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THE SINS OF SÉVERAC BABLON
By Sax Rohmer
CASSELL AND COMPANY, LTD
London, New York, Toronto & Melbourne
First published _January 1914_.
Popular Edition _February 1919_.
CONTENTS
1. TO INTRODUCE MR. JULIUS ROHSCHEIMER
2. "THIRTY MEN WHO WERE ALL ALIKE"
3. MIDNIGHT--AND THE MAN
4. THE HEAD OF CÆSAR
5. A MYSTIC HAND
6. THE SHADOW OF SÉVERAC BABLON
7. THE RING
8. IN THE DRESSING-ROOM
9. ES-SINDIBAD OF CADOGAN GARDENS
10. KIMBERLEY
11. MR. SANRACK VISITS THE HOTEL ASTORIA
12. LOVE, LUCRE AND MR. ALDEN
13. THE LISTENER
14. ZOE DREAMS
15. AT "THE CEDARS"
16. THE LAMP AND THE MASK
17. THE DAMASCUS CURTAIN
18. A WHITE ORCHID
19. THREE LETTERS
20. CLOSED DOORS
21. A CORNER IN MILLIONAIRES
22. THE TURKISH YATAGHAN
23. M. LEVI
24. "V-E-N-G-E-N-C-E"
25. AN OFFICIAL CALL
26. GRIMSDYKE
27. YELLOW CIGARETTES
28. AT THE PALACE--AND LATER
CHAPTER I
TO INTRODUCE MR. JULIUS ROHSCHEIMER
"There's half a score of your ancestral halls," said Julius Rohscheimer,
"that I could sell up to-morrow morning!"
Of the quartet that heard his words no two members seemed quite
similarly impressed.
The pale face of Adeler, the great financier's confidential secretary,
expressed no emotion whatever. Sir Richard Haredale flashed contempt
from his grey eyes--only to veil his scorn of the man's vulgarity
beneath a cloud of tobacco smoke. Tom Sheard, of the _Gleaner_, drew
down a corner of his mouth and felt ashamed of the acquaintance. Denby,
the music-hall comedian, softly whistled those bars of a popular ballad
set to the words, "I stood in old Jerusalem."
"Come along to Park Lane with me," continued Rohscheimer, fixing his
dull, prominent eyes upon Sheard, "and you'll see more English nobility
than you'd find inside the House of Lords!"
"What's made him break out?" the comedian whispered, aside, to Adeler.
For it was an open secret that this man, whose financial operations
shook the thrones of monarchy, whose social fêtes were attended by the
smartest people, was subject to outbursts of the kind which now saw him
seated before a rapidly emptying magnum in a corner of the great
restaurant. At such times he would frequent the promenades of
music-halls, consorting with whom he found there, and would display the
gross vulgarity of a Whitechapel pawnbroker or tenth-rate variety agent.
"'S-sh!" replied the secretary. "A big coup! It is always so with him.
Mr. Rohscheimer is overwrought. I shall induce him to take a holiday."
"Trip up the Jordan?" suggested Denby, with cheery rudeness.
The secretary's drooping eyelids flickered significantly, but no other
indication of resentment displayed itself upon that impassive face.
"A good Jew is proud of his race--and with reason!" he said quietly.
"There are Jews and Jews."
He turned, deferentially, to his employer--that great man having
solicited his attention with the words, "Hark to him, Adeler!"
"I did not quite catch Mr. Sheard's remark," said Adeler.
"I merely invited Mr. Rohscheimer to observe the scene upon his right,"
explained Sheard.
The others turned their eyes in that direction. Through a screen of palm
leaves the rose-shaded table lights, sparkling silver, and snowy covers
of the supper room were visible. Here a high-light gleamed upon a bare
shoulder; there, a stalwart male back showed, blocked out in bold black
upon the bright canvas. Waiters flitted noiselessly about. The drone of
that vocal orchestra filled the place: the masculine conversation, the
brass and wood-wind--the sweeter tones of women, the violins; their
laughter, tremolo passages.
"I'm observing it," growled Rohscheimer. "Nobody in particular there."
"There is comfort, luxury, there," said Sheard.
The financier stared, uncomprehensively.
"Now look out yonder," continued the other.
It was a different prospect whereto he directed their eyes.
The diminuendo of the Embankment lamps, the steely glitter of the waters
beyond, the looming bulk of the bridge, the silhouette shape of the On
monolith; these things lay below them, dimly to be seen from the
brilliant room. Within was warmth, light, and gladness; without, a cold
place of shadows, limned in the grey of discontent and the black of want
and desolation.
"Every seat there," continued Sheard, as the company gazed vaguely from
the window, "has its burden of hopelessness and misery. Ranks of
homeless wretches form up in the arch yonder, awaiting the arrival of
the Salvation Army officials. Where, in the whole world, can misery in
bulk be found thus side by side with all that wealth can procure?"
There was a brief silence. Sheard was on his hobbyhorse, and there were
few there disposed to follow him. The views of the _Gleaner_ are not
everybody's money.
"What sort of gas are you handing us out?" asked Rohscheimer. "Those
lazy scamps don't deserve any comfort; they never worked to get it! The
people here are moneyed people."
"Just so!" interrupted Sheard, taking up the challenge with true
_Gleaner_ ardour. "Moneyed people! That's the whole distinction in two
words!"
"Well, then--what about it?"
"This--that if every guest now in the hotel would write a cheque for an
amount representing 1 per cent. of his weekly income, every man, woman,
and child under the arch yonder would be provided with board and lodging
for the next six months!"
"Why do it?" demanded Rohscheimer, not unreasonably. "Why feed 'em up on
idleness?"
"Their idleness may be compulsory," replied Sheard. "Few would employ a
starving man while a well-nourished one was available."
"Cut the Socialist twaddle!" directed the other coarsely. "It gets on my
nerves! You and your cheques! Who'd you make 'em payable to? Editor of
the _Gleaner_."
"I would suggest," said Sir Richard Haredale, smiling, "to Séverac
Bablon."
"To who?" inquired Rohscheimer, with greater interest than grammar.
"Séverac Bablon," said Sheard, informatively, "the man who gave a
hundred dollars to each of the hands discharged from the Runek Mill,
somewhere in Ontario. That's whom you mean, isn't it, Haredale?"
"Yes," assented the latter. "I was reading about it to-day."
"We had it in this morning," continued Sheard. "Two thousand men."
"Eh?" grunted Rohscheimer hoarsely.
"Two thousand men," repeated Sheard. "Each of them received notes to the
value of a hundred dollars on the morning after the mill closed down,
and a card, 'With the compliments of Séverac Bablon.'"
"Forty thousand pounds!" shouted the millionaire. "I don't believe it!"
"It's confirmed by Reuter to-night."
"Then the man's a madman!" pronounced Rohscheimer conclusively.
"Pity he doesn't have a cut at London!" came Denby's voice.
"Is it?" growled the previous speaker. "Don't you believe it! A maniac
like that would mean ruination for business if he was allowed to get
away with it!"
"Ah, well!" yawned Sheard, standing up and glancing at his watch, "you
may be right. Anyway, I've got a report to put in. I'm off!"
"Me, too!" said the financier thickly. "Come on, Haredale. We're overdue
at Park Lane! It's time we were on view in Park Lane, Adeler!"
The tide of our narrative setting in that direction, it will be well if
we, too, look in at the Rohscheimer establishment. We shall find
ourselves in brilliant company.
Julius's harshest critics were forced to concede that the house in Park
Lane was a focus of all smart society. Yet smart society felt oddly ill
at ease in the salon of Mrs. Julius Rohscheimer. Nobody knew whether the
man to whom he might be talking at the moment were endeavouring to
arrange a mortgage with Rohscheimer; whether the man's wife had fallen
in arrears with her interest--to the imminent peril of the family
necklace; or whether the man had simply dropped in because others of his
set did so, and because, being invited, he chanced to have nothing
better to do.
These things did not add to the gaiety of the entertainments, but of
their brilliancy there could be no possible doubt.
Jewish society was well represented, and neither at Streeter's nor
elsewhere could a finer display of diamonds be viewed than upon one of
Mrs. Rohscheimer's nights. The lady had enjoyed some reputation as a
hostess before the demise of her first husband had led her to seek
consolation in the arms (and in the cheque-book) of the financier. So
the house in Park Lane was visited by the smartest people--to the mutual
satisfaction of host and hostess.
"Where's the Dook?" inquired the former, peering over a gilded
balustrade at the throng below. They had entered, unseen, by a private
stair.
"I understand," replied Haredale, "that the Duke is unfortunately
indisposed."
"Never turns up!" growled Rohscheimer.
"Never likely to!" was Haredale's mental comment; but, his situation
being a delicate one, he diplomatically replied, "We have certainly been
unfortunate in that respect."
Haredale--one of the best-known men in town--worked as few men work to
bring the right people to the house in Park Lane (and to save his
commission). This arrangement led Mr. Rohscheimer to rejoice exceedingly
over his growing social circle, and made Haredale so ashamed of himself
that, so he declared to an intimate friend, he had not looked in a
mirror for nine months, but relied implicitly upon the good taste of his
man.
"Come up and give me your opinion of the new waistcoats," said
Rohscheimer. "I don't fancy my luck in 'em, personally."
Following the financier to his dressing-room, Haredale, as a smart maid
stood aside to let them pass, felt the girl's hand slip a note into his
own. Glancing at it, behind Rohscheimer's back, he read: "Keep him away
as much as ever you can."
"She has spotted him!" he muttered; and, in his sympathy with the
difficulties of poor Mrs. Rohscheimer's position, he forgot,
temporarily, the difficulties of his own.
"By the way," said Rohscheimer, "did you bring along that late edition
with the details of the Runek Mill business?"
"Yes," said Haredale, producing it from his overcoat pocket.
"Just read it out, will you?" continued the other, "while I have a rub
down."
Haredale nodded, and, lighting a cigarette, sank into a deep arm-chair
and read the following paragraph:
"A FAIRY GODMOTHER IN ONTARIO
"(_From our Toronto Correspondent_)
"The identity of the philanthropist who indemnified the
ex-employees of the Runek Mill still remains a mystery. Beyond the
fact that his name, real or assumed, is Séverac Bablon, nothing
whatever is known regarding him. The business was recently acquired
by J. J. Oppner, who will be remembered for his late gigantic
operation on Wall Street, and the whole of the working staff
received immediate notice to quit. No reason is assigned for this
wholesale dismissal. But each of the 2,000 men thus suddenly thrown
out of employment received at his home, in a plain envelope,
stamped with the Three Rivers postmark, the sum of one hundred
dollars, and a typed slip bearing the name, 'Séverac Bablon.' Mr.
Oppner had been approached, but is very reticent upon the subject.
There is a rumour circulating here to the effect that he himself is
the donor. But I have been unable to obtain confirmation of this."
"It wouldn't be Oppner," spluttered Rohscheimer, appearing, towel in
hand. "He's not such a fool! Sounds like one of these 'Yellow' fables to
me."
Haredale shrugged his shoulders, dropping the paper on the rug.
"A man at once wealthy and generous is an improbable, but not an
impossible, being," he said.
Rohscheimer stared, dully. There were times when he suspected Haredale
of being studiously rude to him. He preserved a gloomy silence
throughout the rest of the period occupied by his toilet, and in silence
descended to the ballroom.
The throng was considerable, and the warmth oppressive at what time Mrs.
Rohscheimer's ball was in full swing. Scarcely anyone was dancing, but
the walls were well lined, and the crush about the doors suggestive of a
cup tie.
"Who's that tall chap with the white hair?" inquired Rohscheimer from
the palmy corner to which Haredale discreetly had conveyed him.
"That is the Comte de Noeue," replied his informant; "a distinguished
member of the French diplomatic corps."
"We're getting on!" chuckled the millionaire. "He's a good man to have,
isn't he Haredale?"
"Highly respectable!" said the latter dryly.
"We don't seem to get the dooks, and so on?"
"The older nobility is highly conservative!" explained Haredale
evasively. "But Mrs. Rohscheimer is a recognised leader of the smart
set."
Rohscheimer swayed his massive head in bear-like discontent.
"I don't get the hang of this smart set business," he complained.
"Aren't the dooks and earls and so on in the smart set?"
"Not strictly so!" answered Haredale, helping himself to
brandy-and-soda.
This social conundrum was too much for the millionaire, and he lapsed
into heavy silence, to be presently broken with the remark:
"All the Johnnies holding the wall up are alike, Haredale! It's funny I
don't know any of 'em! You see them in the sixpenny monthlies, with the
girl they're going to marry in the opposite column. Give me their names,
will you--starting with the one this end?"
Haredale, intending, good-humouredly, to comply, glanced around the
spacious room--only to realise that he, too, was unacquainted with the
possibly distinguished company of muralites.
"I rather fancy," he said, "a lot of the people you mean are
Discoveries--of Mrs. Rohscheimer's, you know--writers and painters and
so forth."
"No, no!" complained the host. "I know all that lot--and they all know
me! I mean the nice-looking fellows round the wall! I haven't been
introduced, Haredale. They've come in since this waltz started."
Haredale looked again, and his slightly bored expression gave place to
one of curiosity.