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(Emory University)
[Illustration: Front Cover]
MISS MEPHISTOPHELES.
_A NOVEL_.
(SEQUEL TO MADAME MIDAS.)
BY
FERGUS HUME,
AUTHOR OF "THE MYSTERY OF A HANSOM CAB," "MADAME MIDAS," "THE
PICCADILLY PUZZLE," ETC.
_IN ONE VOLUME_.
LONDON:
F. V WHITE & CO.,
31 SOUTHAMPTON STREET, STRAND, W.C.
-----
1890.
[_All Rights reserved_.]
CONTENTS
CHAP.
I. Faces in the Fire
II. Keith meets with an Adventure
III. Prince Carnival
IV. Lazarus
V. A Woman's Appeal
VI. The Annoyance of Hiram J. Fenton
VII. Mirth and Laughter
VIII. A Mysterious Affair
IX. An Unknown Benefactor
X. Naball makes a Discovery
XI. What Naball overheard
XII. Naball tells a Story
XIII. The Gossip of Clubs
XIV. A Struggle for Fame
XV. The Russell Street Crime
XVI. The Inquest
XVII. A Council of Three
XVIII. Circumstantial Evidence
XIX. A Lovers' Meeting
XX. The Rivals
XXI. A First Night at the Bon-Bon
XXII. Eugénie _v_. Naball
XXIII. The Cypher
XXIV. What Kitty knew
XXV. The Evidence of a Bank Note
XXVI. On The Track
XXVII. Meg proves Useful
XXVIII. Malton makes a Discovery
XXIX. Light at Last
XXX. Exit Kitty Marchurst
MISS MEPHISTOPHELES.
CHAPTER I.
FACES IN THE FIRE.
A wet Sunday--dreary, dismal, and infinitely sloppy. Even the bells
ringing the people into evening service seemed to feel the depressing
influence of the weather, and their brazen voices sounded hoarse and
grumbling, as if they rang under protest. Cold, too!--not a brisk
sharp frost--for here in Melbourne frost and snow are unknown; but a
persevering, insinuating, gnawing cold, just disagreeable enough to
make one shiver and shake with anxiety to get home to a bright fire
and dry clothes. Overhead a leaden-coloured sky, with great masses of
black clouds, from out whose sombre bosoms poured the steady rain,
splashing noisily on the shining roofs, and swelling the gutters in
the streets to miniature torrents.
And then the wind,--a gusty, chilly wind,--that came along
unexpectedly, and drove the unwilling rain against the umbrellas of
struggling pedestrians, or else took a mean advantage of its power,
and turned their umbrellas inside out, with a shrill whistle of
triumph. The steady light streamed out from the painted church
windows, and the dull, blurred glare of the street lamps was reflected
in the wet pavements. Ugh! a night not fit for a dog to be out in, and
yet there were a good many people hurrying along to the church, in
answer to the clamorous voices of the bells.
Some folk, however--wise in their generation--preferred staying at
home to sitting in church, with damp boots and a general sense of
stickiness about their clothes, and though possibly their souls
suffered from such an omission, their bodies were certainly more
comfortable. Among these godless people, who thus preferred comfort to
religion, were two young men occupying a room on a first floor, the
windows of which looked across to the church, now full of damp and
steaming worshippers.
A room in a boarding-house--especially one where boarders only pay
twenty-five shillings a week--is not generally a very luxurious
apartment, and this special room was certainly no exception to the
rule. It was square, with a fairly lofty ceiling, and the walls were
covered with a dull red paper, which, being mellowed by time, had
assumed a somewhat rusty hue.
It was rapidly growing dark outside, and there was no light in the
room, save that which came from a roaring coal fire blazing brightly
up the chimney, and illuminating the apartment in a curiously
fantastic manner. It sent out red shafts of light into dark corners,
as if to find out what was hidden there, and then being disappointed,
would sink back into a dull, sulky glow, only to fall into a chaotic
mass, and blaze merrily up once more.
The apartment wherein the fire played these elfish tricks was
furnished comfortably, but the furniture had a somewhat dingy look.
The carpet was threadbare, except under the table, where there could
be traced some vestiges of its original pattern. A cottage piano was
pushed into a corner slanting ways, and beside it was a great untidy
pile of music. At one end of the room, a desk covered with papers, and
immediately above it a shelf containing a small array of well-worn
books. Near the desk stood an aggravatingly bright sideboard, whereon
were some glasses, a jug of water, and a half-empty bottle of whisky.
Four or five lounging chairs of wicker-work were scattered about,
covered with rugs of wallaby fur, whilst the walls and mantelpiece
were almost covered with photographs, mostly of women, but here and
there a male face, showing the well-known features of Beethoven,
Chopin, and other famous musicians.
This somewhat incongruous apartment was a private sitting-room in an
East Melbourne boarding-house, and was at present in the occupation of
Ezra Lazarus, journalist. Ezra Lazarus himself was seated at the piano
playing snatches of music, while on the hearth-rug, smoking a pipe,
lay a man propped up on his elbow, with his head resting on his hand,
staring into the burning coals, and listening to his friend playing.
Ezra Lazarus was a young man of medium height, with a slender figure,
a pale face, rather dreamy, dark eyes, and black hair and beard
carefully trimmed. He dressed neatly, and, in contrast to most of
his race, wore no jewellery. Why he had become a journalist no one
knew,--himself least of all,--as his tastes did not lie in the
direction of newspaper work, for having all the Hebraic love of music,
he was an accomplished pianist. As for the rest--staid in his
demeanour, soft-spoken in his language, and much given to solitary
wanderings. Yet he was no misanthrope, and those who knew him
intimately found him a most charming companion, full of quaint ideas
and bookish lore, but he was essentially a man of ideality, and shrank
from contact with the work-a-day world. For such a nature as this a
journalistic sphere was most unsuitable, and he felt it to be so, but
having drifted into such a position, he lacked the energy to extricate
himself from his uncongenial employment, and accepted his fate with
oriental apathy, recompensing himself in some measure by giving every
spare moment to the study of music.
The man lying before the fire was the direct opposite of Ezra, both in
appearance and temperament. A tall, sinewy-figured young fellow of
six-and-twenty, with restless keen grey eyes under strongly-marked
eyebrows, and a sensitive mouth, almost hidden by a small fair
moustache. His nose was thin and straight, with delicately-cut
nostrils, and his head was well set on his broad shoulders, albeit he
had a trick of throwing it back which gave him a somewhat haughty
carriage. He had a fair complexion, with that reddish-brown hue which
comes from constantly living in the open air, and altogether looked
like a man addicted to sport rather than to study.
This was Keith Stewart, who, having passed most of his life in
Gippsland, and in wandering about Australia generally, had a year
previously come down to Melbourne with the laudable intention of
devoting himself to literature. That he was poor might be surmised
from his shabby, well-brushed clothes, and his face constantly wore
that expression of watchfulness habitual to those who have to fight
the world in their youth and be on their guard against everyone.
That two such dissimilar natures as these could find any reciprocity
appears strange, but curiously enough some undercurrent of sympathy
had drawn them together from the first time they met. Jew and Gentile,
musician and student, different nationalities, different trains of
thought, yet the mere fact that they could both live in an ideal world
of their own creation, heedless of the restless life which seethed
around, seemed to form a bond of concord between them, and their
mutual isolation drew them almost imperceptibly together.
Keith had only been boarding in the house a week, consequently Ezra
knew nothing about his friend's life, beyond the fact that he was poor
and ambitious. As Stewart never volunteered any information about
himself, Ezra, with the delicacy of a sensitive nature, shrank from
forcing himself on his confidence. The inexhaustible subjects of books
and music, a walk by the banks of the Yarra, or an occasional visit to
the theatre, had been, so far, the limit of their social
companionship. Their inner selves were still unknown to each other. To
all, however, there comes a moment when the desire to unburden the
mind to a sympathetic nature is strong, and it was in such a moment
that Ezra Lazarus first learned the past life of Stewart.
On this dreary Sunday night Ezra let his fingers wander over the
piano, vaguely following his thoughts, and the result was a queer
mingling of melodies--now a bizarre polonaise of Chopin, with its
fantastic blending of patriotic joy and despairing pain, then a rush
of stormy chords, preluding a Spanish dance, instinct with the amorous
languor and fierce passion of the south. Outside, the shrill wind
could be heard sweeping past, a sheet of rain would lash wildly
against the windows, and at intervals the musical thunder of the organ
sounded from the adjacent church.
Keith smoked away steadily and listened drowsily to the pleasant
mingling of sounds, until Ezra began to play the Traviata music, with
its feverish brilliancy and undercurrent of sadness. Then he suddenly
started, clenched his hand, and taking his pipe from his mouth, heaved
an impatient sigh, upon hearing which, Lazarus stopped playing, and
turned slowly round.
"A link of memory?" he said, in his soft voice, referring to the
music.
Stewart replaced his pipe, blew a thick wreath of smoke, and sighed
again.
"Yes," he replied, after a pause; "it recalls to me--a woman."
Ezra laughed half sadly, half mockingly.
"Always the Eternal feminine of George Sand."
Keith sat up cross-legged in front of the fire and shrugged his
shoulders.
"Don't be cynical old chap," he said, glancing round; "I'm sick of
hearing the incessant railing against women--good heavens! are we men
so pure ourselves, that we can afford to cast stones against the sex
to which our mothers and sisters belong."
"I did not mean to be cynical," replied Ezra, clasping his hands round
one of his knees, "I only quoted Sand, because when a man is thinking,
it is generally--a woman.
"Or a debt--or a crime--or a sorrow," interposed the other quickly;
"we can ring the changes on all of them."
"Who is cynical now?" asked the Jew, with a smile.
"Not I," denied Keith, emphatically, drawing hard at his pipe; "or if
I am, it is only that thin veneer of cynicism, under which we hide our
natural feelings now-a-days; but the music took me back to the time
when 'Plancus was consul'--exactly twelve months ago."
"Bah! Plancus is consul still; don't be downhearted, my friend; you
are still in the pleasant city of Prague."
"Pleasant? that is as it may be. I think it a very disagreeable city
without money. Bohemianism is charming in novels, but in real life it
is generally a hunt after what Murger calls that voracious animal, the
half-crown."
"And after women!"
"Ah, bah! Lais and Phryne; both charming, but slightly improper, not
to say expensive."
"Take the other side of the shield," said the Jew gently.
"Lucretia, and--and--by Jove, I can't recollect the name of any other
virtuous woman."
"Who is the lady of the music?"
"My affianced wife," retorted Stewart curtly.
"Ah!" said Ezra thoughtfully, "then we have a feeling in common, I am
also engaged."
Stewart laughed gaily.
"And we both think our lady-loves perfect," he said lightly.
"'Dulcinea is the fairest woman in the world,'--poor Don Quixote."
"Mine is to me," said Ezra emphatically.
"Of course," answered Stewart, with a smile. "I can picture her, tall,
dark, and stately, an imperial daughter of Judah, with the beauty of
Bathsheba and the majesty of Esther."
"Entirely wrong," replied Lazarus dryly, "she is neither tall, dark,
nor stately, but--"
"The exact opposite--I take your meaning," said Keith composedly;
"well, my Dulcinea is like the sketch I have given--beautiful, clever,
poor, and--a governess."
"And you haven't seen her for a year?"
"No--a whole twelvemonth--she is up Sandhurst way trying to hammer
dates and the rule of three into the thick heads of five small brats,
and I--well I'm an unsuccessful literary man, doing what is vulgarly
known as 'a perish.'"
"What made you take up writing?" asked Lazarus.
"What made me take up writing?" repeated Stewart, staring vaguely into
the fire. "Lord knows--destiny, I suppose--I've had a queer sort of
life altogether. I was born of poor but honest parents, quite the
orthodox style of thing, isn't it?"
"Are your parents alive?"
"Dead!" laconically.
There was a pause of a few moments, during which time Keith was
evidently deep in thought.
"According to Sir Walter Scott," he observed at length, "every
Scotchman has a pedigree. I've got one as long as the tail of a kite,
only not so useful. I'd sell all my ancestors, as readily as Charles
Surface did his, for a few pounds. My people claim to be connected
with the royal Stewarts."
"Your name is spelt differently."
"It's spelt correctly," retorted Keith coolly, "in the good old
Scottish fashion; as for the other, it's the French method
acclimatised by Mary Stuart when she married the Dauphin of France."
"Well, now I know your pedigree, what is the story of your life?"
"My life?--oh! I'm like Canning's knife-grinder. 'Story, I've got none
to tell.' My father and mother found royal descent was not bread and
butter, so they sold the paternal acres and came out to Australia,
where I was born. The gold fever was raging then, but I suppose they
inherited the bad luck of the Stewarts, for they did not make a penny;
then they started a farm in Gippsland and ruined themselves. My father
died of a broken heart, and my mother soon followed, so I was left an
orphan with next to nothing. I wandered all over Australia, and did
anything that turned up. Suppressing the family pride, I took a
situation in a Sandhurst store, kept by a man called Proggins, and
there I met Eugénie Rainsford, who, as I told you, taught the juvenile
Progginses. I had a desultory sort of education from my father, and
having read a good deal, I determined to take to literature, inspired,
I suppose, by the poetic melancholy of the Australian bush. I wrote
poetry with the usual success; I then went on the stage, and found I
wasn't a heaven-born genius by any means, so I became a member of the
staff of a small country paper, wrote brilliant articles about the
weather and crops, varied by paste-and-scissors' work. Burned the
midnight oil, and wrote some articles, which were accepted in
Melbourne, so, with the usual prudence of genius, I threw up my billet
and came down here to set the Thames, or rather the Yarra, on fire.
Needless to remark, I didn't succeed or I shouldn't be here, so there
is my history in a nutshell."
"And Miss Rainsford?"
"Oh, I engaged myself to her before I left Sandhurst," said Keith, his
face growing tender, "bless her--the letters she has written me have
been my bulwark against despair--ah! what a poor devil a man is in
this world without a good woman's love to comfort him."
"Are you doing anything now?" said Ezra thoughtfully.
"Nothing. I'm leading a hand-to-mouth, here-to-day-gone-to-morrow
existence. I'm a vagabond on the face of the earth, a modern Cain,
Bonnie Prince Charlie in exile--the infernal luck of my royal
ancestors still sticks to me, but, ah, bah!" shrugging his shoulders,
"don't let's talk any more, old chap, we can resume the subject
to-morrow, meanwhile play me something. I'm in a poetic mood, and
would like to build castles in the air."
Ezra laughed, and, turning to the piano, began to play one of
Henselt's morceaux, a pathetic, dreamy melody, which came stealing
softly through the room, and filled the soul of the young man with
vague yearnings.
Staring idly into the heart of the burning coals, he saw amid the
bluish flames and red glimmer of the fire a vision of the dear dead
days of long ago--shadows appeared, the shadows of last year.
A glowing sunset, bathing a wide plain in delicate crimson hues; a
white gate leading to a garden bright with flowers, and over the gate
the shadow of a beautiful woman stood talking to the shadow of a
man--himself. Mnenosyne--saddest of deities--waved her wand, and the
shadows talked.
"And when will you come back, Keith?" asked the girl shadow.
"When I am a great man," replied the other shadow proudly. "I am
riding forth like Poe's knight in search of El Dorado."
"El Dorado is far away," returned the sweet voice of the girl; "it is
the Holy Grail of wealth, and can never be discovered."
"I will find it," replied the man shadow hopefully. "Meanwhile, you
will wait and hope."
"I will wait and hope," replied the girl, smiling sadly; and the
shadows parted.
The rain beat steadily against the panes, the soft music stole through
the room, and Stewart, with idle gaze, stared into the burning heart
of the fire, as if he expected to find there the El Dorado of his
dreams.