of a few hundreds in the bank at Eastwood, for household purposes, not
a single penny of Mr Morton’s money could be found. All his property
was mortgaged to a high amount; all his securities were disposed of,
and not one penny could be traced. The mortgages on the property were
properly drawn up by a highly respectable solicitor at Eastwood,
the money advanced by a man of undoubted probity; and further, the
money had been paid over to Mr Morton one day early in the year 1883.
Advertisements were inserted in the papers, in fact everything was done
to trace the missing money, but in vain. All Miss Wakefield had for
her pains and trouble was a poor sum of about eleven hundred pounds,
so she had to retire again to her genteel poverty in a cheap London
boarding-house.
This melancholy fact did not give Mr Carver any particular sorrow;
he disliked that lady, and was especially glad that her deep cunning
and underhand ways had frustrated themselves. In all probability, he
thought, Mr Morton had in a fit of suspicion got hold of all his ready
cash and securities, for the purpose of balking the fair lady whom he
had made his heiress; but nevertheless the affair was puzzling, and Mr
Carver hated to be puzzled.
Mr Carver stood in his office in Bedford Row, drumming his fingers on
the grimy window-panes and softly whistling. Nothing was heard in the
office but the scratch of the confidential clerk’s quill pen as he
scribbled out a draft for his employer’s inspection.
‘This is a very queer case, Bates, very queer,’ said Mr Carver,
addressing his clerk.
‘Yes, sir,’ replied Mr Bates, continuing the scratching. That gentleman
possessed the instinct of always being able to divine what his chief
was thinking of. Therefore, when Mr Bates said ‘Yes, sir,’ he knew that
the Eastwood mystery had been alluded to.
‘I’d most cheerfully give—let me see, what would I give? Well, I
wouldn’t mind paying down my cheque for’——
‘One thousand pounds, sir. No, sir; I don’t think you would.’
‘You’re a wonderful fellow, Bates,’ said his admiring master. ‘’Pon my
honour, Bates, that’s the exact sum I was going to mention.’
‘It _is_ strange, sir,’ said the imperturbable Bates, ‘that you and I
always think the same things. I suppose it is being with you so long.
Now, if I was to _think_ you would give me a partnership, perhaps you
would think the same thing too.’
‘Bates,’ said Mr Carver earnestly, never smiling, as was his wont, at
his clerk’s quiet badinage, ‘if we unravel this mystery, as I hope we
may, I’ll tell you what, Bates, don’t be surprised if I give you a
partnership.’
‘Ah, sir, if we unravel it. Now, if we could only find’——
‘Miss Eleanor. Just what I was thinking.’
At this moment a grimy clerk put his head in at the door.
‘Please, sir, a young person of the name of Seaton.’
‘It is Miss Eleanor, by Jove!’ said Bates, actually excited.
‘Wonderful!’ said Mr Carver.
In a few seconds the lady was ushered into the presence of Mr Carver.
She was tall and fair, with a style of beauty uncommon to the people
of to-day. Clad from head to foot in plain black, hat, jacket, and
dress cut with a simplicity almost severe, and relieved only by a
white collar at the throat, there was something in her air and bearing
which spoke of a culture and breeding not easily defined in words, but
nevertheless unmistakable. It was a face and figure that men would look
at and turn again to watch, even in the busy street. Her complexion
was almost painfully perfect in its clear pallid whiteness, and the
large dark lustrous eyes shone out from the marble face with dazzling
brightness. She had a perfect abundance of real golden hair, looped up
in a great knot behind; but the rebellious straying tresses fell over
her broad low forehead like an aureole round the head of a saint.
For a few moments she regarded Mr Carver with a faint, wavering,
unsteady smile. That gentleman tried to speak, and then blew his nose
with unnecessary and ostentatious violence.
‘Don’t you know me, Mr Carver?’ she said at length.
‘My dear Eleanor, my dear Eleanor, do sit down!’ This was the person
whom he had been longing for two years to see, and Mr Carver, cool as
he was, was rather knocked off his balance for a moment.
‘Poor child! Why, why didn’t you come and see me before?’
‘Pride, Mr Carver—pride,’ she replied, with a painful air of assumed
playfulness.
‘But surely pride did not prevent your coming to see your old friend?’
‘Indeed, it did, Mr Carver. You would not have me part with one of my
few possessions?’
‘Nonsense, nonsense!’ said the lawyer, with assumed severity. ‘Now,
sit down there, and tell me everything you have done for the last two
years.’
‘It is soon told. When my uncle—poor deluded man—turned me, as he
did, out of his house on account of my marriage, something had to be
done; so we came to London. For two years my husband has been trying
to earn a living by literature. Far better had he stayed in the
country and taken to breaking stones or working in the fields. It is
a bitter life, Mr Carver. The man who wants to achieve fortune that
way must have a stout heart; he must be devoid of pride and callous to
failure. If I had all the eloquence of a Dickens at my tongue’s end, I
could not sum up two years’ degradation and bitter miserable poverty
and disappointment better than in the few words, “Trying to live by
literature.”—However, it is useless to struggle against it any longer.
Mr Carver, sorely against my inclination, I have come to you to help
us.’
‘My dear child, you hurt me,’ said Mr Carver huskily, ‘you hurt me; you
do indeed. For two years I have been searching for you everywhere. You
have only to ask me, and you know anything I can I will do.’
‘God bless you,’ replied Eleanor, with the gathering tears thick in her
eyes. ‘I know you will. I knew that when I came here. How can I thank
you?’
‘Don’t do anything of the sort; I don’t want any thanks. But before you
go, I will do something for you. Now, listen to me. Before your uncle
died’——
‘Died! Is he dead?’
‘How stupid of me. I didn’t know’——
Mr Carver stopped abruptly, and paused till the natural emotions called
forth in the young lady’s mind had had time to expend themselves. She
then asked when the event had happened.
‘Two years ago,’ said Mr Carver. ‘And now, tell me—since you last saw
him, had you any word or communication from him in any shape or form?
Any letter or message?’
Eleanor shook her head, half sadly, half scornfully.
‘You don’t seem to know Miss Wakefield,’ she said. ‘No message was
likely to reach me, while _she_ remained at Eastwood.’
‘No; I suppose not. So you have heard nothing? Very good. Now, a most
wonderful thing has happened. When your uncle died and his will came to
be read, he had left everything to Miss Wakefield. No reason to tell
you that, I suppose? Now comes the strangest part of the story. With
the exception of a few hundreds in the local bank, not a penny can be
found. All the property has been mortgaged to the uttermost farthing;
all the stock is sold out; and, in fact, nothing is left but Eastwood,
which, as you know, is a small place, and not worth much. We have been
searching for two years, and not a trace can we find.’
‘Perhaps Miss Wakefield is hiding the plunder away,’ Eleanor suggested
with some indifference.
‘Impossible,’ eagerly exclaimed Mr Carver—‘impossible. What object
could she have in doing so? The money was clearly left to her; and it
is not likely that a woman so fond of show would deliberately choose to
spend her life in a dingy lodging-house.’
‘And Eastwood?’
‘Is empty. It will not let, neither can we sell it.’
‘So Miss Wakefield is no better off than she was four years ago!’
Eleanor said calmly. ‘Come, Mr Carver, that is good news, at anyrate.
It almost reconciles me to my position.’
‘Nelly, I wish you would not speak so,’ said Mr Carver seriously. ‘It
hurts me. You were not so hard at one time.’
‘Forgive me, my dear old friend,’ she replied simply. ‘Only consider
what a life we have been leading for the past two years, and you will
understand.’
‘And your husband?’
‘Killing himself,’ she said; ‘wearing out body and soul in one long
struggle for existence. It hurts me to see him. Always hoping, and
always working, always smiling and cheerful before me; and ever the
best of men and husbands. Dear friend, if you knew what he is to me,
and saw him as I do day after day, literally wearing out, you would
consider my seeming hardness pardonable. I am rebellious, you know.’
‘No, no,’ said Mr Carver, a suspicious gleam behind his spectacles;
‘I can understand it. The only thing I blame you for is that you did
not come to me before. You know what a lonely old bachelor I am, and
how—how rich I am. It would have been a positive kindness of you to
come and see me.—Now, listen. On Sunday, you and your husband must come
and dine with me. You know the old Russell Square address?’
‘God bless you for a true friend!’ said Eleanor, her tears flowing
freely now. ‘We will come; and I may bring my little girl with me?’
‘Eh, what?’ replied the lawyer—‘little girl? Of course, of course! Then
we will talk over old times, and see what can be done to make those
cheeks look a little like they used to do.—So you have got a little
girl, have you? Dear, dear, how the time goes!—Now, tell me candidly,
do you want any assistance—any, ah—that is—a little—in short, money?’
Eleanor coloured to the roots of her hair, and was about to reply
hastily, but said nothing.
‘Yes, yes,’ said Mr Carver rapidly.—‘I think, Bates’——
But Mr Bates already had his hand on the cheque-book, and commenced to
fill in the date. Mr Carver gave him a look of approbation, and flashed
him a sign with his fingers signifying the amount.
‘I suppose you have some friends?’ he continued hastily, to cover
Eleanor’s confusion. ‘It’s a poor world that won’t stand one good
friend.’
‘Yes, we have one,’ replied Eleanor, her face lighting up with a tender
glow—‘a good friend. You have heard of Jasper Felix the author? He is
far the best friend we have.’
‘Heard of Felix! I should think I have. Read every one of his books. I
am glad to hear of his befriending you. I knew the man who writes as he
does must have a noble heart.’
‘He has. What we should have done without his assistance, I shudder to
contemplate. I honestly believe that not one of my husband’s literary
efforts would have been accepted, had it not been for him.’
‘I can’t help thinking, Nelly, that there is a providence in these
things, and I feel that better days are in store for you. Anyway, it
won’t be my fault if it is not so. I have a presentiment that things
will come out all right in the end, and I fancy that your uncle’s
fortune is hidden away somewhere; and if it is hidden away, it must be,
I cannot help thinking, for your benefit.’
‘Don’t count upon it, Mr Carver,’ said Eleanor calmly. ‘I look upon the
money as gone.’
‘Nonsense!’ said that gentleman cheerfully; ‘while there is life
there is hope. I begin to feel that I am playing a leading character
in a romance; I do, indeed! Firstly, your uncle dies, and his
fortune is lost; secondly, you disappear; and at the very moment
I am longing—literally longing—to see you, you turn up. Now, all
that remains is to find the hidden treasure, and to be happy ever
afterwards, like the people in a fairy tale.’
‘Always enthusiastic,’ laughed Eleanor. ‘All we have to do is to
discover a mystic clue to a buried chest of diamonds, only we lack the
clue.’
‘’Pon my word, my dear, do you know I really think you have hit it?’
replied Mr Carver with great solemnity. ‘Now, at the time you left
Eastwood, your companion Margaret was in the house; and after your
uncle’s death, she disappeared. From a little hint Miss Wakefield
dropped to me, your old friend was in the sickroom alone with your
uncle the day he died.’
‘Alone? and then disappeared,’ said Eleanor, all trace of apathy gone,
and her eyes shining with interest.
‘Alone. Now, if we could only find Margaret Boulton’——
Eleanor rose from her seat, and approached Mr Carver slowly. Then she
said calmly: ‘There is no difficulty about that; she is at my house
now. I found her only last night on Waterloo Bridge—in fact, I saved
her.’
‘Saved her? Didn’t I say there was a providence in it? Saved her?’
‘From suicide!’
* * * * *
A quarter of an hour later, Eleanor was standing outside Mr Carver’s
office, evidently seeking a companion. From the bright flush on her
face and the sparkle in her eyes, hope—and a strong hope—had revived.
She stood there, quite unconscious of the admiration of passers-by,
sweeping the street in search of her quest. Presently the object
she was seeking came in view. He was a tall man, of slight figure,
with blue eyes deeply sunk in a face far from handsome, but full of
intellectual power and great character; a heavy, carelessly trimmed
moustache hid a sensitive mouth, but did not disguise a bright smile.
That face and figure was a famous one in London, and people there
turned in the busy street to watch Jasper Felix, and admire his rugged
powerful face and gaunt figure. He came swinging down the street now
with firm elastic step, and treated Eleanor to one of his brightest
smiles.
‘Did you think I had forgotten you?’ he said. ‘I have been prowling
about Gray’s Inn Road, for, sooth to say, the air of Bedford Row does
not agree with me.’
‘I hope I have not detained you,’ said Eleanor timidly; ‘I know how
valuable your time is to you.’
‘My dear child, don’t mention it,’ replied the great novelist lightly;
‘my time has been well occupied. First, I have been watching a fight
between two paviors. Do you know it is quite extraordinary how those
powerful men can knock each other about without doing much harm. Then
I have been having a long chat with an intellectual chimney-sweep—a
clever man, but a great Radical. I have spent quite an enjoyable
half-hour.’
‘A half-hour! Have I been so long? Mr Felix, I am quite horrified at
having taken up so much of your time.’
‘Awful, isn’t it,’ he laughed lightly. ‘Well, you won’t detain me much
longer, for here you are close at home.—Now, I will just run into Fleet
Street on my own business, and try and sell this little paper of your
husband’s at the same time. I’ll call in this afternoon; only, mind,
you must look as happy as you do now.’
Jasper Felix made his way through a court into Holborn, and along
that busy thoroughfare till he turned down Chancery Lane. Crossing
the street by the famous _Griffin_, he disappeared in one of the
interminable courts leading out of Samuel Johnson’s favourite
promenade, Fleet Street. The object of his journey was here. On the
door-plate was the inscription, ‘The _Midas Magazine_,’ and beneath the
legend, ‘First Floor.’ Ascending the dingy stair, he stopped opposite
a door on which, in white letters, was written the word ‘Editor.’ At
this door he knocked. It was not the timid rap of a literary aspirant,
but the important tap of a man who knew that he was welcome. Without
pausing for a reply, he pushed open the door.
‘How de do, Simpson?’ said Mr Felix, with a look of amusement in his
blue eyes.
‘Glad to see you, Felix,’ said the editor of the _Midas_ cordially. ‘I
thought you had forgotten us. I hope you have something for our journal
in your pocket.’
‘I _have_ something in my pocket to show you,’ answered Felix, ‘and I
think you will appreciate it.’
‘Is it something of your own?’ queried the man of letters.
‘No, it is not; and, what is more, I doubt if I could write anything so
good myself. I know when you have seen it, you will accept it.’
‘Um! I don’t know,’ replied the editor dubiously. ‘You see, I am simply
inundated with amateur efforts. Of course, sometimes I get something
good; but usually—— Now, if the matter in discussion was a manuscript
of your own’——
‘Now, seriously, Simpson, what do you care for me or anything of mine?
It is the name you want, not the work. You know well enough what sells
magazines of the _Midas_ type. It is not so much the literary matter as
the name. The announcement that the next month’s _Midas_ will contain
the opening chapters of a new serial by some one with a name, is quite
sufficient to increase your circulation by hundreds.’
‘’Pon my honour, you’re very candid,’ rejoined Mr Simpson. ‘But what is
this wonderful production you have?’
‘Well, I’ll leave it with you. You need not trouble to read it,
because, if you don’t take it, I know who will.’
‘What do you want for this triumph of genius?’
‘Well, in a word, ten pounds. Take it or leave it.’
‘If you say it is worth it, I suppose I must oblige you.’
‘That is a good way of putting it; and it will oblige me. But mark
me—this man will some day confer favours by writing for you, instead
of, as you regard it at present, favouring him.’
The proprietor of the _Midas_ sighed gently. The idea of paying over
ten pounds to an unknown contributor was not nice, but the fact of
offending Felix was worse.
‘If,’ said he, harping on the old string, and shaking his head with a
gentle deprecating motion—‘if it was one of yours now’——
‘What confounded nonsense you talk!’ exclaimed Felix impatiently.
‘Don’t get wild, Felix,’ replied Mr Simpson soothingly. ‘I will take
your protégé’s offering, to oblige you.’
‘But I don’t want you to oblige me. I want you to accept—and pay for—an
article good enough for anything. It is a fair transaction; and if
there is any favour about it, then it certainly is not on your side.’
Mr Simpson showed his white teeth in a dazzling smile. ‘Well, Felix, I
do admire your assurance,’ he said loftily. ‘I never heard the matter
put in that light before. My contributors, as a rule, don’t point their
manuscript at my head metaphorically, and demand speedy insertion and
prompt pay.—Do you want a cheque for this manuscript now?’
‘Yes, you may as well give me the cash now.’
Mr Simpson drew a cheque for the desired amount, and passed it over to
Felix, who folded the pink slip and placed it in his pocket; whereupon
the conversation drifted into other channels.
REVOLUTION BELOW-STAIRS.
The relations of employer and employed in private life and in public
are in a state of transition. The foundations of society itself are
undergoing drastic modifications, which will either sap or enhance
its strength. The air is charged with reform in every department of
social life. The very conditions of existence are more or less in
the crucible. The connection between man and man, between woman and
man, between man and the State, or woman and the State, are every one
of them passing through an ordeal of stringent examination. In no
direction is the old order of things vanishing more rapidly than in
the household. The relations of mistress and maid are not to-day what
they were yesterday, or what they will be to-morrow. A hundred years
ago, servants were more part and parcel of the establishment than they
are now. They entered a family, in the majority of cases, whilst they
were young, and marriage or death was the only cause of separation
in general. It never occurred to the domestic of the past to ‘give
notice,’ any more than it occurred to the mistress to dismiss her
servants, on the slightest provocation.
We need not travel far to ascertain what are the agencies which have
wrought the change. The same influences which are every day giving
the working classes increased power have affected in at least an
equally pronounced degree the domestic employee. In 1886, the footman
or the housemaid, the butler or the cook, is perhaps as well educated
as were many heads of households in 1786. If the upper classes are
now more cultured than they were in the olden days, so are the lower
classes. Advertising mediums, cheapness and ease of locomotion, and the
ever-spreading education of the masses, were boons undreamed of by the
‘Jeames’ whom Thackeray portrayed. Before these results of our progress
were realised, the sphere within which the energies of servants found
play was exceedingly limited. Beyond the locality in which they lived
and the immediate circle of their master’s acquaintances, the world was
to them little more than a blank and a mystery. To-day, they are nearly
as familiar with the world as are their masters.
The sooner this is understood and appreciated, the better for the
peace and stability of households. It is an invariable rule that the
most contented homes are those in which the servant is treated with
the greatest respect. Servants must be servants. No one but a lunatic
would suggest that they had any right to enter the drawing-room or
the dining-room on a footing of equality with its owner. But not less
idiotic is it to imagine that they will much longer consent to be
regarded as only one degree removed from the beast of burden. Their
opportunities for acquiring knowledge are so manifold that it would
be wonderful if this were not the case. Ladies and gentlemen sitting
round their table are apt to forget that the man or maid waiting upon
them has ears, and that their comments on life and the way the world is
wagging, cannot fail to excite attention on the part of the domestic.
Topics thrashed out in the dining-room or drawing-room are frequently
carried below-stairs, and there subjected to a similar process, though
it may be on very different lines. The result, equally with that of
love as defined by Kenelm Chillingly, must inevitably be ‘a disturbance
of the mental equilibrium.’
The unrest which characterises society itself characterises every
section of the community. To ‘better’ themselves is the lifelong
aim of servants in the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Good
servants are already at a premium. The complaint is constantly made
that whilst domestics are more independent than of yore, their work
is less carefully attended to. Those who understand the forces at work
in our midst have no difficulty in recognising that, as time goes on,
first-class servants will become rarer still. Preposterous as it may
seem, this phenomenon is only another phase of the ‘social status’
question. There is, quite without reason, attaching to service a
certain disposition on the part of many of our domestics to resent the
washing-up of dishes or the cleaning of a floor.
The rule is not, of course, absolute, and there are many really good
servants who enter a family and stay in it a number of years. But
the tendency of the period is nomadic. In some quarters, there is a
disposition to account for the perpetual changing of servants on the
ground that servants love change. This is not altogether accurate.
Many dislike nothing so much as fresh faces and fresh work, and
are by no means eager to enter upon the duties of their new home.
Others, however, leave one situation with the express hope that
they may never enter another, and if employment of a different kind
offers, eagerly avail themselves of it, albeit generally to their own
disadvantage. Thousands of young men and women in every way qualified
for service are swamping many callings. Milliners, dressmakers, clerks,
shop-assistants—what a host might be found in the ranks of these who
would constitute first-class recruits for private service! It is a
fact, that whilst their numbers are on the increase, the numbers of
domestics are almost stationary. During the decade 1871 to 1881, the
census proved that indoor servants had increased by only one per cent.,
and consequently, proportionately to the increase of population, were
scarcer in 1881 than ten years before. On the other hand, clerks
had doubled; milliners had increased by nearly nineteen per cent.;
dressmakers, by nearly eight per cent.; and seamstresses, by over five
per cent.