A MAYFAIR COUNSELLOR
Herriard had indeed much to exercise his mind that night. Thinking over
his interview with Gastineau, several things puzzled him. To begin
with, he was at a loss to understand his friend’s continued attitude of
disbelief in the value of Campion’s evidence. He would never even be
brought to admit that there might be anything in it beyond an obvious
trick for obtaining money. Every one else held the testimony to be
invaluable; Gastineau alone maintained a rigid scepticism.
Then Herriard could scarcely understand Gastineau’s reception of the
news about Dr. Hallamar. It was to have been expected that he, lying
there a helpless cripple with an abnormally active brain, his spirit
full of energy, and the desire for action, so cruelly fettered by
his helpless limbs, would at least have shown more eagerness at the
hope suddenly brought to him. As it was, he had fallen in with the
suggestion of submitting his case to the great specialist as coolly,
even casually, as though it had been merely a question of sending round
to the chemist’s for a box of lozenges. True, he had lost no time about
writing, and here arose another question which perplexed Herriard.
Why had he insisted upon writing himself to Dr. Hallamar? He had
written the note, had sealed it up without communicating one word of
its contents, and had sent it off by Hencher; whereas the more natural
course would have been to let him, Herriard, who had an acquaintance
with the Doctor, and had already half arranged the visit, be the
messenger. He had kept him there, ostensibly to speak of his need
for a thousand pounds; but surely a few seconds would have settled
that simple matter. The money could not have been transferred before
banking hours next day; the question might have waited till later in
the evening, for Herriard, had he gone, would have returned with the
Doctor, as he had practically arranged to do. Why, again, when Hallamar
had expressed himself as at liberty and willing to attend that evening,
had he put off his visit till the morning? Had Gastineau in his note
suggested this? And, if so, why the delay? Herriard could not make it
all out. Nor why his friend had suddenly found the pressing need of a
thousand pounds. He had always understood that Gastineau had, during
his active life, made a sufficient fortune to assure him easy, if not
affluent, circumstances for the rest of his days. His house was his
own freehold, and, although it was furnished in the most luxurious and
costly fashion, still that had been all capital expenditure and paid
for long since: his current expenses as an invalid, in an existence of
the strictest seclusion, with the smallest possible household, could
not be heavy. With the single exception of indulging a hobby for buying
valuable books, he had, so far as Herriard knew, no extravagances. As
his debtor he was only too glad to let him have the money, for the idea
that all the profit of their partnership was going to his share had
often given him qualms; still, why this sudden demand for a thousand
pounds? Gastineau might have told him; their relations assuredly
justified confidence; nevertheless his reasons had been studiously
vague. A veil of mystery seemed to be falling between the two men; it
was useless to blink the fact that of late their relations had been
gradually changing. Sometimes there had seemed, on Gastineau’s side at
least, to be a certain tacit antagonism between them. Herriard could
not understand it. Was his friend thinking of making yet another man’s
fortune? Had he, himself, any cause for self-reproach in his conduct
towards his mentor? He could hardly charge himself with that. Until the
question of Campion’s evidence had cropped up they had never had even a
difference of opinion. Herriard had never found himself in a position
to dispute the cleverer man’s judgment until Gastineau’s assumption
of that unaccountable attitude towards the witness on whom so much
depended, and his refusal to make, at least, the best of it.
One explanation suggested itself, and it was that his friend’s brain
might be gradually becoming affected. It was not a pleasant solution,
yet more natural than any other alternative which might vaguely present
itself. He had that evening questioned Gastineau about the pain which
at times made him unfit to receive even him, his one friend: telling
him that Dr. Hallamar could not understand the spinal injury at this
stage causing him more than irritation, and perhaps a little smarting
or burning. Gastineau had replied rather tartly that he might be
allowed to be the best judge of his own sufferings, and that a man
would feel pain in spite of the theories of the whole medical faculty
that he had no business to have it.
So Herriard found no solution of his perplexities; the more he thought
of his friend’s conduct the more strange and unaccountable did it
appear; he could only postpone the elucidation for the light of further
developments. And the first that came was one which gave him no help
towards enlightenment.
When, early the next day, he went to the house in Mayfair to learn the
result of the specialist’s visit, Gastineau told him calmly that the
verdict was adverse.
“No; Dr. Hallamar says he can do nothing for me,” the patient
reiterated, as Herriard seemed to question his first announcement. “It
is a bad case of spinal paralysis following a crushing lesion, and
hopelessly incurable. Happily I was never inclined to indulge in any
real hope of a cure.”
“But,” Herriard protested, “I understood that it was in treating
serious spinal lesions that Hallamar was so successful. I don’t
understand his giving you up at least without a trial.”
“Hallamar is manifestly a very clever man, a genius possibly, in his
own line,” Gastineau replied; “and your really clever man always knows
his limitations. It is only pushing fools and quacks who blunder on
till their own incompetency pulls them up sharply. This man, being
no fool, and his interest being all the other way, tells me, after a
careful examination, that he can do nothing for me. Neither you nor I,
my dear Geof, need go behind that verdict.”
“I am sorry,” said Herriard, in a tone of genuine sympathy, “very
sorry. I had set great hopes on his curing you.”
Gastineau’s harsh laugh seemed the outcome of repressed disappointment.
“You thought this wonder-worker could revive the dead, for that is
practically what I am. Even a Hallamar cannot perform miracles. As it
turns out, my dear boy, you need have no cause for regret that you did
not bring this medico to me sooner.”
Something in the tone of the last words put Herriard on his defence. “I
give you my word, Gastineau----” he began warmly. But the other stopped
him with a gesture.
“Please don’t trouble to protest,” he interrupted. “No doubt you did
everything for the best, and, as it happens, could have done no more. I
am here till I die, and it is just as well to know it. Let us dismiss
the subject with a decree nisi. Now, can I help you with anything
to-day, or is it all plain sailing?”
* * * * *
Two days afterwards it happened that the Duchess of Lancashire was
at home to her more select circle of intimates and courtiers, among
the latter being Dormer Greetland, whose profession it was to go
everywhere, that is to say, to every house worth entering where he
could get admittance. It was the eve of the great libel trial, the
last stage which it was now confidently expected would triumphantly
exonerate Countess Alexia von Rohnburg from the stigma she had borne.
“I suppose it is quite certain that the Countess will come out of
it with flying colours?” Lady Rotherfield enquired of the society
newsvendor, a little anxiously, seeing that, after a period of
avoidance which might be called judicious or snobbish, according to
one’s mental view of the conduct of her tribe, she had that very
afternoon left cards at the tabooed house in Green Street.
“She is bound to, on this man Campion’s evidence,” Greetland assured
her sympathetically. “They say the newspaper men are quite prepared
for at least a month’s imprisonment and a thousand pounds fine, which,
of course, means nothing to a man like Brailsford. They say he has
given Burwoods carte blanche to furnish his room in Holloway in the
most elaborate fashion.”
“Ah!” Lady Rotherfield did not much care about the peccant editors and
their schemes for minimizing the rigours of an enforced sojourn in an
unfashionable latitude. She was more interested in her tactical mistake
towards the von Rohnburgs who might still be a power in her world.
“I suppose,” she murmured, “everybody has been holding off a little?
Of course things did at one time look very black against the poor
Countess.”
Greetland gave a shrug of sympathy which conveyed a sort of confession
of apology for pardonable short-sightedness. “One hardly liked to call
while the case hung in the balance,” he protested. “It would have
seemed intrusive and prying; and, naturally, one hates the idea of
that.”
So spoke Mr. Dormer Greetland whose whole existence was one long
intrusion, and for whom earth held no greater pleasure than was to
be derived from prying and the impertinent study of other folks’
weaknesses and distress.
“Ah, then people have not been calling? I wanted to ask you, Mr.
Greetland. You always know the rights and wrongs of everything, and
nowadays people, who ought to know better, are given to such provoking
inaccuracies, don’t you know.”
The recognized fountain of scandal and arbiter of the latest correct
conduct accepted the compliment as merely a truism. “It is a pity,”
he pronounced, “that ignorant people will prattle absurdities, and
that they find others to believe them. Why, I can assure you, Lady
Rotherfield, that I have to spend half my time in contradicting the
most ridiculous fairy tales that idiots rush about with. It is enough
to disgust one with the present state of things in society.”
“Yes,” Lady Rotherfield assented, “as though it were not bad enough to
have all these outsiders pushing themselves into our houses, without
their bringing their misleading half-knowledge of our affairs with
them. So the Countess will be quite rehabilitated? I am so glad. She
is really so clever and charming, and one shudders to think what would
have been the result if she had been unable to establish her innocence;
anyhow, _declassées_ have such a terrible time, and give it to their
friends. I suppose it would not do to invite them to dine till the case
is really over?”
Greetland pouted dubiously. “There is, of course, a certain risk,
but it is scarcely worth considering, as the case stands. On the
other hand, it would be a good move to show confidence, where one is
practically safe, and an invitation sent off before the verdict is
given would re-establish the _entente cordiale_. I know for a fact that
Herriard is absolutely certain of getting a conviction, and of course
that means the triumph of Alexia.”
“Just so,” Lady Rotherfield agreed. “One may as well send them to-night
an invitation to dine next week. So many people will like to meet her
now.”
“Yes, indeed,” the social Autolycus agreed. “The Countess will be
absolutely the rage, and it will be quite the smart thing to give
dinners to meet her. So I should not delay, if you want to get her next
week. There is sure to be a rush for her.”
“Ah, yes, to be sure. People are so eager to make the best of these
little disappointments. I’ll send out cards directly I get home. You’ll
come, dear Mr. Greetland? You must come. What day will suit you?”
“I haven’t a night for the next three weeks,” answered the much desired
gossip.
“Oh, but you must really come,” Lady Rotherfield urged. “What people
next week can you throw over best?”
The _preux chevalier_ consulted a gold-bound note-book. “Let me see,”
he murmured, as, with an air of due importance, he ran through his
thronging engagements. “You know I’ll do what I can for you, dear
lady. Tuesday, the Andovers; Lady Andover would never forgive me if
I threw her over; Wednesday, the Zoylands; half the Cabinet will be
there, I must go and make Lord Sarum tell me what we are really going
to do about Russia; Thursday, the Tudor-Fitzralphs; I am to dine and
go to the play with some poor people who have just bought the Duke of
St. Ives’s house in Piccadilly; they are hopeless outsiders, by way of
being millionaires, of course, and all that, which is so tiresome, but
I have promised to do what I can for them, and it would be an awful
blow if I didn’t turn up.”
“Surely you might throw the wretched creatures over,” his would-be
hostess suggested. “Millionaires have no feelings, to speak of, or they
would never have become millionaires. Surely you are not going to let
such absurd people stand in your way?”
“Oh, no,” Greetland responded; “they are too utterly impossible and
beneath consideration. One would think as little of throwing them over
as of pitching a pebble into the Serpentine. But the difficulty is that
I have got Lady Hester Nayland to consent to go, and if I am not there
she will have no one to speak to.”
“Why does she go?” was Lady Rotherfield’s not unnatural enquiry.
“Well,” Greetland explained, “it appears that Lady Hester, who has
taken up good works since Ormskirk jilted her, landed the millionaire
people the other day at a bazaar with a lot of rubbish at fancy prices.
They are as keen on getting something more for their money as she is
for their money. So she has graciously consented to dine with them on
condition that she goes into dinner with me and is not expected to
speak much to the _nouveaux riches_. Consequently, if I fail, poor Lady
Hester will be reduced to silence for a whole evening, and you know, to
put it mildly, she has no impediment in her speech.”
“No, indeed,” Lady Rotherfield replied, “except the impediment it made
to her marriage. They say Ormskirk was absolutely stunned, and for a
relief has gone out to some spot on the Sahara where he won’t hear the
sound of a human voice for six months.”
“Yes,” Greetland said, “I’m afraid it would be the refinement of
cruelty to leave Lady Hester in the lurch, and she does in her heart
so hate the _haute Juiverie_. No, I see I am dining with the Ambroses
on Friday. They are unexceptional themselves, but rather injudicious
in their choice of friends. One never knows what one is in for there.
I once had to meet at their house an awful person from the City who
talked in multiples of a million, and whose principal capital seemed to
be capital I’s. He had brought an absurd wife, festooned with diamonds
like a segment of a transformation scene. I told Lady Ambrose that
if she ever invited these farcical creatures again, which I hoped
she would not, she ought to arrange to have a lime-light man to throw
different colours on the pantomime person to vary the monotony of the
ill-gotten gems.”
“No wonder,” Lady Rotherfield observed, “diamonds are going out of
fashion with us.”
“Very well, then,” Greetland decided, “it must be Friday. If poor Lady
Ambrose will be injudicious about the people she asks one to meet, she
must expect an occasional disappointment.”
“Friday, then,” said the lady. “It is quite good of you. I will secure
the von Rohnburgs at once. Ah, dear Duchess,” she went on, as their
hostess joined them, “we were just talking of this tiresome case.
How you, to say nothing of the dear Countess Alexia, must have been
worried, and how glad you must be at the prospect of seeing the last of
it. Will the Duke have to give evidence again?”
“Oh, yes, I’m afraid so,” the Duchess answered, with a touch of
ruefulness. “The poor Duke has been bound over to appear again just as
though he were a common malefactor who would be likely to abscond.”
“How absurd,” Lady Rotherfield exclaimed, with as much show of
indignation as she could command.
“Yes,” her Grace pursued. “I call it abominable and most idiotic that
there should be no distinction made between people in our position and
the common herd whose native air is the atmosphere of a police court.
Why should a man like Lancashire be forced to hang about the horrid
dingy place, jostled by all sorts of unpleasant people, and then be
insulted and browbeaten by unmannerly lawyers who would not dare to
speak to him anywhere else? I call it too disgusting.”
“The Duke must hate it,” Greetland suggested sympathetically.
“Naturally. He is most indignant about the whole business. And the
police-court ordeal, he says, is so unconstitutional in his case. How
can men in Lancashire’s position expect to be looked up to, and to keep
up their dignity, if they are liable to be placed in these ridiculous
positions and made a laughing-stock for the mob?”
“Just so,” Lady Rotherfield agreed, in a tone of compassionate
indignation. “That is what I always maintain. If Dukes and so forth are
to have their weaknesses exposed and to be exhibited as no different
from ordinary humanity, what becomes of their prestige and influence?
They ought certainly to be exempt from these public exposures.”
This was going somewhat farther towards the truth than the Duchess had
intended. She looked rather black, while Greetland’s face was a study
of amusement struggling with the professional decorum due towards the
Peerage.
“The Duke,” said her Grace tartly, “talks of bringing the question
before the House of Lords.”
“Don’t you think, Duchess,” suggested Lady Rotherfield sweetly,
“that it would be wiser to let it drop? You are not likely to have
another affair of the sort here, one would hope, and if it is debated,
that terrible _farceur_, Evesham, is sure to make fun of it and,
incidentally, of the dear Duke.”
The Duchess’s face lowered darker than ever. She was very tenacious of
her monopoly of gibing at her consort’s stupidity. Greetland, who had
plenty of tact, natural and acquired, was about to intervene with a
change of subject, when Aubrey Playford, who had just come in, joined
them with a suggestion in his manner of something important to tell.
“Have you heard the latest news, Duchess?” he asked quickly, as he
touched her hand.
“No; what is it?” the Duchess enquired, in some trepidation as she
noticed the little malicious gleam of pleasure in his eyes.
“Anything to do with the case?” Greetland asked casually. It was
natural for him to hate people who got before him with news.
“Very much to do with the case,” Playford replied. “This new witness,
Campion, whose evidence was to settle it off-hand----”
“What!” exclaimed Lady Rotherfield breathlessly, “he has not absconded?”
“Worse, for him, at any rate,” Playford answered. “He has met with a
fatal accident.”
The news was so startling that for a few moments no one could speak.
“How unfortunate!” Lady Rotherfield commented mechanically.
“How dreadful!” chimed in the Duchess, trying to calculate how the
incident would affect her interest in the case.
“But is it true?” Greetland questioned sceptically. He always made a
point of challenging the authenticity of news carried by other people.
“Undoubtedly true,” Playford returned emphatically. “He was knocked
down and run over by a hansom this evening, and, curiously enough, just
here in Piccadilly, not a stone’s throw from where he made out he
originally saw Reggie Martindale’s supposed murderer.”
The propinquity of the tragedy slightly enhanced its impressiveness.
“And he is dead?” The Duchess asked the question.
Playford gave a decisive nod. “Died before they could get him to St.
George’s Hospital.”
“Are they sure it is the same man?” Greetland suggested, holding
tenaciously to his line of non-acceptance.
“Absolutely,” Playford answered. “My man told me all about it. He saw
the poor fellow being taken away in the ambulance. And I made a point
of calling at the police-station to enquire if what I had heard was
true. There is no doubt that the man was Campion; the Superintendent
was quite positive. So I thought I would come and tell you at once,
Duchess.”
“It was very kind of you,” the hostess replied, as graciously as her
state of mind permitted. “Dear me, this distressing business seems
unending.”
“Poor Countess Alexia!” Greetland remarked, slyly watching Lady
Rotherfield.
The prospective hostess of the unfortunate Countess had for the moment
overlooked that consequence of the tragedy.
“Ah,” she exclaimed, waking up to the fresh interest. “This poor man’s
death must make all the difference to her, must it not?”
“Decidedly,” Playford answered, with a readiness bred of malice.
The Duchess had gone off to carry the news. Lady Rotherfield turned to
Greetland.
“Oh, Mr. Greetland, how lucky this unpleasant news came just now. Fancy
one’s feelings if one had seen it in the papers to-morrow morning, when
the invitations had been posted over-night! I do hope Lady Ambrose
won’t have another objectionable City person to inflict on you next
Friday.”