(From _The Story-Teller_)
1922
To say that the usually amiable Ambrose Cleaver was in the devil of a
temper would be merely to echo the words of his confidential clerk,
John, who, looking through the glass partition between their offices,
confessed to James, the office boy, that he had not seen such goings on
since old Ambrose, the founder of the firm, was gathered to his
fathers.
"There won't be a bit of furniture in the place presently," said he,
"and I wouldn't give twopence for the cat when he's finished kicking
her. This comes of the women, my boy. Never have nothing to say to a
woman until you've finished your dinner and lighted your cigar. Many a
good business have I seen go into the Bankruptcy Court because of a
petticoat before lunch. You keep away from 'em if you want to be Lord
Mayor of London, same as Dick Whittington was."
James did not desire particularly to become Lord Mayor of London, but
he was greatly amused by his employer's temper.
"Never heard such language," said he--"and him about to marry her. Why,
he almost threw them jewels at her 'ead; and when she told him he must
have let the devil in by accident, he says as he was always glad to see
her friends. They'll make a happy couple, surely."
John shook his old dense head, and would express no opinion upon the
point.
"Misfortunes never come singly," said he. "Here's that Count Florian
waiting for him in the ante-room. Now that's a man I can't abide. If
anybody told me he was the devil, I'd believe him soon enough. A bad
'un, James, or I don't know the breed. An evil man who seems to pollute
the very air you breathe."
James was not so sure of it.
"He give me half a crown for fetching of a cab yesterday, and told me
to go to the music-hall with it. He must have a lot of money, for he
never smokes his cigars more than half-way through, and he wears a
different scarf-pin every day. That's wot comes of observation, Mr.
John. I could tell you all the different pairs of trousers he's worn
for the last three weeks, and so I'm going to make my fortune as the
advertisements say."
Mr. John would not argue about that. The bell of the inner office now
tinkled, and that was an intimation that the Count Nicholas Florian was
to be admitted to the Holy of Holies. So the old man hurried away and,
opening the sacred door with circumspection, narrowly escaped being
knocked down by an enraged and hasty cat--glad to escape that inferno
at any cost.
"You rang, sir?"
Ambrose Cleaver, thirty-three years of age, square-jawed, fair-haired,
a florid complexion and with a wonderful pair of clear blue eyes,
admitted that he did ring.
"And don't be so d----d slow next time," he snapped. "I'll see the
Count Florian at once."
The old man withdrew timidly, while his master mopped up the ink from
the pot he had broken in his anger.
"Enough to try the devil himself," was the sop that argument offered to
his heated imagination. "She knows I hate Deauville like poison, and of
course it's to Deauville she must go for the honeymoon. And she looks
so confoundedly pretty when she's in a temper--what wonderful eyes
she's got! And when she's angry the curls get all round her ears, and
it's as much as a man can do not to kiss her on the spot. Of course, I
didn't really want her to have opals if she thinks they're unlucky, but
she needn't have insisted that I knew about it and bought them on
purpose to annoy her. Good God! I wish there were no women in the world
sometimes. What a splendid place it would be to live in, and what a
fine time the men would have--for, of course, they are all the
daughters of the devil really, and that's why they make life too hot
for us."
Mr. John entered at this moment showing in the Count, and so a very
cheerful argument was thus cut short. Ambrose pulled himself together
and suppressing, as best he could, any appearance of aversion from the
caller who now presented himself, he sat back in his chair and prepared
to hear "the tale."
Count Florian was at that time some fifty-nine years of age, dark as an
Italian and not without trace of an Eastern origin. Though it was early
in the month of May, he still wore a light Inverness cape of an ancient
fashion, while his patent-leather boots and his silk hat shone with the
polish of a well-kept mirror. When he laughed, however, he showed
ferocious teeth, some capped with gold, and in his eyes was a fiery
light not always pleasant to behold.
"A chilly morning," he began. "You have no fire, I see."
"You find it so?" queried Ambrose. "Well, I thought it quite warm."
"Ah," said the count, "you were born, of course, in this detestable
country. Do not forget that where I live there are people who call the
climate hell," and he laughed sardonically, with a laugh quite
unpleasant to hear.
Ambrose did not like such talk, and showed his displeasure plainly.
"The climate is good enough for me," he said. "Personally, I don't want
to live in the particular locality you name. Have a cigar and tell me
why you called--the old business, I suppose? Well, you know my opinion
about that. I want none of it. I don't believe it is honest business,
and I think that if we did it, we might all end in the dock. So you
know my mind before we begin."
The Count heard him patiently, but did not seem in any way disturbed.
"There is very little business that is honest," he said; "practically
none at all. Look at politics, the Church, art, the sciences--those who
flourish are the imposters, while your honest men are foolish enough to
starve in garrets. If a man will undertake nothing that is open to the
suspicion of self-interest, he should abandon all his affairs at once
and retire to a monastery, where possibly he will discover that the
prior is cheating the abbot and the cellarer cheating them both. You
have a great business opportunity, and if anybody suffers it is only
the Government, which you must admit is a pure abstraction--suggesting
chiefly a company of undiscovered rascals. The deal which I have to
propose to you concerns a sum of half a million sterling, and that is
not to be passed by lightly. I suggest, therefore, that at least you
read the documents I have brought with me, and that we leave the matter
of honesty to be discussed by the lawyers."
He laid upon the table a bundle of papers as he spoke, and lighted a
cigarette by lightly rubbing a match against the tip of the fourth
finger of his left hand. Ambrose felt strangely uneasy. A most uncanny
suspicion had come upon him while the man was speaking. He felt that no
ordinary human being faced him, and that he might in very truth be
talking with the devil. Nor would this idea quit him despite its
apparent absurdity.
"You must have great influence, Count," he remarked presently--"great
influence to get such a valuable commission as this!"
The Count was flattered.
"I have servants in every country," he said; "the rich are always my
friends--the poor often come to me because they are not rich. Few who
know me can do without me; indeed, I may say that but for such men as I
am the world would not go on. I am the mainspring of its endeavour."
"And yet when I met you it was on the links above La Turbie."
The count laughed, showing his glittering teeth as any carnivorous
animal might have done.
"Ah, I remember. You met me when I was playing golf with a very saintly
lady. Latterly, I hear, she has ceased to go to church and taken to
bobbed hair. Women are strange creatures, Mr. Cleaver, but difficult,
very difficult sometimes. I have had many disappointments with women."
"You find men easier?"
"Indeed, there are few men who are not willing to go to the devil if
the consideration be large enough. A woman, on the other hand, is too
often the victim of her emotions. She will suffer eternal torment for
the man she loves, and she will cheat for him. But for the rest of
us--nothing, positively nothing at all; she is neither honest nor
dishonest, she merely passes us by."
"Ah," exclaimed Ambrose, a little wearily, "I wish I could think that
about my _fiancée_. She's just been up--that's why you find me upset. I
bought her opals, and, of course, she wants diamonds. You see, I forgot
she wasn't born in October."
The Count nodded his head in sympathy.
"I must have a little talk to her. I am sure we shall be good friends.
Miss Kitty Palmer, is it not? Forgive me, I read it in the newspapers--a
charming face but a little temper, I think. Well, well, there is no
harm in that. What a dull place the world would be but for a little
temper! You have much to be thankful for, Mr. Cleaver--very, very much.
And now this concession, by which you will make two hundred thousand
pounds at a very moderate estimate. There will be very little temper
when you take home that news. No woman is angry with a man who makes
money, but she has a great contempt for him who does not."
"Even if he made it dishonestly?"
"She does not care a snap of the fingers how he makes it, believe me."
"And afterwards, when he goes to prison----"
"Pshaw--only fools go to prison. If your foolish principles were made
the test, there would hardly be a free man in Mincing Lane. We should
have to lock up the whole City. Come, let me have your signature, and I
will do the rest. To refuse is madness. You are offered the chance of a
lifetime."
Ambrose did not reply to him immediately. It had come to him suddenly
that this was the hour of a great temptation, and he sat very still,
conscious that his heart beat fast because of the evil that was near
him. The Count watched him, meanwhile, as a wild beast may watch its
prey. The man's eyes appeared to have turned to coals of fire; his
fingers twitched; his teeth were on edge--he had even ceased to smoke.
"Well?" he said at last, unable to suffer the silence any longer.
Ambrose rose from his chair and went over slowly to the great safe,
which stood in the corner of his office; he unlocked it and took some
documents from a shelf upon the right-hand side. The Count stood at his
elbow while he did so, and he could feel the man's breath warm upon his
shoulder.
Suddenly a violent impulse overcame him. He swung round and seized the
fellow by the collar, and in an instant, endowed as it were with
superhuman strength, he hurled the man into the safe and turned the key
upon him.
"By heaven!" he cried, "but I have locked up the devil."