Yard could not assist him in getting it back; he must manage it
single-handed.
"It's very kind of you, Mr. Inspector, to try and find it for me," he
said; "but the fact is, it--it ain't so valuable as I fancied. I can't
afford to have it traced--it's not worth it!"
The inspector laughed. "I never said it was, that I know. The job I'm in
charge of is a bigger concern than your trumpery ring, my friend."
"Then I don't see what I've got to do with it," said Leander.
The officer had taken his measure by this time; he must admit his man
into a show of confidence, and appeal to his vanity, if he was to obtain
any information he could rely upon.
"You're a shrewd chap, I see; 'nothing for nothing' is your motto, eh?
Well, if you help me in this, and put me on the track I want, it'll be a
fine thing for you. You'll be a principal witness at the police-court;
name in the papers; regular advertisement for you!"
This prospect, had he known it--but even inspectors cannot know
everything--was the last which could appeal to Leander in his peculiar
position. "I don't care for notoriety," he said loftily; "I scorn it."
"Oho!" said the inspector, shifting his ground. "Well, you don't want to
impede the course of justice, do you?--because that's what you seem to
me to be after, and you won't find it pay in the long run. I'll get this
out of you in a friendly way if I can; if not, some other way. Come,
give me your account, fair and full, of how you came to lose that ring;
there's no help for it--you must!"
Leander saw this and yielded. After all, it did not much matter, for of
course he would not touch upon the strange sequel of his ill-omened act;
so he told the story faithfully and circumstantially, while the
inspector took it all down in his note-book, questioning him closely
respecting the exact time of each occurrence.
At last he closed his note-book with a snap. "I'm not obliged to tell
you anything in return for all this," he said; "but I will, and then
you'll see the importance of holding your tongue till I give you leave
to talk about it."
"_I_ shan't talk about it," said Leander.
"I don't advise you to. I suppose you've heard of that affair at
Wricklesmarsh Court? What! not that business where a gang broke into the
sculpture gallery, one of the finest private collections in England? You
surprise me!"
"And what did they steal?" asked Leander.
"They stole the figure whose finger you were ass enough (if you'll allow
me the little familiarity) to put your ring on. What do you think of
that?"
A wild rush of ideas coursed through the hairdresser's head. Was this
policeman "after" the goddess upstairs? Did he know anything more? Would
it be better to give up the statue at once and get rid of it? But
then--his ring would be lost for ever!
"It's surprising," he said at last. "But what did they want to go and
burgle a plaster figure for?"
"That's where it is, you see; she ain't plaster--she's marble, a genuine
antic of Venus, and worth thousands. The beggars who broke in knew that,
and took nothing else. They'd made all arrangements to get away with her
abroad, and pass her off on some foreign collection before it got blown
upon; and they'd have done it too if we hadn't been beforehand with
them! So what do they do then? They drive up with her to these gardens,
ask to see the manager, and say they're agents for some Fine Arts
business, and have a sample with them, to be disposed of at a low price.
The manager, so he tells me, had a look at it, thought it a neat article
and suitable to the style of his gardens. He took it to be plain
plaster, as they said, and they put it up for him their own selves,
near the small gate up by the road; then they took the money--a pound or
two they asked for it--and drove away, and he saw no more of them."
"And was that all they got for their pains?" said Leander.
The inspector smiled indulgently. "Don't you see your way yet?" he
asked. "Can't you give a guess where that statue's got to now, eh?"
"No," said Leander, with what seemed to the inspector a quite
uncalled-for excitement, "of course I can't! What do you ask me for? How
should I know?"
"Quite so," said the other; "you want a mind trained to deal with these
things. It may surprise you to hear it, but I know as well how that
statue disappeared, and what was done with her, as if I'd been there!"
"Do you, though?" thought Leander, who was beginning to doubt whether
his visitor's penetration was anything so abnormal. "What was done with
her?" he asked.
"Why, it was a plant from the first. They knew all their regular holes
were stopped, and they wanted a place to dump her down in, where she
wouldn't attract attention, till they could call for her again; so they
got her taken in at the gardens, where they could come in any time by
the gate and fetch her off again--and very neatly it was done, too!"
"But where do you make out they've taken her to now?" asked Leander, who
was naturally anxious to discover if the official had any suspicions of
him.
"I've my own theory about that," was his answer. "I shall hunt that
Venus down, sir; I'll stake my reputation on it."
"Venus is her name, it seems," thought Leander. "She told me it was
Aphrodite. But perhaps the other's her Christian name. It can't be the
Venus I've seen pictures of--she's dressed too decent."
"Yes," repeated the inspector, "I shall hunt her down now. I don't envy
the poor devil who's giving her house-room; he'll have reason to repent
it!"
"How do you know any one's giving her house-room?" inquired Leander;
"and why should he repent it?"
"Ask your own common sense. They daren't take her back to any of their
own places; they know better. They haven't left the country with her.
What remains? They've bribed or got over some mug of an outsider to be
their accomplice, and a bad speculation he'll find it, too."
"What would be done to him?" asked the hairdresser, with a quite
unpleasant internal sensation.
[Illustration: "WHAT WOULD BE DONE TO HIM?" ASKED THE HAIRDRESSER, WITH
A QUITE UNPLEASANT INTERNAL SENSATION.]
"That is a question I wouldn't pretend to decide; but I've no hesitation
in saying that the party on whose premises that statue is discovered
will wish he'd died before he ever set eyes on her."
"You're quite right there!" said Leander. "Well, sir, I'm afraid I
haven't been much assistance to you."
"Never mind that," said the inspector, encouragingly; "you've answered
my questions; you've not hindered the law, and that's a game some burn
their fingers at."
Leander let him out, and returned to his saloon with his head in a worse
whirl than before. He did not think the detective suspected him. He was
clearly barking up the wrong tree at present; but so acute a mind could
not be long deceived, and if once Leander was implicated his guilt would
appear beyond denial. Would the police believe that the statue had run
after him? No one would believe it! To be found in possession of that
fatal work of art would inevitably ruin him.
He might carry her away to some lonely spot and leave her, but where was
the use? She would only come back again; or he might be taken in the
act. He dared not destroy her; his right arm had been painful all day
after that last attempt.
If he gave her up to the authorities, he would have to explain how he
came to be in a position to do so, which, as he now saw, would be a
difficult undertaking; and even then he would lose all chance of
recovering his ring in time to satisfy his aunt and Matilda. There was
no way out of it, unless he could induce Venus to give up the token and
leave him alone.
"Cuss her!" he said angrily; "a pretty bog she's led me into, she and
that minx, Ada Parkinson!"
He felt so thoroughly miserable that hunger had vanished, and he dreaded
the idea of an evening at home, though it was a blusterous night, with
occasional vicious spirts of rain, and by no means favourable to
continued pacing of streets and squares.
"I'm hanged if I don't think I'll go to church!" he thought; "and
perhaps I shall feel more equal to supper afterwards."
He went upstairs to get his best hat and overcoat, and was engaged in
brushing the former in his sitting-room, when from within the cupboard
he heard a shower of loud raps.
His knees trembled. "She's wuss than any ghost!" he thought; but he took
no notice, and went on brushing his hat, while he endeavoured to hum a
hymn.
"Leander!" cried the clear, hard voice he knew too well, "I have
returned. Release me!"
His first idea was to run out of the house and seek sanctuary in some
pew in the opposite church. "But there," he thought disgustedly, "she'd
only come in and sit next to me. No, I'll pluck up a spirit and have it
out with her!" and he threw open the door.
"How have you dared to imprison me in this narrow tomb?" she demanded
majestically, as she stepped forth.
Leander cringed. "It's a nice roomy cupboard," he said. "I thought
perhaps you wouldn't mind putting up with it, especially as you invited
yourself," he could not help adding.
"When I found myself awake and in utter darkness," she said, "I thought
you had buried me beneath the soil."
"Buried you!" he exclaimed, with a sudden perception that he might do
worse.
"And in that thought I was preparing to invoke the forces that lie below
the soil to come to my aid, burst the masses that impeded me, and
overwhelm you and all this ugly swarming city in one vast ruin!"
"I won't bury her," Leander decided. "I'm sorry you hadn't a better
opinion of me, mum," he said aloud. "You see, how you came to be in
there was this way: when you went out, like the snuff of a candle, so to
speak, you left your statue standing in the middle of the floor, and I
had to put it somewhere where it wouldn't be seen."
"You did well," she said indulgently, "to screen my image from the
vulgar sight; and if you had no statelier shrine wherein to instal it,
the fault lies not with you. You are pardoned."
"Thank you, mum," said Leander; "and now let me ask you if you intend to
animate that statue like this as a regular thing?"
"So long as your obstinacy continues, or until it outlives my
forbearance, I shall return at intervals," she said. "Why do you ask
this?"
"Well," said Leander, with a sinking heart, but hoping desperately to
move her by the terrors of the law, "it's my duty to tell you that that
image you're in is stolen property."
"Has it been stolen from one of my temples?" she asked.
"I dare say--I don't know; but there's the police moving heaven and
earth to get you back again!"
"He is good and pious--the police, and if I knew him I would reward
him."
"There's a good many hims in the police--that's what we call our guards
for the street, who take up thieves and bad characters; and, being
stolen, they're all of 'em after _you_; and if they had a notion where
you were, they'd be down on you, and back you'd go to wherever you've
come from--some gallery, I believe, where you wouldn't get away again in
a hurry! Now, I tell you what it is, if you don't give me up that ring,
and go away and leave me in quiet, I'll tell the police who you are and
where you are. I mean what I say, by George I do!"
"We know not George, nor will it profit you to invoke him now," said the
goddess. "See, I will deign to reason with you as with some froward
child. Think you that, should the guards seize my image, _I_ should
remain within, or that it is aught to me where this marble presentment
finds a resting-place while I am absent therefrom? But for you, should
you surrender it into their hands, would there be no punishment for your
impiety in thus concealing a divine effigy?"
"She ain't no fool!" thought Leander; "she mayn't understand our ways,
but she's a match for me notwithstanding. I must try another line."
"Lady Venus," he began, "if that's the proper way to call you, I didn't
mean any threats--far from it. I'll be as humble as you please. You look
a good-natured lady; you wouldn't want to make a man uncomfortable, I'm
sure. Do give me back that ring, for mercy's sake! If I haven't got it
to show in a day or two, I shall be ruined!"
"Should any mortal require the ring of you, you have but to reply, 'I
have placed it upon the finger of Aphrodite, whose spouse I am!' Thus
will you have honour amongst mortals, being held blameless!"
"Blameless!" cried Leander, in pardonable exasperation. "That's all you
know about it! And what am I to say to the lady it lawfully belongs to?"
"You have lied to me, then, and you are already affianced! Tell me the
abode of this maiden of yours."
"What do you want it for?" he inquired, hoping faintly she might intend
to restore the ring.
"To seek it out, to go to her abode, to crush her! Is she not my rival?"
"Crush my Matilda?" he cried in agony. "You'll never do such a thing as
that?"
"You have revealed her name! I have but to ask in your streets, 'Where
abideth Matilda, the beloved of Leander, the dresser of hair? Lead me to
her dwelling.' And having arrived thereat, I shall crush her, and thus
she shall deservedly perish!"
He was horrified at the possible effects of his slip, which he hastened
to repair. "You won't find it so easy to come at her, luckily," he said;
"there's hundreds of Matildas in London alone."
"Then," said the goddess, sweetly and calmly, "it is simple: I shall
crush them all."
"Oh, lor!" whimpered Leander, "here's a bloodthirsty person! Where's the
sense of doing that?"
"Because, dissipated reveller that you are, you love them."
"Now, when did I ever say I loved them? I don't even know more than two
or three, and those I look on as sisters--in fact" (here he hit upon a
lucky evasion) "they _are_ sisters--it's only another name for them.
I've a brother and three Matildas, and here are you talking of crushing
my poor sisters as if they were so many beadles--all for nothing!"
"Is this the truth? Palter not with me! You are pledged to no mortal
bride?"
"I'm a bachelor. And as for the ring, it belongs to my aunt, who's over
fifty."
"Then no one stands between us, and you are mine!"
"Don't talk so ridiculous! I tell you I ain't yours--it's a free
country, this is!"
"If I--an immortal--can stoop thus, it becomes you not to reject the
dazzling favour."
A last argument occurred to him. "But I reelly don't think, mum," he
said persuasively, "that you can be quite aware of the extent of the
stoop. The fact is, I am, as I've tried to make you understand, a
hairdresser; some might lower themselves so far as to call me a barber.
Now, hairdressing, whatever may be said for it" (he could not readily
bring himself to decry his profession)--"hairdressing is considribly
below you in social rank. I wouldn't deceive you by saying otherwise. I
assure you that, if you had any ideer what a barber was, you wouldn't be
so pressing."
She seemed to be struck by this. "You say well!" she observed,
thoughtfully; "your occupation may be base and degrading, and if so, it
were well for me to know it."
"If you were once to see me in my daily avocations," he urged, "you'd
see what a mistake you're making."
"Enough! I will see you--and at once. Barb, that I may know the nature
of your toil!"
"I can't do that now," he objected; "I haven't got a customer."
"Then fetch one, and barb with it immediately. You must have your tools
by you; so delay not!"
"A customer ain't a tool!" he groaned, "it's a fellow-man; and no one
will come in to-night, because it's Sunday. (Don't ask me what Sunday
is, because you wouldn't understand if I tried to tell you!) And I don't
carry on my business up here, but below in the saloon."
"I will go thither and behold you."
"No!" he exclaimed. "Do you want to ruin me?"
"I will make no sign; none shall recognise me for what I am. But come I
will!"
Leander pondered awhile. There was danger in introducing the goddess
into his saloon; he had no idea what she might do there. But at the same
time, if she were bent upon coming, she would probably do so in any
case; and besides, he felt tolerably certain that what she would see
would convince her of his utter unsuitability as a consort.
Yes, it was surely wisest to assist necessity, and obtain the most
favourable conditions for the inevitable experiment.
"I might put you in a corner of the operating-room, to be sure," he said
thoughtfully. "No one would think but what you was part of the fittings,
unless you went moving about."
"Place me where I may behold you at your labour, and there I will
remain," she said.
"Well," he conceded, "I'll risk it. The best way would be for you to
walk down to the saloon, and leave yourself ready in a corner till you
come to again. I can't carry a heavy marble image all that way!"
"So be it," said she, and followed him to the saloon with a proud
docility.
"It's nicely got up," he remarked, as they reached it; "and you'll find
it roomier than the cupboard."
She deigned no answer as she remained motionless in the corner he had
indicated; and presently, as he held up the candle he was carrying, he
found its rays were shining upon a senseless stone.
He went upstairs again, half fearful, half sanguine. "I don't altogether
like it," he was thinking. "But if I put a print wrapper over her all
day, no one will notice. And goddesses must have their proper pride. If
she once gets it into her marble head that I keep a shop, I think that
she'll turn up her nose at me. And then she'll give back the ring and go
away, and I shan't be afraid of the police; and I needn't tell Tillie
anything about it. It's worth risking."
AN EXPERIMENT
V.
"'Tis time; descend; be stone no more; approach:
Strike all that look upon with marvel."
_The Winter's Tale._
The next day brought Leander a letter which made his heart beat with
mingled emotions--it was from his Matilda. It had evidently been written
immediately before her return, and told him that she would be at their
old meeting-place (the statue of Fox in Bloomsbury Square) at eight
o'clock that evening.
The wave of tenderness which swept over him at the anticipation of this
was hurled back by an uncomfortable thought. What if Matilda were to
refer to the ring? But no; his Matilda would do nothing so indelicate.
All through the day he mechanically went through his hairdressing,
singeing, and shampooing operations, divided between joy at the prospect
of seeing his adored Matilda again, and anxiety respecting the cold
marble swathed in the print wrapper, which stood in the corner of his
hair-cutting saloon.
He glanced at it every time he went past to change a brush or heat a
razor, but there was no sign of movement under the folds, and he
gradually became reassured, especially as it excited no remark.
But as evening drew on he felt that, for the success of his experiment,
it was necessary that the cover should be removed. It was dangerous,
supposing the inspector were to come in unexpectedly and recognise the
statue; but he could only trust to fortune for that, and hoped, too,
that even if the detective came he would be able to keep him in the
outer shop.
It was only for one evening, and it was well worth the risk.
A foreign gentleman had come in, and the hairdresser found that a fresh
wrapper was required, which gave him the excuse he wanted for unveiling
the Aphrodite. He looked carefully at the face as he uncovered it, but
could discover no speculation as yet in the calm, full gaze of the
goddess.
The foreign gentleman was inclined to be talkative under treatment, and
the conversation came round to public amusements.
"In my country," the customer said, without mentioning or betraying what
his particular country was--"in my country we have what you have not,
places to sit out in the fresh air, and drink a glass of beer, along
with the entertainments. You have not that in London?"
"Bless your soul, yes," said Leander, who was a true patriot, "plenty of
them!"
"Oh, I did not aware that; but who?"
"Well," said the hairdresser, "there's the Eagle in the City Road, for
one; and there's the Surrey Gardens; and there's Rosherwich," he added,
after a pause. (The Fisheries Exhibition, it may be said, was as yet
unknown.)
"And you go there, often?"
"I've been to Rosherwich."
"Was it goot there--you laike it, eh?"
"Well," said Leander, "they tell me it's very gay in the season.
P'rhaps I went at the wrong time of the year for it."
"What you call wrong time for it?"
"Slack--nothing going on," he explained; "like it was when I went last
Saturday."
"You went last Saturday? And you stay a long time?"
"I didn't stay no longer than I could help," Leander said. "All our
party was glad to get away."
The foreigner had risen to go, when his eyes fell on the Venus in the
corner.
"You did not stay long, and your party was glad to come away?" he
repeated absently. "I am not surprised at that." He gave the hairdresser
a long stare as he spoke. "No, I am not surprised.... You have a good
taste, my friend; you laike the antique, do you not?" he broke off
suddenly.
"Ah! you are looking at the Venus, sir," said Leander. "Yes, I'm very
partial to it."
"It is a taste that costs," his customer said.
He looked back over his shoulder as he left the shop, and once more
repeated softly, "Yes, it is a taste that costs."
"I suppose," Leander reflected as he went back, "it does strike people
as queer, my keeping that statue there; but it's only for one evening."
The foreigner had scarcely left when an old gentleman, a regular
customer, looked in, on his way from the City, and at once noticed the
innovation. He was an old gentleman who had devoted much time and study
to Art, in the intervals of business, and had developed critical powers
of the highest order.
He walked straight up to the Venus, and stuck out his under lip. "Where
did you get that thing?" he inquired. "Isn't this place of yours small
enough, without lumbering it up with statuary out of the Euston Road?"
"I didn't get it there," said Leander. "I--I thought it would be 'andy
to 'ang the 'ats on."
"Dear, dear," said the old gentleman, "why do you people dabble in
matters you don't understand? Come here, Tweddle, and let me show you.
Can't you _see_ what a miserable sham the thing is--a cheap, tawdry
imitation of the splendid classic type? Why, by merely exhibiting such a
thing, you're vitiating public taste, sir--corrupting it."
Leander did not quite follow this rebuke, which he thought was probably
based upon the goddess's antecedents.
"Was she reelly as bad as that, sir?" he said. "I wasn't aware so, or I
shouldn't give any offence to customers by letting her stay here."
As he spoke he saw the indefinable indications in the statue's face
which denoted that it was instinct once more with life and intelligence,
and he was horrified at the thought that the latter part of the
conversation might have been overheard.
"But I've always understood," he said, hastily, "that the party this
represents was puffickly correct, however free some of the others might
have been; and I suppose that's the costume of the period she's in, and
very becoming it is, I'm sure, though gone out since."
"Bah!" said the old gentleman, "it's poor art. I'll show you _where_ the
thing is bad. I happen to understand something of these things. Just
observe how the top of the head is out of drawing; look at the lowness
of the forehead, and the distance between the eyes; all the canons of
proportion ignored--absolutely ignored!"
What further strictures this rash old gentleman was preparing to pass
upon the statue will never be known now, for Tweddle already thought he
could discern a growing resentment in her face, under so much candour.
He could not stand by and allow so excellent a customer to be crushed on
the floor of his saloon, and he knew the Venus quite capable of this:
was she not perpetually threatening such a penalty, on much slighter
provocation?
He rushed between the unconscious man and his fate. "I think you said
your hair cut?" he said, and laid violent hands upon the critic, forced
him protesting into a chair, throttled him with a towel, and effectually
diverted his attention by a series of personal remarks upon the top of
his head.
The victim, while he was being shampooed, showed at first an alarming
tendency to revert to the subject of the goddess's defects, but Leander
was able to keep him in check by well-timed jets of scalding water and
ice-cold sprays, which he directed against his customer's exposed crown,
until every idea, except impotent rage, was washed out of it, while a
hard machine brush completed the subjugation.