THE FOOLISH NOTE.
Yorke walked all the way from St. John's Wood to Bury Street, and it
was not altogether a pleasant walk.
There is a popular parlor game called "Consequences," and, after a
fashion, he was playing that game as he strode along smoking vigorously.
It is an easy and pleasant amusement running into debt; but there are
consequences. It is also an easy and pleasant matter to make love to
two women; but the consequences have to be reckoned with, and the
reckoning, whether it come sooner or later, is a serious matter.
He had never loved Lady Eleanor, but he respected and liked her. He
had certainly never loved Finetta, but he had liked her--liked her very
much; and as he made his way through the silent streets his heart--it
was by no means a hard one--was filled with pity and remorse.
"It was playing it very rough to go and tell her that I should have
to cut her, that she wasn't fit company for me any longer, but what
else could I do? I couldn't cut her without a word, without saying
'Good-by,'" he mused. "And how well she took it. No scene! no fuss!
no reproaches!" It was well that he was unable to see Finetta at that
moment; or perhaps it would have been better for him if he could.
"She bore it like a brick. She is a brick! Most women of her class
would have raised a duse of a row, and made it hot for me all round.
Yes, Fin's behaved well. What a fool I have been! What fools we men
all are! Why did I want to strike up a friendship with Finetta of the
Diadem? And yet that's scarcely the fair way to look at it, for in a
way she's as good as I am. And she'd have gone a hundred miles to do me
a service; yes, and have shared her last penny with me. I know that!
Poor Fin! Thank Heaven, it's over! I'll begin a new life from to-night,
please God. A life devoted to my darling. My darling! Heaven! It
scarcely seems true that she is mine. I wonder whether she is asleep.
Perhaps she is looking up at these small stars, and----. Yes, I hope
she is thinking of me. Jove! It's like having a guardian angel all to
one's self to be loved by such a woman as Leslie. I wish I were more
worthy of her. I wish I'd met her years ago! What a time I seem to have
wasted!"
He had forgotten Finetta long before he reached home, and was wrapped
up heart and soul in Leslie, and looking with impatience toward the
hour when he could return to Portmaris.
He would have gone back the next day, but the duke had asked him to do
one or two things for him; and he, Yorke, was anxious to pay some bills.
He went out after breakfast, and his first call was at a grimy office
in a dark and dingy court leading out of Lombard Street. This was the
parlor of a certain money-lending spider called Levison, and Lord Yorke
was not the first fly that had found its way into it.
Mr. Levison was a grimy man with a hooked nose and thick lips, an
unctuous smile, and decidedly Israelite accent. He was dressed in the
height of fashion, wore a scarlet necktie in which shone an enormous
diamond horse-shoe pin, a thick gold cable albert across his waistcoat,
and innumerable rings upon his fingers, which called unkind attention
to the fact that the latter were dirty.
This young gentleman greeted Lord Yorke with a mixture of respect and
familiarity which made Yorke--and most other persons--feel an almost
irresistible longing to kick him.
"And 'ow's your lordship?" said Mr. Levison, with a smile that
stretched his flexible lips from ear to ear. "It ain't often we see you
in the city, my lord; more's the pity for the city!" And he laughed
and rubbed his hands. "What can I have the pleasure of doin' for your
lordship? A little accommodation, I s'pose, eh?"
Yorke shook his head.
"Thanks, no, Mr. Levison," he said.
Mr. Levison appeared to be surprised.
"No? Oh, come now, my lord! Not want a little money? You're joking!"
"Strange as it may seem, I am serious," said Yorke as pleasantly as he
could. "I don't want any money; in fact, I've come to take up that bill
for two hundred and fifty pounds."
And he took out his pocket-book, in which were lying snugly the
bank-notes for which he had cashed the duke's check.
Now, it is generally and not erroneously supposed that a Jew is always
ready and glad to receive money; but Mr. Levison, singular to relate,
looked neither ready nor glad. He stared at Yorke with widely opened
eyes, and his face grew first red and then pale.
"You don't mean to say that you want to pay off that two hundred and
fifty, my lord?" he said at last and in a tone almost of dismay.
"Startles you, doesn't it?" said Yorke, with a smile, for the Jew's
consternation amused him. "It is rather an unexpected and extraordinary
proceeding on my part, I'll admit; but----. Get the bill, Levison," and
he began to separate the notes.
The Jew gazed at them, and then up at the handsome, careless face, and
lastly at the ground.
"Look here, my lord," he said, thickly. "There really ain't any
neshesity for you to go and inconvenience yourself, there ain't,
indeed! Besides," he had turned to the grimy desk and consulted a grimy
account book, "the bill ain't due! There's no call to pay it for some
time yet."
"I know, at least I thought so," said Yorke, carelessly; "but I've got
some money, and I thought I'd like to clear off something of what I owe
you. Why!" and he laughed, "you don't seem inclined to take it. What's
the matter? You haven't--" his face grew grave, "you haven't parted
with the bills to any one else, Levison?"
Mr. Levison's oily face grew almost pale--say yellow.
"What! Me go and part with the bills of a customer like you! Not me,
my lord! 'Tain't likely! I know better what's due to a swell like your
lordship."
"Very well, then," said Yorke. "Take my money, and let me have it,
please."
"Yesh, yesh, certainly. If your lordship insists; but upon my sacred
honor, I'd rather lend you another two-fifty than----. Well, well!" And
he went to a safe and fumbled in his pocket.
"Tut, tut!" he exclaimed. "Blessed if I haven't left my keys at my
brother's. Excuse me half a minute, will you, my lord? 'Ave a glass of
sherry and a smoke while you're waiting----."
"No, no, thanks," said Yorke, who had once been prevailed upon to taste
Mr. Levison's sherry, and had smelled the cigars while Mr. Levison had
been smoking them. "Look sharp, my cab is waiting."
"Not more than 'arf a minute," said Mr. Levison, and he darted out,
down the street, and full pelt into Messrs. Rawlings and Duncombe.
Ralph Duncombe, cool, grave, collected, a contrast to the flurried
Israelite, looked up from his writing-table.
"Mishter Dunkombe, sir!" gasped Levison. "Here's Lord Horchester come
to take up that bill of two-fifty. Wonderful, ain't it? Let's have it
sharp. Moses! I wouldn't have him know I'd sold it to you for twice the
money, and he 'arf suspects something a'ready."
Ralph Duncombe looked down at the letter he was writing; finished it,
as if he had scarcely heard, then drew a book toward him, looked at it,
and said:
"The bill isn't due. Why should Lord Auchester want to pay money before
it is wanted?"
"'Ow do I know? Mad, p'raps! Anyhow, he does!"
Ralph Duncombe thought a moment, then he pushed the book from him, and
looked straight at the anxious face before him.
"He cannot have the bill," he said.
Levison gasped.
"What?"
"He cannot have it. It suits me to stick by it till it is due."
"Oh, Mishter Dunkombe, sir! What's the meaning of that? What am I to
say to him?"
"A mere whim on my part--perhaps," said Ralph Duncombe, coolly,
impassively. "What are you to say? Say anything. Offer to lend him more
money. I will take any bill he gives you. Good-morning."
He struck the gong standing at his elbow, and Levison, feeling too
bewildered to expostulate or argue, was shown out.
He went back slowly, wiping the perspiration from his face. If it were
known that he had parted with Lord Auchester's bills he would probably
get a bad name with the other 'swells,' and lose half of them as
customers; his business would be ruined!
He forced a grin as he entered the office, and threw up his hands with
a beautiful gesture of amazement.
"Heresh a go, my lord!" he exclaimed. "Brother's gone off to see a
client in the country, and took them confounded keys of mine with him.
But there, it don't matter for a day or two, does it? I'll send the
bill, or call on your lordship----."
Yorke put his pocket-book back.
"Very well," he said. "Mind, I want to pay the money--while I've got
it. You see?"
The Jew grinned.
"I see; before it melts; eh, my lord? But there, as I said, why pay at
all? Why not let me lend you----."
Yorke shook his head and laughed.
"No, thanks, Mr. Levison. I don't mean to trouble you in that way
again, if I can help it. Good-morning." And with a pleasant nod he went
out of the grimy parlor, leaving the spider staring after him with
unfeigned surprise.
"Don't want to borrow any more money!" he gasped. "Why, what in the
name of Moses has come to him. He--he must be going off his 'ead!"
Yorke dismissed the little incident from his mind, guessing nothing of
its significance, or the effect it would have on his future, and had
himself driven to Bond Street.
He had commenced the morning by doing his duty--or trying to do it--and
now he was going to reward himself by buying a present for Leslie.
He had pondered over what he should get, and had at first, naturally,
thought of a ring; but he had remembered that she could not wear it
without attracting notice and question, and had decided on a locket.
The man showed him some, and Yorke selected a plain one with the
initial 'Y' prettily worked in bas-relief.
While he was paying for it, the shopman, who knew him quite well,
brought forward a tray of diamond ornaments.
"The newest designs, my lord," he said.
Yorke shook his head, but even as he did so Finetta flashed across his
mind. He looked at the bundle of notes; he had plenty of money; she had
behaved remarkably well; she deserved a present, a parting gift; he
would give her one.
He knew Finetta's passion for diamonds, and comforted himself with the
reflection--a wrong one, as we know--that they would console her for
the loss of him.
He was not long in choosing--not half as long as he had been in
selecting Leslie's simple locket--and purchased a pendant. It cost him
a hundred and thirty pounds.
"Shall I send them, my lord?" asked the man.
"No," said York. "I'll take 'em. Put them up, singly, in a box. I'm
going to send them through the post."
The man inclosed them in a couple of wooden boxes, and bowed Lord
Auchester out.
York went home, and straight to a drawer in which he kept odd things,
and after some amount of rummaging found a _carte de visite_ portrait
of himself. He sat down, lit a cigar, and, as neatly as he could, cut
out the head of the portrait and fitted it in the locket; wrote on a
slip of paper, "From Yorke," and laid them aside.
Then he took a sheet of paper, and dashed off in the charming scrawl
which boys acquire at Eton--and never lose--the following note:
"DEAR FIN.--Will you accept the inclosed and wear it for the sender's
sake, and in remembrance of the many delightful times we have spent
together? I thought of you nearly all the way home last night--it was
awfully late!--and shall never forget how good you have always been to
me. Think of me sometimes when you wear this trifle, and don't think
too unkindly!"
"Yours,
"YORKE."
It was a foolish note. But he would be a wise man who could write a
wise one under such circumstances. Of course, a wise one wouldn't have
written at all; but Yorke was not famous for prudence.
He laid this note beside the beautiful diamond pendant, wrapped, like
the locket, in tissue paper, and was putting them in their respective
boxes when Fleming came in.
"Lord Vinson, my lord," he said.
Yorke looked up with a shade of annoyance on his face.
"Oh----. Ask Lord Vinson to wait a moment," he said, hurriedly. "There's
a midday post for the country, isn't there?"
"Yes, my lord," said Fleming. "Can I help your lordship?" for Yorke was
hunting about for string and sealing wax.
"No! Yes. Here, wrap these boxes up in thickish paper, and seal the
string. Mind! This, No. 1, goes in this one, and that, No. 2, in that!
Understand?"
"Yes, my lord," said Fleming, and no doubt he thought he did. But when
he brought them back from the side table at which he had been packing
them, and Lord Yorke asked him which was No. 1, Fleming, the usually
careful and correct, handed him No. 2!
And so it happened that when, a few minutes later, Fleming walked off
with them to the post-office, the locket with the portrait, but with
Finetta's letter, was directed to Finetta, and the diamond pendant to
Leslie!