A VALIANT IGNORANCE
A
VALIANT IGNORANCE
A Novel
BY
MARY ANGELA DICKENS
AUTHOR OF “CROSS CURRENTS,” “A MERE CYPHER,” ETC.
“Thy gold is brass!”
PRINCE HOHENSTIEL SCHWANGAU
_IN THREE VOLUMES_
VOL. III.
London MACMILLAN & CO. AND NEW YORK 1894
A VALIANT IGNORANCE
CHAPTER I
It was not generally known among his acquaintances that Marston Loring
had come back from Africa accompanied by a new friend; this new friend
was not introduced by Loring at either of his clubs, and yet the two
met at least once every day. He was a man named Alfred Ramsay; a small,
insignificant-looking man, with sandy hair, which had turned--in
streaks--the peculiar grey which such hair assumes, and small, dull eyes
that never seemed to move in his head.
It was nearly three o’clock on the afternoon following that on which
Loring had called on Mrs. Romayne, and he and his new friend were
together in his chambers in the Temple. Mr. Ramsay had been there
several times before, and he was sitting now in an arm-chair in the
sunshine with an air of total want of interest in his surroundings,
which was characteristic of him. Loring was walking up and down the room
thoughtfully.
“Romayne!” observed Ramsay. “Not a particularly good name on the market!
It belonged to a first-class swindler twenty years ago--William Romayne.
This young gentleman is no connexion, I suppose?”
The remark broke a short silence, and Loring stopped in his walk and
leant back against the mantelpiece as he answered.
“Yes,” he said tersely, “he’s his son. He has never been in his father’s
line, though--I doubt whether he knows anything about him, though it’s an
odd thing that he shouldn’t! As to the name, why, it’s an old story, and
won’t affect any one nowadays, I take it. The point is that he has this
respectable capital, and is--exceedingly keen on increasing it.”
There was a dryness in Loring’s voice as he said the last words, which
implied a great deal more than did his words. And it was apparently to
that significance that the other man replied.
“A chip of the old block,” said Ramsay musingly. “I wonder, now, how far
it goes?”
The last words were spoken very slowly, and the dull eyes looked straight
before them.
Loring looked down at him with a cynical smile just touching his lips.
He knew considerably more about his new friend’s character than he would
have chosen to put into words, and he could guess, not inaccurately, what
was passing in his mind at the moment. And the realisation of the shadowy
possibilities with which Ramsay was occupied was no part of Marston
Loring’s designs. He made no direct answer.
“He should be here by this time,” he said carelessly.
And as he spoke there was a sharp, cheery rap at the door; it opened
quickly, and Julian Romayne appeared, very boyish, very good-looking, and
with a curious, veiled keenness in his eyes.
“We were just expecting you,” said Loring, greeting him with a friendly
nod. “Let me introduce you to Mr. Alfred Ramsay.”
Mr. Alfred Ramsay had risen to honour the introduction, turning his whole
head slowly round as he looked at Julian, so that his eyes still gazed
straight before them as they rested on the young man’s face.
“Pleased to know you,” he said indifferently.
“Very glad to make your acquaintance,” responded Julian pleasantly. “I
hope I’m not behind time?”
“Pretty fair,” said Loring, laying his hand on the young man’s shoulder
with kindly patronage. “But Ramsay is a busy man, you know, so suppose we
get to business at once. Ramsay,” he continued, in a brisk, businesslike
voice, as the three sat down about the table, “Romayne knows nothing of
the affair whatever. I shall begin by running over the preliminaries with
him. And, first of all,” he went on, turning to Julian, “of course it is
understood, Romayne, that we keep the matter to ourselves.”
He spoke in a curt, off-hand manner, and as Julian made a quick gesture
of acquiescence, he went on in the same businesslike tone.
“I don’t know whether you know anything about the Welcome Diamond Mining
Company?” he said. “Probably not. It was floated about this time last
year, and the greater part of the business came into my hands. The shares
were taken up all right, but--well, it didn’t come to anything, and its
affairs had something to do with my going out to the Cape. It was in
connection with those same affairs that I and Ramsay met.”
Julian had listened so far with a clouded countenance, and now, as Loring
paused, he leant back in his chair with a movement of irrepressible
disappointment.
“Oh!” he said shortly. “It’s a mine, then?”
“There is a mine in connection with it,” replied Loring imperturbably.
“But you need not trouble yourself about the mine. That is only
the figure-head, you understand. The affair itself is a matter
of--arrangement. Look here, Romayne,” he went on, as Julian leant
suddenly forward across the table, “shares in the Welcome Diamond Mining
Company are at this moment worth about five shillings each.”
He paused. He had been leaning carelessly back in his chair, and now he
moved, uncrossing his legs, and leaning one arm on the table.
“In a few days,” he went on deliberately and significantly, “they will
fall to two shillings.” He paused again, with a slight, matter-of-course
gesture. “That will be worked, of course,” he said.
Julian nodded comprehension.
“Yes?” he said.
“At that price,” continued Loring, “all the shares will be bought up by
two or three men, in consequence of private information received from the
Cape.”
The last words came from Loring slowly and deliberately, and his eyes
met Julian’s significantly. A quick flash of understanding passed across
Julian’s face, and Loring continued easily:
“Reports to this effect will get about. The fact of the presence in
London of a mining engineer from the vicinity of the Welcome will
also get about. Perhaps he may allow himself to be interviewed, you
know--nothing definite, of course. The shares will go up with a run.”
He paused, and Julian threw himself back in his chair, tapping the table
meditatively with one hand. His gaze was fixed upon the wall just over
Loring’s head, and there was a curious expression on his face which
combined the keen matter-of-fact calculation of the habitual speculator
with a certain unconscious gleam of hungry excitement which was eloquent
of youth and inexperience. A minute or two passed, during which Mr.
Ramsay’s eyes rested indifferently on the young man’s face, and then
Julian spoke. His voice, also, in spite of his evident attempt at
emulation of Loring’s businesslike nonchalance, was just touched by that
youthful incapacity for holding keen personal interest in abeyance.
“And the private information received from the Cape will be
supplied----?” he said interrogatively.
“Will be supplied by Ramsay,” returned Loring.
The words were spoken with the slightest possible movement of the
eyelids. Julian made a quick gesture of comprehension, and there was a
moment’s silence. Then Loring went on crisply, darting a quick glance at
Julian’s face in its calculating eagerness.
“In a private speculation of this kind, of course, it is a case of
working together and share and share alike. Now, we propose--Ramsay and
I, you understand--to make up a joint capital for the purchase of these
shares. We are prepared to put into it fifteen thousand pounds between
us, and we want another ten thousand at least. If you are prepared to put
in that sum, or more, on the understanding that the profits--after each
man has received back his original investment--are divided into three
equal shares, we are willing to take you in with us.”
Julian looked up at him quickly.
“Into three equal shares?” he said, with a stress on the adjective.
“Into three equal shares,” returned Loring drily. “Capital is not the
sole requisite in this affair, and the other factors are supplied by
Ramsay and myself.”
A dark flush mounted to Julian’s forehead, and the avidity in his eyes
developed.
“It’s a large order, though,” he said. “I don’t quite see where I come
in at that rate, after all.”
Loring leant back in his chair and looked him full in the face.
“You can please yourself, of course,” he said. “Take it or leave it. You
will come in to the tune of something like thirty thousand. If you see
your way to trebling your capital by any other means, do so. Lots of
fellows will be glad to take your place with us.”
Julian’s eyes gleamed greedily, and he wavered obviously.
“Those are your final terms?” he said.
“Our final terms,” said Loring concisely, looking at Ramsay, who nodded
nonchalantly in confirmation of the words.
A silence ensued. Julian sat staring down at the table, his brows knit,
evidently in close thought. At last he glanced up suddenly at the two men
who had been waiting carelessly for his decision.
“I call it rather rough,” he said brusquely; “but--all right. If the
thing looks all right when you’ve trotted it out, I accept.”
He passed on instantly, with a brief, telling question, to the inner
working of the scheme.
There is perhaps nothing by which self-revelation is more frankly and
unconsciously made than through the means by which a man may be most
easily roused to enthusiasm. Enthusiasm--a genuine quickening of his
mental pulses, even--had been a condition of things practically unknown
to the easy-going, commonplace Julian Romayne of a year before; but
in the course of the last two months he had experienced it often. To
hear of large sums of money, large profits, rapid returns on striking
investments, touched him, instinctively, as a record of artistic
achievements will touch an artist, as triumphs of research will touch an
historian, as prodigies of physical prowess will touch an athlete. And
as Loring answered him now, and went on with fuller and more technical
detail, his face changed strikingly. His eyes brightened, and an eager,
fascinated light came into them; he leant farther forward, listening,
commenting, questioning, with quick and always increasing excitement.
Half an hour passed, and still the three men sat about the table,
talking in terse, businesslike fashion; three-quarters of an hour, an
hour. At the end of that time, Julian, his face flushed and eager,
his eyes glistening and sparkling, his hand absolutely shaking with
excitement, was holding that hand out to Mr. Ramsay with a gesture which
witnessed to the work of that hour, as volumes could not have done.
As far as words went, he and Mr. Ramsay had hardly exchanged three
sentences; it was the bond that lay behind the words that had drawn them
together. Mr. Ramsay had spoken very little, indeed, but his silent
presence had never for a moment seemed superfluous, or without a certain
indefinite weight; and there was a dull approval in his slow eyes now as
he turned them on the young man.
“We’ve settled so much, then,” said Julian, in a quick, familiar way,
“and we meet here on Thursday at two. Until then----” He turned to
Loring, and stretched out his hand eagerly. “Thanks, old man,” he said in
a low, quick voice. “Thanks.”