly. Overlooking the Green Park, sufficiently lofty to be
removed from the immediate noise of the traffic, and situate in that
part of the street which was macadamised, there were, perhaps, no more
delightful chambers in town than those occupied by the Tin-Tax
secretary. They consisted but of three rooms--sitting-room,
bed-chamber, and bath-room; but all were lofty and well-proportioned,
and were furnished in a thoroughly luxurious manner. A big bookcase,
with its contents admirably selected, covered one side of the
sitting-room, on the walls of which hung Raphael Morghen prints, and
before-letter proofs after Landseer, Leslie, and Stanfield; a round
table, over which were suspended three swinging moderator-lamps, with
white-china shades and crimson-silk fringe; a sofa and numerous
easy-chairs, all in crimson velvet and walnut-wood; rich spoils of
Bohemian glass, standing in odd corners on quaint oak cabinets; two
Sèvres china dogs, in begging attitude, mounting guard on either end
of the mantelshelf; and a flying female figure suspended across the
looking-glass;--such were among the incongruous contents of the room.
On the table, two yellow-paper covered French novels, a Horace,
and M'Culloch's Commercial Directory lay side by side; in the
looking-glass, cards for evening-parties and dinners were jostled by
tickets soliciting vote and interest in approaching elections of
charitable societies, remindings of gatherings of learned bodies, and
small bills for books or boots. It was Mr. Simnel's pleasure to keep
up this _mélange_; his time was generally fully occupied; he chose
people to consider that he had not a moment to himself; he wished
those who called on him on business to see the invitations, in order
that they might judge therefrom of his position in society; and he
took care that the attention of those idle droppers-in, who came on a
Sunday morning, for instance, or late at night, to have a chat, should
be directed to the business-cards, to give them a notion of his
standing in the money-making, business world. Since Mr. Simnel assumed
the reins at the Tin-Tax Office, two or three hundred men had sat with
their legs under that round table, discussing an excellent dinner, and
meeting pleasant people; but not one of them had ever left the room
without Mr. Simnel's feeling that his coming had been productive of
benefit to his host, and that the invitation had fully answered its
intent. Baron Oppenhardt, the great financier, never could tell what
made him accept Simnel's invitation, save that he knew his host was
connected with Government and had a long head of his own; yet he never
refused. And little Blurt, whose "connexion with the press" was of a
limited nature, never could understand why, biennially, he sat under
those shaded moderator-lamps in Piccadilly, and consumed Pommery Greno
out of bell-shaped glasses. But Simnel knew why he had them to dinner,
and took their value out of both Oppenhardt and Blurt.
A long-headed man, Mr. Simnel, and, to judge from the strange smile on
his face on that particular day, full of some special scheme, as he
emerged from his bedroom and looked out into Piccadilly. Any thing but
a vain man, and long past the age when the decoration of one's person
enters largely into account, Mr. Simnel had yet paid special attention
to his toilette during the short interval which had elapsed since his
arrival at home from the Tin-Tax Office. He was got up with elaborate
care and yet perfect simplicity; indeed, there was a touch of the old
school in his drab riding-trousers, white waistcoat, blue cut-away
coat, and blue bird's-eye neckerchief, with small stand-up collars. A
glance into the street showed him that his horses were ready, and he
descended at once. At the door he found his groom mounted on a
knowing-looking gray cob, short, stiff, and sturdy, and leading a
splendid thoroughbred bright bay with black points. This Mr. Simnel
mounted and rode easily away.
Through Decimus Burton's archway he turned into Hyde Park and made at
once for the Row. There were but few men lounging about there at that
time of the year, but Simnel was known to some of them; and after nods
had been exchanged, they fell to comparing notes about him and his
horse and his style of living, wondering how it was done, admiring his
cleverness, detracting from his position--talking, in fact, as men
will do of another who has beat them in this grand struggle for place
which we call life. The Row was very empty, and Simnel paid but little
attention to its occupants: now and then he occasionally raised his
whip mechanically in acknowledgment of some passing salute, but it is
to be doubted whether he knew to whom he was telegraphing, as his
thoughts were entirely fixed on his mission. However, he wore a
pleasant smile on his face, and that was quite enough: grinning, like
charity, covers a multitude of sins; and if you only smile and hold
your tongue, you can pass through life with an _éclat_ which excellent
eloquence, combined with a serious face, would fail to give. So Mr.
Simnel went smiling along at the easiest amble until he got clear of
the Row and the town, and then he gave the bay his head, and never
drew rein until he turned up a country lane immediately on passing
Ealing Common.
Half way up this lane stood The Den, and evidences of Kate Mellon's
calling began to abound so soon as you turned out of the high-road. In
the fields on either side through the bare hedges one could see a
string of horses in cloths and head-pieces, each ridden by a groom,
skirting the hedges along which a proper riding-path had been made;
occasionally a yellow break, driven by a veteran coachman, with a
younger and more active coadjutor perched up behind, and standing with
his eyes on a level with the coach-box observing every motion of the
horses, would rumble by, while the clay-coloured gig containing Mr.
Sandcrack the veterinary surgeon, who, in his long white cravat,
beard, and tight trousers, looked a pleasant compound of a
dissenting-minister, a horse-jockey, and an analytical chemist, was
flying in and out of the lane at all times and seasons. Mr. Simnel
seemed accustomed to these scenes and thoroughly well known amongst
them, the grooms and breaksmen touched their hats to him, and he
exchanged salutations with Mr. Sandcrack, and told him that the bay
had got rid of all his wind-galls and never went better in his life.
So straight up the lane until he arrived at the lodge, and then,
before his groom could ride up, his cheery cry of "Gate!" brought out
the buxom lodge-keeper, and she also greeted Mr. Simnel with a curtsey
of recognition, and received his largesse as he rode through; so down
the little carriage-drive, past the pigeon-house elevated on a pole,
and the pointers' kennels, and the strip of garden cultivated by the
lodge-keeper, and in which one of the lodge-keeper's dirty chubby
children was always sprawling; past the inner gates, through which
could be caught glimpses of the circular straw-ride, and the stable
and loose boxes, and the neatly gravelled courtyard, up the sweep and
so to the house-door. Freeman, the staid stud-groom from Yorkshire,
had seen the visitor's entry from the stable, where he was
superintending, and hurried up to meet him. Before Mr. Simnel's own
groom had come alongside, Freeman was at his horse's head.
"Mornin', sir," said he, touching his hat. "Missis is oop at
Fouracres, close by, givin' lesson to a young leddy, just by t' water
soide: joompin' brook, oi think. Howsever she'll be in d'rackly, oi
know."
"All right, Freeman," said Mr. Simnel, leisurely dismounting. "Horses
all well? Fine weather for horseflesh, this!"
"Ay, ay, it be, sir!" said the old man. "Stood be pratty well, oi'm
thinkin': coughs and colds, and that loike, as is allays case this
toime o' year."
"Don't hurry Miss Mellon on my account, Freeman," said Mr. Simnel; "I
can wait. I'll go into the house, and you can let her know that I'm
here, when she comes in. By the way, Freeman, I haven't seen you since
Christmas: here's for old acquaintance' sake."
Freeman touched his hat gratefully, but not submissively, as he
pocketed the half-sovereign which Mr. Simnel slipped into his
capacious palm, and moved off towards the stables with the groom and
the horses.
"Good man, that," said Simnel to himself, as he went into the house.
"Straightforward, conscientious sort of fellow, and thoroughly devoted
to _her_. Proper style of man to have in an establishment: thoroughly
respectable--do one credit by his looks. If it ever comes off, I
certainly should keep Mr. Freeman on."
Mr. Simnel passed on into the long low dining-room, where he found the
table spread for luncheon, with a very substantial display of cold
roast beef, fowls, and tongue, sherry, and a tall bottle of German
wine. He smiled as he noticed these preparations, and then leisurely
walked round the room. He paused at an oil-painting of Kate with a
favourite horse by her side. The artist evidently knew much more about
the equine than the human race. The horse's portrait was admirable,
but poor Kitty, with vermilion cheeks and glaring red hair, and a blue
habit with long daubs of light in it, like rain-streaks on a window,
was a lamentable object to look on. Only one other picture decorated
the walls, a portrait of the Right Hon. the Earl of Quorn, aged 61,
founder of the Society for the Relief of Incapacitated Jobmasters and
Horse-dealers, dedicated to him by his faithful servants the
publishers; representing a hale old gentleman, remarkable principally
for his extraordinary length of check-neckcloth, seated on a
weight-carrying cob, and staring intently at nothing. On a side-table
lay a thick book, _Youatt on the Horse_, and a thin pamphlet,
_Navicular not Incurable_, a _Little Warbler_ (poor Kitty!), and a kind
of album, into which a heterogeneous mixture of recipes for
horse-medicines, scraps of hunting news, lists of prices fetched at
the sales of celebrated studs, and other sporting memoranda had been
pasted. Simnel was looking through this, and had just come upon a slip
of printed matter, evidently cut from a newspaper, announcing the
appointment of Mr. Charles Beresford to be a commissioner of the
Tin-Tax Office, in place of Cockle pensioned--a slip against which
there were three huge deep pencil-scorings--when the door opened and
his hostess entered.
Although her habit was draggled and splashed, and her hair disarranged
and blown about her face, Kate Mellon never had looked, to Simnel's
eyes at least, more thoroughly charming than she did at that instant.
The exercise she had just gone through had given her a splendid
colour, her eyes were bright and sparkling, her whole frame showed to
perfection in the tight-fitting jacket; and as she came into the room
and removed her hat, the knot of hair behind, loosened from the comb,
fell over her shoulders in golden profusion. She wound it up at once
with one hand, advancing with the other outstretched to her guest.
"Sorry I'm late, Simnel," said she; "but I had a pupil here, and
business is business, as you know well enough. Can't afford to throw
away any chance, so I gave her her hour, and now she's off, and I am
all the better by a guinea. I didn't stop to change my habit because I
heard you were waiting, and I knew you wouldn't mind."
"You couldn't look more enchanting than you do now, Kate," said
Simnel.
"Yes, yes; I know," said Kitty; "all right! But I thought you knew
better than that. This is the wrong shop for flummery of that sort, as
you ought to have learnt by this time. Have some lunch?"
They sat down to the table, and during the meal talked on ordinary
subjects; for the most part discussing their common acquaintance, but
always carefully avoiding bringing Beresford's name forward. When they
had finished, Kate said, "You want to smoke, of course. I think I
shall have a puff myself. No, thank you; your weeds are too big for
me; I've got some Queens here that old Sir John Elle sent me after I
broke that roan mare for his daughter. By George, what a brute that
was! nearly killed me at first, she did; and now you might ride her
with a pack-thread."
Simnel did not reply. Kate Mellon curled herself up on an ottoman in
the window with her habit tucked round her; lit a small cigar; and
slowly expelling the smoke said, as the blue vapour curled round her
head, "And now to business! You wanted to talk to me, you said; and I
told you to come up to-day. What's it all about?"
"About yourself, Kate. You know thoroughly well my feelings to you;
you know how often I have--"
"Hold on a minute!" said Kate; "I know that you've been philandering
and hanging on about me,--or would have been, if I'd have let
you,--for this year past. I know that well enough; but I thought there
was to be none of this. I thought I'd told you to drop that subject,
and that you'd consented to drop it. I told you I wouldn't listen to
you, and--"
"Why would not you listen to me, Kate?" said Simnel earnestly.
"Why? Because--"
"Don't trouble yourself to find an excuse; I'll tell you why," said
Simnel. "Because you were desperately bent on a fruitless errand;
because you were beating the wind and trying to check the storm;
because you were in love,--I must speak plainly, Kitty, in a matter
like this,--in love with a man who did not return your feeling, and
who even now is boasting of your passion, and laughing at you as its
dupe!"
"What!" cried the girl, throwing away the cigar and starting to her
feet.
"Sit down, child," said Simnel, gently laying his hand on her arm;
"sit down, and hear me out. I know your pluck and spirit; and nothing
grieves me more, or goes more against the grain with me, than to have
to tell you this. But when I tell you that the man to whom you so
attached yourself has spoken lightly and sneeringly of your
infatuation; that amongst his friends he has laughingly talked of a
scene which occurred on the last occasion of his visit to this house,
when you suggested that he should marry you--"
"Did he say that?" asked the girl, pushing her hair back from her
face,--"did he say that?"
"That and more; laughed at the notion, and--"
"O my God!" shrieked Kate Mellon, throwing up her arms. "Spare me!
stop, for Heaven's sake, and don't let me hear any more. Did he say
that of me? Then they'll all know it, and when I meet them will grin
and whisper as I know they do. Haven't I heard them do it of others a
thousand times? and now to think they'll have the pull of me. O good
Lord, good Lord!" and she burst into tears and buried her face in her
handkerchief. Then suddenly rousing, she exclaimed: "What do you come
and tell me this for, Simnel? What business is it of yours? What's
your motive in coming and smashing me up like this?"
"One, and one only," said Simnel in a low voice. "I wanted to prevent
your demeaning yourself by ever showing favour to a man who has
treated you so basely. I wanted you to show your own pride and spirit
by blotting this Beresford from your thoughts. I wanted you to do
this--whatever may be the result--because--I love you, Kate!"
"That's it!" she cried suddenly--"that's it! You're telling me lies
and long stories, and breaking my heart, and making me make a fool of
myself, only that you may stand well with me and get me to like you!
How do I know what you say is true? Why should Charley do this? Why
did Charley refuse what I offered him? I meant it honestly enough, God
knows. Oh, why did he refuse it?" and again she burst into tears.
"Oh, he did refuse it?" said Simnel, quietly. "So far, then you see I
am right; and you will find I am right throughout. I'll tell you why
he acted as he did to you. Because he's full of family pride, and
because he never cared for you one rush. At this very moment he is
desperately in love with a married woman, and is only awaiting her
husband's death to make her his wife!"
"Can you prove that?" asked Kate eagerly.
"I can! you shall have ample opportunity of satisfying yourself--"
"Does the husband suspect?"
"Not in the least."
"That's right!" said the girl with sudden energy--"that'll do! Only let
me prove that, and I'll give him up for ever."
"If I do this for you, Kitty, surely my love will be sufficiently
proved. You will then--"
"Yes, we'll talk of that afterwards. I'll see you next week, and
you'll tell me more of this new love-affair of--of _his!_ Don't stop
now. I'm all out of sorts. You've upset me. I wasn't in condition.
I've been doing a little too much work lately. Go now, there's a good
fellow! Good-by." Then stopping suddenly--"You're sure you're not
selling me, Simnel?"
"I swear it!" said Simnel.
"I wish to heaven you had been," said the poor girl; "but we'll see
about the new business next week. I think we'll spoil that pretty game
between us, eh? There, good-by." And she set her teeth tight, and
rushed from the room.
"So fax so good," said Mr. Simnel, as he rode quietly home. "She's
taken it almost a little too strongly. My plan now is to soften her
and turn her to me. I think I have a card in my hand that will win
that trick, and then--the game's my own!"