THE LAW--AND THE PROFITS
Sallie saw how Jasper Slyne's face blanched at sight of that very
untimely intruder, whose keen eyes seemed to take in the situation there
at a glance.
Mr. Jobling had fallen backward into a convenient armchair and, with
both hands clapped to his nose, was moaning most piteously. Captain Dove
was standing over him, with features inflamed, in a very bellicose
posture and glaring at the new-comer, toward whom Slyne had turned
inquiringly.
"You're--looking for some one, M. Dubois?" Slyne asked, in a tone of
polite surprise, which, Sallie knew, was assumed.
"A thousand pardons," returned that individual. "I am indeed looking for
some one--whom I thought to find here. I had no intention, however, of
intruding upon a lady--" He bowed profusely to Sallie. "It may be," he
suggested, "that I have mistaken the number. Is not this the suite 161?"
"One hundred and sixty," Slyne told him, and evidently did not think it
worth while to add that the next suite was his own.
"A thousand pardons," repeated M. Dubois, very penitently. "I am too
stupid! But mademoiselle will perhaps be so gracious as to forgive me
this time."
He bowed to Sallie again and to Slyne, and disappeared, sharply scanning
the latter's face to the last.
"Who's that son of a sea-cook?" snapped Captain Dove, and Mr. Jobling
looked wanly up out of one eye.
"A French detective," Slyne answered reflectively. But Sallie felt sure
that he was afraid of M. Dubois, and wondered why.
"Well, he has nothing against me that I'm aware of," the old man
declared. "And now--what about this wire? Does it mean that some other
fellow has scooped the pool--and that I've had all my trouble for
nothing, eh?" He clenched his fist again and shook it in the lawyer's
face.
"No, no," gasped Mr. Jobling. "Don't be so hasty. It makes no difference
at all, now that we have Lady Josceline with us. I told you that the
American, Carthew, is of no account against her--and how he has ever
cropped up again I can't conceive. In any case--"
"In any case, you'd better be off to your room and ring for a bit of
beefsteak to doctor that eye with," Slyne interposed in a tone of
intense annoyance.
"And I wish to goodness, Dove!" he added savagely, "that you would
behave a little more like a reasonable human being and less--"
"Less of your lip, now!" snarled the old man. "And _don't_ keep on
saying that. Just take it from me again, both of you, that you'd better
not be so slow again in telling me--"
"You didn't give me time," Mr. Jobling protested.
Slyne opened the door. "Come on," he urged. "You've got to get your kit
packed, Jobling. We'll be leaving before very long now."
"Have you made up your mind to come with us, Dove?"
Captain Dove nodded, most emphatically. "I'll send word to Brasse and Da
Costa at once," he remarked, "and then I'll be ready to start whenever
you are."
He left the room after Mr. Jobling, and Slyne, in the doorway, looked
back at Sallie, the reassuring smile on his lips belied by his cold,
calculating eyes.
"And how about you, Sallie?" he asked. "Have you made up your mind? Are
you satisfied--so far? Or--would you rather go back to the _Olive
Branch_?
"If you would--I'll let you off your promise, even now! And don't forget
that this will be your last chance to recall it."
"You know I can't go back to the _Olive Branch_, Jasper," she answered
slowly. "But--"
He did not give her time to say more. "That's settled for good, then,"
he asserted. "Your promise stands, and I know you'll keep it when the
time comes--after I've done my part.
"I'm only sorry I haven't been able to get rid of Captain Dove right
away, but it won't be long now till--You needn't worry any more about
him. I'll see that he behaves better.
"If there's anything else I can do for your comfort, you must let me
know. And now, I'll leave you to your own devices until it's time to
start on our travels. Better get a rest while you can, eh? We've a very
busy week ahead of us."
She saw that he did not intend to tell her any more in the meantime, and
was glad to see him go. Then she called Ambrizette in for company, and
sat down by the window again, to try to sort out for herself the
bewildering tangle that life had once more become within a few hours.
Gazing out across the familiar sea with wistful, far-away eyes, she
mused for a time over what Captain Dove had told Mr. Jobling of her
history, and strove to piece together with that all she herself could
recall of that dim and always more mysterious past out of which she had
come to be Captain Dove's property, bought and paid for, at a high
price, as he had repeated several times.
Her own earliest vague, disconnected, ineffectual memories were all of
some dark, savage mountain-country; of endless days of travel; of
camp-fires in the cold, and hungry camels squealing for fodder; of the
fragrant cinnamon-smell of the steam that came from the cooking-pots.
Before, or, it might have been, after that, she had surely lived on some
seashore, in a shimmering white village with narrow, crooked lanes for
streets and little flat-roofed houses huddled together among hot
sandhills where the _suddra_ grew and lean goats bleated always for
their kids.
Then, as if in a very vexing dream, she could almost but never quite
see, through the thickening mist of the years, once-familiar
faces--white men, with swords, in ragged uniforms, and big brown ones
with wicked eyes and long, thin guns, glaring down at her over a high
wall, through smoke and fire, and fighting, and the acrid reek of
powder....
And there remembrance grew blank altogether, until it connected with
Captain Dove, on the deck of a slaving-dhow far out of sight of any
land. She had been only a little child when he had carried her up the
side of his own ship in his arms, while she laughed gleefully in his
face and pulled at his shaggy moustache, but she could still remember
some of the incidents of that day.
She had lived on board his successive ships ever since. And ever since,
until recently, he had always been very good to her, in his own queer,
gruff way. He had always treated her as though she were a child of his
own, shielding her, in so far as he could, from even the knowledge of
all the evil which he had done up and down the world. She had grown up
in the belief that his despotic guardianship was altogether for her good
and not to be disputed.
But now--she was no longer a child. And all her old, unquestioning faith
in his inherent good intentions, toward her at least, was finally
shattered. She knew now that he really looked upon her as a mere
chattel, with a cash value--just as if she had been one of the hapless
cargo of human cattle confined in the pestiferous hold of the dhow on
whose deck he had found her at play. She knew now that he had bought and
paid for them as well as her, and sold them again at a fat profit, far
across the seas--all but the dumb, deformed black woman whom he had
picked from among them to act as her nurse.
And if it did not occur to her to question either his power or his
perfect right to dispose of her future also as he might see fit, had not
all her experience gone to prove that might is right everywhere, that
law and justice are merely additional pretexts devised by the strong for
oppressing the weak? She had had to choose between remaining on board
the _Olive Branch_, or paying Jasper Slyne his price for the chance of
escape he had offered her in pursuance of his own aims.
She disliked and distrusted Slyne scarcely less than before. But she did
not see how she could have chosen otherwise. And, in any case,--it was
too late now to revoke the promise she had made him.
She was still afraid to place any faith in the promises he had made
her. She had no idea how he had come at his alleged discovery of her
real identity. But Mr. Jobling's obvious belief in that recurred to her
mind, and she fell to wondering timidly what life would be like as Lady
Josceline Justice.
Her impressions on that point were very hazy, however, and she had still
to puzzle out the problem added by Justin Carthew. But she finally gave
up the attempt to solve that at the moment, contenting herself with the
tremulous hope that she might soon be on her way toward that dear,
unknown, dream-home for which her hungry heart had so often ached.
Of the exorbitant price so soon to be paid for the brief glimpse of
happiness Slyne had agreed to allow her, she took no further thought at
all. She had already made up her mind to meet that without complaint.
An hour or more later, when Slyne looked in to tell her that it was time
to start, she was still seated at the window, gazing out over the
steel-grey sea with wistful, far-away eyes.
At his instigation she veiled herself very closely. And he had brought
with him a hooded cloak for Ambrizette. No one took any particular
notice of the inconspicuous party which presently left the Hotel de
Paris in a hired car, as if for an excursion along the coast.
At a station fifty miles away they left the car and caught the
night-mail for Paris. Slyne's baggage was on board it, in the care of a
sullen chauffeur, and there were also berths reserved for them all.
"Did you see any more of Dubois?" Sallie heard Slyne ask the man, who
shook his head indifferently in reply.
The long night-journey passed without other incident than a dispute
between Captain Dove and the sleeping-car attendant, which raged until
Slyne threatened to have the train stopped at the next station and send
for the police. And the sun was shining brightly when they reached
Paris.
Mr. Jobling went straight on to London, but Slyne took Sallie and
Captain Dove to a quiet but expensive hotel, where they remained for a
few days, which passed in a perfect whirl of novelty and excitement for
her. And when they in their turn crossed the Channel, she had for
baggage at least a dozen new trunks containing the choicest spoils of
the Rue de la Paix. Slyne had pooh-poohed all her timid protests against
his lavish expenditure on her account, and had also provided for Captain
Dove and Ambrizette in their degree. He had evidently a fortune at his
disposal, and was bent on showing her how generous he could be.
He was also unostentatiously displaying other good qualities which had
all gone to make those days pass very pleasantly for her. She could not
fail to appreciate the courtesy and consideration which he consistently
showed her now. His patience with Captain Dove, a trying companion at
the best of times and doubly troublesome idle, more than once made her
wonder whether he could be the same Jasper Slyne she had known on the
_Olive Branch_. Prosperity seemed to have improved him almost beyond
recognition.
He had a cabin at her disposal on the Calais-Dover steamer but she
stayed on deck throughout the brief passage, glad to breathe the salt
sea-air again, while he entertained her with descriptions of London and
she watched the twinkling lights that were guiding her home.
And then came London itself, at last, somewhat grey, and cold, and
disconsolate-looking on a wet winter morning.
But after breakfast in a cosy suite at the Savoy, a blink of sunshine
along the Embankment helped to better that first hasty impression. And
then Slyne took Captain Dove and her in a taxicab along the thronged and
bustling Strand to Mr. Jobling's office in Chancery Lane.
They got out in front of a dingy building not very far from Cursitor
Street. It was raining again, and Sallie, looking up and down the
narrow, turbid thoroughfare, felt glad that she did not need to live
there.
Indoors, the atmosphere was scarcely less depressing. A dismal passage
led toward a dark stairway, up which they had to climb flight after
flight to reach at last a dusty, ill-smelling, gas-lighted room,
inhabited only by a shabby, shock-headed hobbledehoy of uncertain age
and unprepossessing appearance, perched on a preposterously high stool
at a still higher desk, behind a cage-like partition.
"I want to see Mr. Jobling, at once," Slyne announced to him. And Mr.
Jobling's "managing clerk" looked slowly round, with a snake-like and
disconcerting effect due to a very long neck and a very low collar.
"Show Mr. Slyne in immediately, Mullins," ordered a pompous voice from
within; and Mr. Jobling himself, a blackcoated, portly, important
personage there, came bustling out from his private office to welcome
his visitors.
"How d'ye do, how d'ye do, Lady Josceline!" he exclaimed, and cocked an
arch eyebrow at Sallie's most becoming costume; although the effect he
intended was somewhat impaired by the fact that he was still suffering
from a black eye, painted over in haste--and by an incompetent artist.
"I can see now what's been keeping _you_ in Paris!" he added
facetiously, and, having shaken hands with Slyne, who seemed to think
that superfluous, turned to receive Captain Dove with the same
politeness.
"Phew!" whistled Mr. Jobling and drew back and stared at the old man.
"I'd _never_ have recognised you in that rig-out."
Captain Dove pulled off a pair of smoked glasses he had been wearing,
the better to look him, with offensive intent, in his injured eye. For
Captain Dove was still enduring much mental as well as physical
discomfort in a disguise which he had only been induced to adopt a
couple of days before, and after an embittered quarrel with Slyne. The
stiff white collar round his corded neck was still threatening to choke
him and then cut his throat. He had been infinitely more at his ease in
his scanty, short-tailed frock-coat and furry top-hat than he was in the
somewhat baggy if more becoming black garb he had donned in its place,
with a soft wide-awake always flapping about his ears.
"Come inside," Mr. Jobling begged hurriedly, and, looking round as he
followed them into his sanctum, "Mullins!" he snapped, "don't stand
there staring. Get on with your work, at once.
"You're later than I expected," he remarked to Slyne as he closed the
door, "but just in time. The Court's closed, of course, for the
Christmas vacation, but I've filed an application for a hearing in
Chambers, and--"
He paused as a telephone-bell rang shrilly outside, and a moment later
the shock head of his "managing clerk" protruded into the room, almost
as if it did not belong to a body at all.
"Mr. Spettigrew says that our application in Chambers will be heard by
Mr. Justice Gaunt, in 57B, at eleven-thirty sharp this forenoon,"
announced that youth and, with a final wriggle of his long neck,
withdrew.
"Devil take him!" exclaimed Captain Dove, somewhat startled and much
incensed. "I wouldn't keep a crested cobra like that about me for--"
"Let's see those accounts of yours, now," said Slyne, disregarding that
interruption, and Mr. Jobling, having first looked at his watch,
produced from another drawer a great sheaf of papers, all carefully
docketed. He slipped off the top one and somewhat reluctantly handed
that to his friend.
Slyne took it from him eagerly, and sat for a time gloating over it with
eyes which presently began to glow.
But when Captain Dove, growing restless, would have glanced over his
shoulder to see what was tickling his fancy so, he frowned and folded
that document up and returned it to Mr. Jobling.
"Give it here, now!" growled Captain Dove, menacing Mr. Jobling with a
clenched fist; and the lawyer, after an appealing, impotent glance at
Slyne, had no recourse but to comply with that peremptory order.
"Are you quite sure of your figures?" Slyne asked, with a scowl. He
seemed conscious that he, in his haste, had made a false step. And Mr.
Jobling nodded with nervous assurance.
"I have inside sources of information as to the revenue of the estates,"
he replied, "and a note of all the investments. I've allowed a wide
margin for all sorts of incidentals. I think you'll find, in fact, that
Lady Josceline's inheritance will amount to even more than I've
estimated."
Slyne smiled again, more contentedly. Nor was his complaisance overcome
even when Mr. Jobling put to him a half-whispered petition for a
further small cash advance to account of expenses.
"I wasn't even able to pay Mullins' wages with what you gave me in
Paris," said the stout solicitor vexedly. "Fees and so on swallowed it
all up, and--I'm actually short of cab-fares!"
"Why don't you fire Mullins, then?" demanded Slyne with a shade of
impatience. "I've just got rid of my chauffeur because he was costing me
more than he was worth."
"But I can't afford to get rid of Mullins. Just at the moment he's very
useful to me. It would create a bad impression if I had to run my own
errands. And--the fact is, he knows far too much. I'll pay him off and
shut his mouth by and by, when I have more time to attend to such
matters."
"How much do you want?" Slyne inquired with a frown evidently meant to
warn his friend to be modest.
"Can you spare twenty pounds--to go on with?"
Slyne hesitated, but only for a few seconds. Then he pulled out a
pocket-book and surreptitiously passed that sum to the penniless man of
law, who accepted it with no more than a nod of thanks.
"I'll pay Mullins now," he remarked, and immediately hurried out of the
room. Captain Dove was gasping for breath and showed every other symptom
of a forthcoming explosion.
As soon as the door shut behind him, the old man gave open vent to his
wrath. And a most furious quarrel followed between Slyne and him.
Sallie, too, learned then, for the first time, of the vast inheritance
which would be hers, of Slyne's cunning plan to buy Captain Dove out for
a mere pittance, and how he himself expected to profit through marrying
her.
But she was not overwhelmed with surprise by that belated discovery. She
had almost anticipated the final disclosure of some such latent motive
behind all Slyne's professions to her. The only difference it might make
would be to Captain Dove. Slyne and he were still snarling at each other
when Mr. Jobling walked jauntily in again. But at sight of him Captain
Dove began to subside.
"We mustn't be late. Mr. Spettigrew will be expecting us now. I've sent
Mullins on ahead with my papers," observed Mr. Jobling breezily, and
went on to explain that Mr. Justice Gaunt, by nature a somewhat
cross-grained old limb of the law, had been very ill-pleased over being
bothered again, and at a moment when most of his colleagues were
enjoying a holiday, about any such apparently endless case as that of
the Jura succession, which had been cropping up before him, at more or
less lengthy intervals, for quite a number of years, and concerning
which he had, only a few days before, made an order of court in favour
of Justin Carthew.
Captain Dove clapped his soft felt hat on his head with a very
devil-may-care expression.
"Come on, then," said he grimly, and Mr. Jobling was not slow to lead
the way. So that they reached Mr. Justice Gaunt's chambers punctually at
the hour appointed, and were ushered into his lordship's presence by Mr.
Spettigrew, the learned counsel retained by Mr. Jobling on Sallie's
behalf, a long, lifeless-looking gentleman in a wig and gown and
spectacles. And his lordship smiled very pleasantly as Sallie raised her
heavy veil at counsel's crafty request.
"Pray be seated, my dear young lady," his lordship begged with fatherly,
old-fashioned kindness, and indicated a chair meant for counsel, much
nearer his own than the rest. Nor did he often take his eyes from her
face throughout the course of a long and convincing dissertation by Mr.
Spettigrew, on her past history, present position in life, and claims on
the future, with some reference to the rival claims of Mr. Justin
Carthew.
"And I have full proof to place before you, at once, if you wish it,
m'lud," concluded Mr. Spettigrew in his most professional drone, "in
support of the fact that the lady before you is the lawful daughter of
the late earl and the countess, his second wife, who died in the desert.
Mr. Justin Carthew, on the other hand, is related to the family in a
very different and distant degree, and there are, as y'r ludship has
been good enough to agree, no other survivors.
"I beg leave now to request that y'r ludship will rescind the authority
granted to Mr. Justin Carthew, and admit my client's petition _ad
referendum_."
"Produce your proofs," ordered his lordship, and Mr. Spettigrew
extracted from a capacious black bag a pile of papers at which Mr.
Justice Gaunt looked with no little disgust.
"What are they, in chief?" asked Mr. Justice Gaunt, turning over page
after page of closely written law-script, as gingerly as if he believed
that one might perhaps explode and blow him to pieces. And Mr.
Spettigrew launched forth again into a long list of certificates,
records, researches, findings, orders of court, sworn statements and
affidavits, by Captain Dove--"Then trading in his own ship, m'lud, now
retired and devoting his time to mission-work among deep-sea sailors;"
by Mr. Jasper Slyne, gentleman; by Mr. Jobling, whom he did not pause
to describe; by a couple of dozen other people, living or dead, at home
or abroad; all in due legal form and not to be controverted.
"I think you'll find them in perfect order, and absolutely conclusive,
m'lud," counsel came to a finish triumphantly, and sat down, greatly to
the relief of all present.
"H'm!" said his lordship, still gravely regarding Sallie: whose eyes had
nothing to conceal from him. "And so this is the long-lost Lady
Josceline!"
His searching glance travelled slowly to Captain Dove's face, and then
to Slyne's; both of whom met it without winking, although Captain Dove
was no doubt glad of the protection of his smoked glasses.
"I'll have to go through the proofs, of course," said his lordship
reflectively and let his gaze rest on Sallie again. "But--if
everything's as you say, I don't think it will be long before Lady
Josceline finds herself in full enjoyment of all her rights and
privileges. If everything's as you say, I'll do whatever lies in my
power to expedite matters; I think I can promise you that the case will
be called immediately the vacation is over. Meanwhile, however, and till
I have looked through the proofs, I can make no further order."
He rose, and they also got up from their chairs as he came round from
behind his desk and confronted Sallie, a tall, stooping old man with a
wrinkled face and tired but kindly eyes.
She looked up into them frankly, and he laid a hand on her shoulder.
"Yours has been a very sad history so far, my dear young lady," he said,
his head on one side, still studying her. "I hope it will be all the
brighter henceforth. I knew--the last Earl of Jura--when we were both
young men--before he married. You remind me of him, as he was then, in
many respects. Good day to you now; my time here is not my own, you
know. But some day, perhaps you will allow me to pay my respects to
you--at Justicehall, since we're to be neighbours; my own home isn't
very far from yours."
Outside in the corridor, Mr. Jobling shook hands rapturously with every
one, even with Captain Dove.
"We've turned the trick already," he declared. "You heard what his
lordship said. With him on our side, the whole thing's as good as
settled. All we have to do now is to wait until the Courts take up again
and confirm--"
"How long will that be?" Slyne inquired. He, too, was smiling
ecstatically.
"Not much more than a fortnight," the lawyer informed him. "It will soon
pass. We must just be patient."
"We must keep very quiet, too," said Slyne, "unless we want to give the
whole show away to the enemy in advance. We must clear off out of London
till then. I'll tell you what, Jobling! Why shouldn't we all go down to
Scotland to-night?"
Mr. Jobling nodded agreement. "An excellent idea," he declared. "There's
nothing to keep us here."
"That's settled, then," Slyne asserted. "And we'll all dine together at
the Savoy before we start. I think we can afford to celebrate the
occasion, eh! And I want to show Lady Josceline a few of her future
friends."