COUSIN ALFRED'S SECRET.
It was a few days later, in the forenoon. John Haveril was gone into
the City on the business of keeping together what he had got--a
business which seems to take up the whole of a rich man's time and
more, so that he really has no chance of looking for the way to the
kingdom of heaven. His wife sat at the window of her room in the
hotel, contemplating the full tide of life below. She was not in the
least a philosopher--the sight of the people, and the carriages, and
the omnibuses, did not move her to meditate on the brevity of life as
it moves some thinkers. It pleased her; she thought of places where
she had lived in Western America, and the contrast pleased her. Nor
was she moved, as a poet, to find something to say about this tide of
life. The poet, you know, looks not only for the phrase appropriate,
but for the phrase distinctive. Mrs. Haveril had never heard of such a
thing. She only thought that there was nothing like it in the Western
States, and that she remembered nothing like it in the village of
Hackney. Molly was lying on the sofa, reading a novel.
One of the hotel pages disturbed her dreamery, which was close upon
dropping off, by bringing up in a silver salver a dirty slip of paper,
on which was written in pencil--
"Mr. Alfred Pennefather. For Mrs. Haveril. Bearer waits."
"Is it a man in rags? Is he a disgrace to the hotel?"
"Well, ma'am, he _is_ in rags. As for his being a disgrace--he says
he's your cousin." Here he laughed, holding the silver salver before
his mouth.
"I wouldn't laugh at a poor man, if I were you. Why," said Mrs.
Haveril, drawing a bow at a venture, "you've got cousins of your own
in the workhouse. Send him up, right away," she added.
The man came in. The page shut the door quickly behind him, to conceal
the figure of rags not often seen in that palatial place.
It was Alfred the Broken; strange to say, though it was less than
a week since he had received that gift of golden sovereigns, the
appearance of the man was as seedy as ever; his hat--a ridiculously
tall silk hat with a limp brim--can anything look more forlorn?--his
coat with ragged wrists; his boots parting from the soles; a ragged
and decayed person, more ragged, more decayed, than before.
"Well?" the lady's voice was not encouraging. "You came here last week
with the rest of them."
"I did, Alice--I did."
"You had champagne with the rest; you heard what my husband had to
say: when the rest were gone, he gave you money. What have you done
with that money? What do you want now?"
"I want to have a quiet talk with you."
The man had that sketchy irresolute face which foretells, in certain
levels of life, social wreck. Not an evil face, exactly--the man with
the evil face very often gets on in life--but with a weak face. You
may see such a face any day in a police-court. First, it is a charge
connected with the employer's accounts, then it is generally a charge
of petty robbery. The last case I saw myself was one of boots snatched
from an open counter. Between the first charge and the second there
is a dreadful change in the matter of clothes; but there is never
any change in face. As for Alfred Pennefather, one could understand
that he had once been the gay and dashing Alf among his pals; that he
had heard the midnight chimes ring; that he knew by experience the
attractions of the public billiard-room, and the joys of pool; that
he read the sporting papers; that he put a "bit" on his fancy; that
whatever line of life he might attempt, therein he would fail; and
that repeated failures would place him outside the forgiveness of his
friends. For repeated misfortunes, as well as repeated follies, we can
never forgive.
"You can talk," said his cousin. "This--young lady"--she was going to
say "cousin of yours"--"does not count. Go on."
"I hoped, the other day, Alice, to find you alone. In that crowd of
greedy impudent beggars and flatterers, I could not. I assure you I
was ashamed of being in such company. As for Cousin Charles, if it had
not been for you----"
"Go on to something else, please. You all came for what you could
get; now, what do you want?"
"I'll sit down." He took the most comfortable chair in the room, and
stretched out his legs. "This is the lap of luxury. Alice, you're a
happy woman."
"Oh! Go on."
"The world has been against me, Alice, from the beginning. Look at
these boots. Ask yourself whether the world has not been against me.
Don't believe what they say. Scandalous, impudent liars, all of them,
especially Charles. No fault of mine. No, Alice. It's the world."
"What do you want, again?"
"I want an advance."
"Then do what my husband told you--write to him. What has become of
the money he gave you? Is that spent already?"
"Don't call it spent, Alice. Debts paid, common necessaries bought."
"Debts! Who would trust you? Necessaries! Why, you are shabbier than
ever."
"Well, I can prove to you, Alice, that the money was well laid out."
When, after many days, the man at the bottom of the ladder gets a few
pounds in gold, the first temptation is to make a night of it. What?
We are not money-grabbers. To-morrow for a new rig-out; to-morrow
for the weary business of finding employment; to-night for joy and
the wine-cup. When the morrow dawns the wine-cup still lingers in
the brain--but the gold pieces--where are they? Gone as a dream--a
splendid dream of the night. Thus, after a little sleep and a little
slumber, poverty cometh again as a robber: and want as an armed man.
"Don't let's talk about money spent," he said cheerfully. "Let's talk
about the future. I'm right down at the bottom of the ladder, Alice.
Help me up."
If a man says that he is at the bottom of the ladder, he generally
speaks the truth. It is one of those little things about which we are
agreed not to tell lies. And when he asks to be helped up, he always
speaks with sincerity.
"I have no money of my own."
"You've things that make money." His eyes fell on a bracelet lying on
the table.
Alice shook her finger at him. "Cousin Alfred," she said, "if you mean
that I am going to give you my husband's presents for you to take to
a pawnbroker, I will have you bundled out of the house. Now, tell me
what you came for, before I ring the bell for the waiter."
He began to cry. He really was underfed and very miserable. "Oh! she's
got a hard heart--and all I want is forty pounds--for the good will
and stock-in-trade of a tobacconist--to become a credit to the family."
"I have no money of my own," Alice repeated. "If that is all you have
to say, go away. My husband may come back at any moment."
"He won't. I watched. He's gone into the City on the top of a 'bus.
With all his money, rides outside a 'bus. He's gone, and I mean,
Alice----"
Molly rose and put down her novel. Then she advanced and seized the
man, taking a combined handful of shirt-collar and coat-collar, which
she twisted in her strong hand. He spread out his legs and hands; he
struggled; the grip tightened; he rolled over; the coat-collar came
off in her hand.
"Get up and go, you miserable creature!" she cried.
He rose slowly.
"Go!" said Molly.
"No coat-collar would stand such treatment," he said. "Pay me for the
damage you have done to my wardrobe."
"Give him a shilling, Molly, and let him go."
"Wait a minute--wait a minute. Oh, don't be violent, Alice! I've got
a secret. If you knew it, you'd give me money. I'll sell it for forty
pounds."
"Sell it to my husband."
He got up feeling for his injured coat-collar. "This girl's so
impetuous. May I sit down again?"
"No," said Molly. "Stand. If you don't tell your secret in two
minutes, out you go."
"It's about your marriage, Alice. You were married about twenty-six
years ago--it was in 1871, I remember. You married a play-acting
fellow--Anthony by name----"
"That's no secret."
"Which wasn't his real name, but his theatrical name. His real name
was Woodroffe."
"That is no secret, either."
"Your family wouldn't stand by you, being proud of their connections,
although the only gentleman of the lot was myself--and I was in a
bank."
"Oh, get on to your secret!"
"But, Cousin Will--Charles's brother--he stood by you, because he was
in the play-acting line himself, and he got the boot, too, from the
family. Will gave you away. You were married in South Hackney Church.
After the wedding you went away. Will met me that same day; I remember
I was a little haughty with him, because a bank clerk can't afford to
know a common actor. He told me about it."
"What is your secret?"
"Two or three years later I met Will again, and borrowed something off
him. Then he told me you had gone off to America."
"That is no secret."
"I'm coming to the secret. Don't you be impatient, Alice. It's my
secret, not yours. Now, then. About fifteen years ago, I met a fellow
at a billiard-table. He wouldn't play much, and he had some money, and
so I thought--well--I got him to lodge with us. Mother kept lodgings
in Myddleton Square in those days. He came; he said his name was
Anthony, and he was a comedian from the States. We are coming to the
secret now. Well, he stayed with us there a few weeks, and I took some
money off him at pool; but he never paid his rent, and went away."
"Go on."
"That was your husband, Alice--your husband, I say--your husband." His
voice fell to a mysterious whisper.
"Well; and why not?"
"Well--if you will have it--I'll say it out loud. That was your
husband. You married John Haveril because you thought your husband
was dead. Perhaps you hoped he would never find you out. Very well.
He's alive still. I've seen him. That's my secret."
"I care nothing whether he is alive or dead."
"That's bluff. He's alive, I say; and I know where he is at this very
minute."
"Now you have told your secret, you may go," said Molly.
"I tell you," said Alice, "that I do not care to know anything at all
about that man."
"Well--but--if he is living, how can you be anybody else's wife?
Look here, Alice. I'm telling the truth. John Anthony, whose name
is Woodroffe, is in London. Last week I met him by accident, but he
doesn't remember me. We were engaged in the same occupation. Why
should I conceal the poverty to which I am reduced by the hard hearts
of wealthy friends? We were carrying boards in Oxford Street. At night
we used the same doss-house."
"I tell you that I do not wish to hear anything about that man. If he
is in poverty and wickedness, he deserves it."
"Wouldn't you help him now?"
"I tell you I have no money."
"But this man is your husband."
"I tell you again, I do not want to know anything about the man."
"Well, I can go and tell him that you're here, rolling in gold. Forty
pounds I want, and then I'll become a credit to the family--as a
tobacconist. Else you shall have your husband back again. I've only
to set him on to you."
"I don't want your secret."
"Not to keep your husband from finding you out? Have you no heart,
Alice?"
Molly pointed to the door. "Out!" she ordered. "Out, this instant!"
He turned away reluctantly. "I thought better of you, Alice. Well,
it's a wicked world. Go straight, and you go downhill. Chuck your
respectability, and you're like the sparks that fly upward. When I
came here the other day, I thought I was coming to see a respectable
woman."
"Out!" Molly advanced upon him.
He placed a chair in front of him. "I know where your husband is--in
the Marylebone Workhouse Infirmary; that's where he is. I shall go
to him. 'Anthony,' I shall say, 'your wife's over here--with another
man.'"
Molly threw the chair down, and rushed at him.
He fled before the fire and fury of those eyes.
* * * * *
"Molly dear," Alice asked, "am I hard-hearted? I have not a spark of
feeling left for that man; it moved me not in the least to hear of his
wretched plight. He is to me just a stranger--a bad man--suffering
just punishment."
"But his name is Woodroffe. That is strange, is it not?"
"Yes; his name is Woodroffe. He belonged, he always said, to a highly
respectable family. That fact did not make him respectable."
"I wonder if he is any relation to Dick--my old friend, Dick
Woodroffe. He's a musician now, and singer, too, and his father was a
comedian before him."
"Well, dear, I don't know. As for that man in the infirmary, I dare
say John will go and see if anything can be done for him. He deserted
me first, and divorced me afterwards, Molly, twenty-four years
ago--for incompatibility of temper. That is the kind of man he is."