It was a very wearisome day to Davis as he waited for the return of
Paul Classon. Grog's was not a mind made for small suspicions or petty
distrusts,--he was a wholesale dealer in iniquity, and despised minute
rogueries; yet he was not altogether devoid of anxiety as hour, by hour
went over, and no sign of Classon. He tried to pass the time in
his usual mode. He shot with the pistol, he fenced, he whipped the
trout-stream, he went over his “martingale” with the cards, but somehow
everything went amiss with him. He only hit the bull's-eye once in three
shots; he fenced wide; a pike carried off his tackle; and, worst of all,
he detected a flaw in the great “Cabal,” that, if not remediable, must
render it valueless.
“A genuine Friday, this!” muttered he, as he sauntered up a little
eminence, from which a view might be had of the road for above a mile.
“And what nonsense it is people saying they 're not superstitions!
I suppose I have as little of that kind of humbug about me as my
neighbors; yet I would n't play half-crowns at blind-hookey today. I'd
not take the favorite even against a chance horse. I'd not back myself
to leap that drain yonder; and why? Just because I 'm in what the French
call _guignon_. There's no other word for it that ever I heard. These
are the days Fortune says to a man, 'Shut up, and don't book a bet!'
It's a wise fellow takes the warning. I know it so well that I always
prepare for a run against me, and as sure as I am here, I feel that
something or other is going wrong elsewhere. Not a sign of him,--not a
sign!” said he, with a heavy sigh, as he gazed long and earnestly along
the line of road. “He has n't bolted, that I'm sure of; he'd not 'try
that on' with _me_. He remembers to this very hour a licking I gave him
at school. I know what it is, he's snug in a wine 'Schenke.' He's in for
a big drink, the old beast, as if he could n't get blind drunk when he
came home. I think I see him holding forth to the boors, and telling
them what an honor it is to them to sit in his company; that he took a
high class at Oxford, and was all but Bishop of--Eh, is that he? No,
it 's going t' other way. Confounded fool!--but worse fool myself for
trusting him. That's exactly what people would say: 'He gave Holy Paul
three naps, and expected to see him come back sober!' Well, so I did;
and just answer me this: Is not all the work of this world done by
rogues and vagabonds? It suits them to be honest for a while; they ride
to order so long as they like the stable. Not a sign of him!” And with a
comfortless sigh he turned back to the house.
“I wish I knew how Lizzy was to-night!” muttered he, as he rested his
head on his hand, and sat gazing at her picture. “Ay, that is your
own saucy smile, but the world will take that out of you, and put a
puckered-up mouth and hard lines in its place, that it will, confound
it! And those eyes will have another kind of brightness in them, too,
when they begin to read life glibly. My poor darling, I wish you could
stay as you are. Where are you now, I wonder? Not thinking of old Kit, I
'm certain! And yet, maybe, I wrong her,--maybe she is just dwelling on
long--long ago--home, and the rest of it. Ay, darling, that's what the
lucky ones have in life, and never so much as know their luck in having
it. By Jove! she is handsome!” cried he, as he held up the miniature
in ecstasy before him. “'If she's so beautiful, Mr. Ross, why don't
she come to the Drawing-room?' say the Court people. Ay, you'll see her
there yet, or I'm not Kit Davis! Don't be impatient, ladies; make your
running while the course is your own, for there's a clipper coming. I'd
like to see where they'll be when Lizzy takes the field.”
And now, in his pride, he walked the room, with head erect and arms
folded. It was only for a very short space, however, that these
illusions withdrew him from his gloomier reveries; for, with a start,
he suddenly recurred to all the anxieties of the morning, and once more
issued forth upon the high-road to look out for Classon. The setting sun
sent a long golden stream of light down the road, on which not a living
thing was to be seen. Muttering what were scarcely blessings on the head
of his messenger, he strolled listlessly along. Few men could calculate
the eventualities of life better or quicker than Davis. Give him the man
and the opportunities, and he would speedily tell you what would be the
upshot. He knew thoroughly well how far experience and temperament mould
the daring spirit, and how the caution that comes of education tames
down the wild influences suggested by temptation.
“No,” said he to himself, “though he had my passport and three Napoleons
besides, he has not levanted. He is far too deep a fellow for that.”
At last a low rumbling sound came up from the distance; he stopped
and listened. It came and went at intervals, till, at last, he could
distinctly mark the noise of wheels, and the voice of a man urging on
his horse. Davis quickened his pace, till, in the gray half-light, he
descried a little one-horse carriage slowly advancing towards him. He
could only see one man in it; but as it came nearer, he saw a heap of
clothes, surmounted by what indicated the presence of another in the
bottom of the conveyance, and Grog quickly read the incident by the aid
of his own anticipation. There, indeed, lay Paul Classon, forgetful of
the world and all its cares, his outstretched arm almost touching the
wheel, and the heavy wooden shoe of the peasant grazing his face.
[Illustration: 080]
“Has he got the letters? Where are they?” cried Davis, eagerly, to the
driver.
“They're in his hat”
Grog snatched it rudely from his head, and found several letters of
various sizes and shapes, and with what, even in that dim light, seemed
a variety of addresses and superscriptions.
“Are you certain none have fallen out or been lost on the road?” said
Davis, as he reckoned them over.
“That I am,” said the man; “for at every jolt of the wagon he used to
grip his hat and hold it fast, as if it was for very life, till we
came to the last village. It was there he finished off with a flask of
Laubthaler that completely overcame him.”
“So, then, he was sober on leaving Neuwied?”
“He was in the so-called 'bemuzzed' state!” said the man, with a
half-apologetic air.
“Take him down to the inn; throw him into the hay-yard--or the river, if
you like,” said Davis, contemptuously, and turned away.
Once in his own room, the candles lighted, the door locked, Davis sat
down to the table on which the letters were thrown. Leisurely he took
them up one by one and examined their superscriptions.
“Little news in these,” said he, throwing three or four to one side;
“the old story,--money-seeking.” And he mumbled out, “'Your acceptance
being duly presented this day at Messrs. Haggitts and Drudge's, and no
provision being made for payment of the same--' It's like the burden of
an old song in one's ears. Who is this from? Oh, Billy Peach, with some
Doncaster news. I do wonder will the day ever come that will bring
me good tidings by the post; I 've paid many a pound in my life for
letters, and I never yet chanced upon one that told me my uncle Peter
had just died, leaving me all his estates in Jamaica, or that my aunt
Susan bequeathed to me all her Mexican stock and the shares in four
tin-mines. This is also from Peach, and marked 'Immediate;'” and he
broke it open. It contained only these lines: “Dark is the word for
a week or two still. On Tuesday your name will appear amongst the
passengers for New York by the 'Persia.' Saucy Sal is a dead break-down,
and we net seven hundred safe; Pot did it with a knitting-needle while
they were plaiting her. What am I to do about the jewels?”
Davis's brow darkened as he crushed the paper in his hand, while he
muttered, “I wish these infernal fools had not been taught to write! He
ought to know that addressing me Captain Christopher never deceived a
'Detective' yet. And this is for the Honorable Annesley Beecher,”
said he, reading aloud the address, “'care of Captain Christopher,
Coblentz--try Bingen--try Neuwied.' A responsible-looking document this;
it looks like a despatch, with its blue-post paper and massive seal;
and what is the name here, in the corner? 'Davenport Dunn,' sure
enough,--'Davenport Dunn.' And with your leave, sir, we 'll see what you
have to say,” muttered he, as he broke the seal of the packet. A very
brief note first met his eyes; it ran thus:--
“Dear Sir,--While I was just reading a very alarming account
of Lord Lackington's illness in a communication from Messrs.
Harmer and Gore, the post brought me the enclosed letter for
yourself, which I perceive to be in her Ladyship's hand; I
forward it at once to Brussels, in the hope that it may
reach you there. Should her Ladyship's tidings be better
than I can fain persuade myself to hope, may I presume to
suggest that you should lose no time in repairing to Italy.
I cannot exaggerate the peril of his Lordship's state; in
fact, I am hourly expecting news of his death; and, the
_peculiar circumstances_ of the case considered, it is
highly important you should possess yourself of every
information the exigencies of the event may require. I beg
to enclose you a bank post-bill for two-hundred pounds,
payable at any banker's on your signature, and have the
honor to be, with sincere respect,
“Your humble Servant,
“Davenport Dunn.
“P. S.--I have reason to know that certain claims are now
under consideration, and will be preferred erelong, if
suitable measures be not adopted to restrain them.”
“From which side do you hold your brief, Master Davenport Dunn? I should
like to know _that!_” said Davis, as he twice over read aloud this
postscript. He looked at Lady Lackington's letter, turned it over,
examined the seal and the postmark, and seemed to hesitate about
breaking it open. Was it that some scruple of conscience arrested his
hand, and some mysterious feeling that it was a sisterly confidence he
was about to violate? Who knows! At all events, if there was a struggle
it was a brief one, for he now smashed the seal and spread the open
letter before him.
With a muttered expression of impatience did he glance over the four
closely written pages indited in the very minutest of hands and the
faintest possible ink. Like one addressing himself, however, to a severe
task, he set steadily to work, and for nigh an hour never rose from the
table. We have no right, as little have we the wish, to inflict upon our
reader any portion of the labor this process of deciphering cost Davis,
so that we will briefly state what formed the substance of the epistle.
The letter was evidently begun before Lord Lackington had been taken
ill, for it opened with an account of Como and the company at the Villa
d'Este, where they had gone to resume the water-cure. Her Ladyship's
strictures upon the visitors, their morals, and their manners, were
pleasantly and flippantly thrown off. She possessed what would really
seem an especial gift of her class,--the most marvellous use of the
perceptive faculties,--and could read not alone rank and condition, but
character and individuality, by traits of breeding and manner that would
have escaped the notice of hundreds of those the world calls shrewd
observers. This fragment, for it was such, was followed, after a
fortnight, by a hastily written passage, announcing that Lord Lackington
had been seized with an attack resembling apoplexy, and for several
hours remained in great danger. She had detained the letter to give the
latest tidings before the post closed, and ultimately decided on not
despatching it till the next day. The following morning's communication
was a minute account of medical treatment, the bleedings, the
blisterings, the watchings, and the anxieties of a sick-bed, with all
the vacillating changes that mark the course of malady, concluding with
these words: “The doctors are not without hopes, but confess that their
confidence is rather based on the great strength and energy of his
constitution than upon any success that has attended their treatment,
from which I may say that up to this no benefit has accrued. So well
as I can interpret his utterance, he seems very anxious to see you, and
made an effort to write something to you, which, of course, he could not
accomplish. Come out here, therefore, as quickly as possible; the route
by Lucerne is, they tell me, the shortest and speediest. If I were to
give my own opinion, it would be that he is better and stronger than
yesterday; but I do not perceive the doctors disposed to take this
view.” After this came a lengthened statement of medical hopes and
fears, balanced with all the subtle minuteness known to “the Faculty.”
They explained to a nicety how if that poor watch were to stop it could
not possibly be from any fault of theirs, but either from some vice in
its original construction, or some organic change occasioned by
time. They demonstrated, in fact, that great as was their art, it was
occasionally baffled; but pointed with a proud humility to the onward
progress of science, in the calm assurance that, doubtless, we should
one day know all these things, and treat them as successfully as we
now do--I am afraid to say what. One thing, however, was sufficiently
clear,--Lord Lackington's case was as bad as possible, his recovery
almost hopeless. On the turn-down of the last page was the following,
written in evident haste, if not agitation: “In opening the letters
which have arrived since his illness, I am astonished to find many
referring to some suit, either meditated or actually instituted, against
our right to the title. Surely some deep game of treachery is at work
here. He never once alluded to such a possibility to myself, nor had I
the slightest suspicion that any pretended claim existed. One of these
letters is from Mr. Davenport Dunn, who has, I can see from the tone
in which he writes, been long conversant with the transaction, and as
evidently inclines to give it a real or feigned importance. Indeed, he
refers to a 'compromise' of some sort or other, and strongly impresses
the necessity of not letting the affair proceed further. I am actually
distracted by such news coming at such a moment. Surely Lackington
could never have been weak enough to yield to mere menace, and have thus
encouraged the insolent pretensions of this claim? As you pass through
London, call at Fordyce's, somewhere in Furnival's Inn, and, just in
course of conversation, showing your acquaintance with the subject,
learn all you can on the matter. Fordyce has all our papers, and must
necessarily know what weight is due to these pretensions. Above all,
however, hasten out here; there is no saying what any day--any hour--may
produce. I have no one here to give me a word of advice, or even
consolation; for, though Lady Grace is with us, she is so wrapped up in
her new theological studies--coquetting with Rome as she has been all
the summer--that she is perfectly useless.
“Have you any idea who is Terence Driscoll? Some extraordinary notes
bearing this signature, ill-written and ill-spelt, have fallen into my
hands as I rummaged amongst the papers, and they are all full of this
claim. It is but too plain Lackington suffered these people to terrify
him, and this Driscoll's tone is a mixture of the meanest subserviency
and outrageous impertinence. It is not unlikely Fordyce may know him. Of
course, I need not add one word of caution against your mention of
this affair, even to those of your friends with whom you are in closest
intimacy. It is really essential not a hint of it should get abroad.
“I have little doubt, now, looking back on the past, that anxiety
and care about this matter have had a large share in bringing on
Lackington's attack. He had been sleepless and uneasy for some time
back, showing an eagerness, too, about his letters, and the greatest
impatience if any accident delayed the post Although all my maturer
thoughts--indeed, my convictions--reject attaching any importance to
this claim, I will not attempt to conceal from you how unhappy it has
made me, nor how severely it has affected my nerves.”
With one more urgent appeal to lose not an hour in hastening over the
Alps, the letter concluded; the single word “weaker,” apparently written
after the letter was sealed, giving a deep meaning to the whole.
Davis was not satisfied with one perusal of the latter portion of this
letter, but read it over carefully a second time; after which, taking a
sheet of paper, he wrote down the names of Fordyce and Terence Driscoll.
He then opened a Directory, and running his eye down a column, came to
“Fordyce and Fraude, 7 Furnivats Inn, solicitors.” Of Terence Driscolls
there were seventeen, but all in trade,--tanners, tinmen, last-makers,
wharfingers, and so on; not one upon whom Davis could fix the likelihood
of the correspondence with the Viscount. He then walked the room, cigar
in mouth, for about an hour, after which he sat down and wrote the note
to Beecher which we have given in a former chapter, with directions
to call upon Stein, the moneylender, and then hasten away from Aix as
speedily as possible. This finished, he addressed another and somewhat
longer epistle to Lazarus Stein himself, of which latter document this
true history has no record.
We, perhaps, owe an apology to our reader for inverting in our narrative
the actual order of these events. It might possibly have been more
natural to have preceded the account of Beecher's reception of the
letter by the circumstances we have just detailed. We selected the
present course, however, to avoid the necessity of that continual change
of scene, alike wearisome to him who reads as to him who writes; and as
we are about to sojourn in Mr. Davis's company for some time to come,
we have deferred the explanation to a time when it should form part of a
regular series of events. Nor are we sorry at the opportunity of asking
the reader to turn once again to that brief note, and mark its
contents. Though Davis was fully impressed with the conviction that Lord
Lackington's days were numbered; though he felt that, at any moment,
some chance rumor, some flying report might inform Beecher what great
change was about to come over his fortunes,--yet this note is written in
all the seeming carelessness of a gossiping humor: he gives the latest
news of the turf, he alludes to Beecher's new entanglements at home, to,
his own newly discovered martingale for the play-table, trusting to the
one line about “Benson's people” to make Beecher hasten away from Aix,
and from the chance of hearing that his brother was hopelessly ill.
While Grog penned these lines, he would have given--if he had it--ten
thousand pounds that Beecher was beside him. Ay, willingly had he given
it, and more, too, that Beecher might be where no voice could whisper
to him the marvellous change that any moment might cause in his destiny.
Oh, ye naturalists, who grow poetical over the grub and the butterfly,
what is there, I ask ye, in the transformation at all comparable with
that when the younger brother, the man of strait and small fortune,
springs into the peer, exchanging a life of daily vicissitudes, cheap
dinners and duns, dubious companionships and high discounts, for the
assured existence, the stately banquets, the proud friendships, the pomp
and circumstance of a lord? In a moment he soars out of the troubled
atmosphere of debts and disabilities, and floats into the balmy region
whose very sorrows never wear an unbecoming mourning.
Grog's note was thus a small specimen of what the great Talleyrand used
to call the perfection of despatch writing, “not the best thing that
could be said on the subject, but simply that which would produce
the effect you desired.” Having sent off this to Beecher, he then
telegraphed to his man of business, Mr. Peach, to ascertain at Fordyce's
the latest accounts of Lord Lackington's health, and answer “by wire.”
It was far into the night when Davis betook himself to bed, but not to
sleep. The complications of the great game he was playing had for him
all the interest of the play-table. The kind of excitement he gloried
in was to find himself pitted against others,--wily, subtle, and
deep-scheming as himself,--to see some great stake on the board, and to
feel that it must be the prize of the best player. With the gambler's
superstition, he kept constantly combining events with dates and eras,
recalling what of good or ill-luck had marked certain periods of his
life. He asked himself if September had usually been a fortunate month;
did the 20th imply anything; what influence might Holy Paul exert over
his destiny; was he merely unlucky himself, or did he bring evil fortune
upon others? If he suffered himself to dwell upon such “vain auguries”
as these, they still exerted little other sway over his mind than to
nerve it to greater efforts; in fact, he consulted these signs as a
physician might investigate certain symptoms which, if not of moment
enough to call for special treatment, were yet indicative of hidden
mischief.
His gambling experiences had given him the ready tact, by a mere glance
around the table, to recognize those with whom the real struggle
should be waged; to detect, in a second, the deep head, the crafty
intelligence, that marvellous blending of caution with rashness that
make the gamester; and in the same spirit be now turned over in thought
each of those with whom he was now about to contend, and muttered
the name of Davenport Dunn over and over. “Could we only 'hit it off'
together, what a game might we not play!” was his last reflection ere he
fell off to sleep.