When, on the night after the failure of Vernon and Son, Lionel
Crawford heard from Dora Harrington the name of Dominique Lavirotte,
and repeated it after her, he was filled with amazement. "This is the
most extraordinary thing," he said, "that ever happened to me in all
my life. Dominique Lavirotte," he repeated for the second time. "I am
amazed!"
"Do you know him?" the girl asked.
"Well! Why, he owns the place I am taking you to. It isn't much of a
place. It is only the tower of an old church. They are always talking
of buying it from him and taking it down. But you see it isn't big
enough to give room for building a warehouse or store on the ground it
occupies, and it is impossible to take in any other building with it.
But come, sweetheart," he said; "when did you eat last?"
"I--I had some breakfast."
"But breakfast is a long way since. You are young, and must be hungry.
Here is the door of the tower." He took out a large key, and having
turned the lock, thrust the door into the darkness. "Now," he said,
leading her in, "be very careful; there is a hole here. Stand where
you are until I find the lantern and matches."
He groped about, and in a few seconds had lighted the candle in the
lantern. Then he took the young girl by the hand, and said: "This
way."
By the light of the lantern she could see that they were walking on
two planks, which together were not more than eighteen inches wide.
Beyond the planks was a hole, the depth of which she could not guess.
"Don't be afraid," he said. "Keep close to the wall and you are all
right."
The girl shuddered. She, who a few minutes ago was on her way to the
river, now shrank from the notion of death. Had she not met someone
who knew her lover, someone who knew Dominique, her darling Dominique?
This was to get a new lease of life, a new interest in worldly things,
a fresh-filled cup from the fountain of hope.
She clung closely to the wall, and followed the old man through the
gloom. They reached a corner, and here found a ladder.
"Up this ladder," he said; adding, "What shall I call you? What is
your name?"
"Dora," she said. "Dora Harrington."
"Then, Dora, my dear child," he said, "keep close to the wall on this
ladder, too, for there is no hand-rail, as you see."
They mounted the ladder. It ran along two sides of the tower. Then
they found themselves on the first loft. The head of the ladder was
unprotected by any rail. Two other lofts they reached in a similar
manner, she clinging closely to the wall.
"This is my sitting-room," he said, with a laugh. "It is not very wide
or long, but it is lofty, airy, and, although there is not much
furniture, and the little I have is the worse of the wear, it will
have a great interest for you, for it belongs to him, Mr. Lavirotte.
Sit down here, now, on this couch. The spring is not so good as it
once was. You will have a cup of tea and some nice bread-and-butter.
That little table over there is my kitchen. See," he said, "we do not
take long to light the fire, and we shall have boiling water in a few
minutes. Boiling water," he said, "and the prospect of a nice cup of
tea is better for you, sweetheart, than the cold Thames. The prospect
of--of--ugh! Let us forget that unpleasant folly of ours."
He had kindled the lamp in a small oil-stove, and set the kettle on
the stove. "And now," he said, "while the water is boiling you shall
tell me as much as you please about yourself."
She was very tired, and for the present the mere rest was food and
drink to her. It was pleasant to sit there, half-tranced with fatigue,
to sit upon this couch which belonged to him, in the presence of
someone who knew him, and with the prospect of succour from a friendly
hand.
The furniture in the loft was not, indeed, handsome. It never had
been. When Lavirotte lived in London he had furnished a couple of
rooms, and upon leaving them found that he could get little or nothing
for the furniture. So he carted it away to St. Prisca's Tower in
Porter Street, and there it was when, at the request of Lionel
Crawford, he let the tower to him.
In the loft where Dora Harrington now found herself there were three
ordinary chairs, one arm-chair, a couch, and two tables, besides the
"kitchen." The walls were rough, unplastered brick. The roof of the
loft was unceiled. Under the table was a small piece of carpet.
"My own room," said the old man, "is above this, and this shall be
yours for to-night, and as long as you wish after, until you get a
better one, or until he comes for you."
"How can I thank you for your kindness? May I ask your name?"
"Lionel Crawford," said the old man. "I live in the room above this,
because my business requires me to be near the roof by night."
"Your business requires you," she said, "to be near the roof by
night." By this time he had made the tea, and she had drunk a little,
and begun to be refreshed. "Can it be you are an astronomer?"
"No, no," he said. "I am no astronomer, and yet all the matters of
weather interest me greatly. The rain to-night may be worth a fortune
to me."
"You are a farmer, perhaps," she said. "Or no, that cannot be; but you
own land?"
"Not a rood. Although I say I am much interested in the weather, I am
neither interested in growing anything, nor in meteorology beyond the
winds and the rains. By day I get as far away from the sun as I can,
as close to the rich centre of the earth as I may. By night I aspire,
I seek the highest point I can reach, and there I worship the clouds
and the winds that they may befriend me."
The old man was now sitting in the easy-chair, leaning forward, his
eyes fixed on vacancy. He had a weird, possessed expression. He seemed
to be looking at things far off, and yet clearly within the power of
his vision. He seemed like one in a dream, and yet his words were as
consequential and coherent as the reasoning in Euclid. His might have
been the head of an alchemist, or of some other man who dwelt with
unascertained potentialities, with mystic symbols and orders and
rites, with things transcending the ken of vulgar flesh, with
subtleties of matter known to few, rare drugs, rich spices, the
virtues of gems, the portents of earth and air, the mystic language of
the stars, the music of the spheres.
"And when it is winter," asked the girl, "you wish, I suppose, for
sunshine and calms?"
"No," he said. "Never. Always for rain and wind; wind and rain. Wind
in the daytime, and rain by night, winter and summer; all the year
round."
"And may I ask you," said the girl, timidly, "what you are?"
"When I met you this evening," he said, in the same tone as he had
employed since he became abstracted, "I was Giant Despair."
"And now," she said, "what are you?"
"The rain and you have come," he said. "I am now the humble Disciple
of Hope."
"And, sir, may I ask, have you no friends, no relatives?"
"None that I know of," he said. "All my children are, I think, dead.
My wife is dead. My best friends are the dead."
"But surely, sir," she said, "there is among the living someone in
whom you take an interest?"
"No; no one. I am a client of the dead. If any good ever comes to me
in life it will be out of the buried past. I doubt if good will ever
come. I am too old and spent. I was too old and spent when I began my
labours here. For years I had my great secret hidden in my breast. I
nursed it, I fed it, I dreamed over it. For years I lived in this
neighbourhood hoping some day or other to gain admission to this
tower. I could not find out who owned it. It pays no rates or taxes.
It is not registered in any name that I could ever find out. I had
begun to think I should never get any nearer the goal, when one day as
I was without the walls I saw a young man come up, thrust a key into
the lock of the great door, and try in vain to move the rusty bolt. I
watched him with consuming eagerness----"
"This was some time ago?"
"Years, two or three years. I drew up to the young man and said: 'I
fear, sir, it is a tougher job than you bargained for.' I offered to
get him a locksmith, and in less than an hour we got in. The young man
told me he had come from abroad----"
"What was the young man's name?" asked the girl.
"Dominique Lavirotte," said the old man, in the voice of a seer busy
with things remote.
"My Dominique," she whispered; "my darling Dominique."
The old man went on without heeding the interruption. He had forgotten
the connection between the girl and the man.
"The stranger told me," said old Crawford, "that although he had lived
some time in England, he had now been for years abroad. This was all
the property he had in the world, and he had never seen it before. He
understood it was absolutely valueless, and he had merely come to see
it now out of curiosity. 'For,' he said, 'is it not strange that in
the City of London, where the rent of land is six shillings a square
foot, I should own some for which I cannot get a penny the square
yard? I wish I could get someone to buy it,' he said.
"'You must not think of selling it,' said I. 'I have been waiting here
years in the hope of meeting you.'
"'Why?' he cried in astonishment. 'Do you want to buy?'
"'No,' I said. 'May I speak to you a while in private?' The locksmith
was standing by. Then I took this handsome young man aside, and having
made him swear he would not reveal the matter to anyone----"
"What?" cried the girl, leaning forward eagerly.
"That is _my_ secret," said the old man.