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SUNRISE.
BY
WILLIAM BLACK.
_Author of "Shandon Bells," "Yolande," "Strange Adventures of a
Phaeton," "Madcap Violet" etc., etc._
NEW YORK:
JOHN B. ALDEN, PUBLISHER,
1883.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER PAGE
I. A FIRST INTERVIEW. 1
II. PLEADINGS. 8
III. IN A HOUSE IN CURZON STREET. 14
IV. A STRANGER. 23
V. PIONEERS. 29
VI. BON VOYAGE! 37
VII. IN SOLITUDE. 44
VIII. A DISCOVERY. 51
IX. A NIGHT IN VENICE. 58
X. VACILLATION. 64
XI. A COMMISSION. 72
XII. JACTA EST ALEA. 79
XIII. SOUTHWARD. 86
XIV. A RUSSIAN EPISODE. 94
XV. NEW FRIENDS. 101
XVI. A LETTER. 108
XVII. CALABRESSA. 115
XVIII. HER ANSWER. 123
XIX. AT THE CULTURVEREIN. 129
XX. FIDELIO. 137
XXI. FATHER AND DAUGHTER. 144
XXII. EVASIONS. 151
XXIII. A TALISMAN. 158
XXIV. AN ALTERNATIVE. 165
XXV. A FRIEND'S ADVICE. 172
XXVI. A PROMISE. 179
XXVII. KIRSKI. 186
XXVIII. A CLIMAX. 193
XXIX. A GOOD-NIGHT MESSAGE. 201
XXX. SOME TREASURES. 208
XXXI. IN A GARDEN AT POSILIPO. 215
XXXII. FRIEND AND SWEETHEART. 223
XXXIII. INTERVENTION. 230
XXXIV. AN ENCOUNTER. 237
XXXV. THE MOTHER. 245
XXXVI. THE VELVET GLOVE. 252
XXXVII. SANTA CLAUS. 259
XXXVIII. A SUMMONS. 266
XXXIX. A NEW HOME. 274
XL. A CONCLAVE. 280
XLI. IN THE DEEPS. 288
XLII. A COMMUNICATION. 295
XLIII. A QUARREL. 302
XLIV. A TWICE-TOLD TALE. 308
XLV. SOUTHWARD. 316
XLVI. THE BEECHES. 321
XLVII. AT PORTICI. 329
XLVIII. AN APPEAL. 337
XLIX. AN EMISSARY. 345
L. A WEAK BROTHER. 352
LI. THE CONJURER. 359
LII. FIAT JUSTITIA. 366
LIII. THE TRIAL. 373
LIV. PUT TO THE PROOF. 380
LV. CONGRATULATIONS. 387
LVI. A COMMISSION. 394
LVII. FAREWELL! 401
LVIII. A SACRIFICE. 409
LIX. NATALIE SPEAKS. 416
LX. NEW SHORES. 424
CHAPTER I.
A FIRST INTERVIEW.
One chilly afternoon in February, while as yet the London season had not
quite begun, though the streets were busy enough, an open barouche was
being rapidly driven along Piccadilly in the direction of Coventry
Street; and its two occupants, despite the dull roar of vehicles around
them, seemed to be engaged in eager conversation. One of these two was a
tall, handsome, muscular-looking man of about thirty, with a sun-tanned
face, piercing gray eyes, and a reddish-brown beard cropped in the
foreign fashion; the other, half hidden among the voluminous furs of the
carriage, was a pale, humpbacked lad, with a fine, expressive,
intellectual face, and large, animated, almost woman-like eyes. The
former was George Brand, of Brand Beeches, Bucks, a bachelor unattached,
and a person of no particular occupation, except that he had tumbled
about the world a good deal, surveying mankind with more or less of
interest or indifference. His companion and friend, the bright-eyed,
beautiful-faced, humpbacked lad, was Ernest Francis D'Agincourt,
thirteenth Baron Evelyn.
The discussion was warm, though the elder of the two friends spoke
deprecatingly, at times even scornfully.
"I know what is behind all that," he said. "They are making a dupe of
you, Evelyn. A parcel of miserable Leicester Square conspirators,
plundering the working-man of all countries of his small savings, and
humbugging him with promises of twopenny-halfpenny revolutions! That is
not the sort of thing for you to mix in. It is not English, all that
dagger and dark-lantern business, even if it were real; but when it is
only theatrical--when they are only stage daggers--when the wretched
creatures who mouth about assassination and revolution are only
swaggering for half-pence--bah! What part do you propose to play?"
"I tell you it has nothing to do with daggers and dark lanterns," said
the other with even greater warmth. "Why will you run your head against
a windmill? Why must you see farther into a mile-stone than anybody
else? I wonder, with all your travelling, you have not got rid of some
of that detestable English prejudice and suspicion. I tell you that when
I am allowed, even as an outsider, to see something of this vast
organization for the defence of the oppressed, for the protection of the
weak, the vindication of the injured, in every country throughout the
globe--when I see the splendid possibilities before it--when I find that
even a useless fellow like myself may do some little thing to lessen the
mighty mass of injustice and wrong in the world--well, I am not going to
stop to see that every one of my associates is of pure English birth,
with a brother-in-law on the Bench, and an uncle in the House of Lords.
I am glad enough to have something to do that is worth doing; something
to believe in; something to hope for. You--what do you believe in? What
is there in heaven or earth that you believe in?"
"Suppose I say that I believe in you, Evelyn?" said his friend, quite
good-naturedly; "and some day, when you can convince me that your newly
discovered faith is all right, you may find me becoming your meek
disciple, and even your apostle. But I shall want something more than
Union speeches, you know."
By this time the carriage had passed along Coventry Street, turned into
Prince's Street, and been pulled up opposite a commonplace-looking house
in that distinctly dingy thoroughfare, Lisle Street, Soho.
"Not quite Leicester Square, but near enough to serve," said Brand, with
a contemptuous laugh, as he got out of the barouche, and then, with the
greatest of care and gentleness, assisted his companion to alight.
They crossed the pavement and rang a bell. Almost instantly the door was
opened by a stout, yellow-haired, blear-eyed old man, who wore a huge
overcoat adorned with masses of shabby fur, and who carried a small lamp
in his hand, for the afternoon had grown to dusk. The two visitors were
evidently expected. Having given the younger of them a deeply respectful
greeting in German, the fur-coated old gentleman shut the door after
them, and proceeded to show the way up a flight of narrow and not
particularly clean wooden stairs.
"Conspiracy doesn't seem to pay," remarked George Brand, half to
himself.
On the landing they were confronted by a number of doors, one of which
the old German threw open. They entered a large, plainly furnished,
well-lit room, looking pretty much like a merchant's office, though the
walls were mostly hung with maps and plans of foreign cities. Brand
looked round with a supercilious air. All his pleasant and friendly
manner had gone. He was evidently determined to make himself as
desperately disagreeable as an Englishman can make himself when
introduced to a foreigner whom he suspects. But even he would have had
to confess that there was no suggestion of trap-doors or sliding panels
in this ordinary, business-like room; and not a trace of a dagger or a
dark lantern anywhere.
Presently, from a door opposite, an elderly man of middle height and
spare and sinewy frame walked briskly in, shook hands with Lord Evelyn,
was introduced to the tall, red-bearded Englishman (who still stood, hat
in hand, and with a portentous stiffness in his demeanor), begged his
two guests to be seated, and himself sat down at an open bureau, which
was plentifully littered with papers.
"I am pleased to meet you, Mr. Brand," he said, speaking carefully, and
with a considerable foreign accent. "Lord Evelyn has several times
promised me the honor of making your acquaintance."
Mr. Brand merely bowed: he was intent on making out what manner of man
this suspected foreigner might be; and he was puzzled. At first sight
Ferdinand Lind appeared to be about fifty or fifty-five years of age;
his closely cropped hair was gray; and his face, in repose, somewhat
care-worn. But then when he spoke there was an almost youthful vivacity
in his look; his dark eyes were keen, quick, sympathetic; and there was
even a certain careless ease about his dress--about the turned-down
collar and French-looking neck-tie, for example--that had more of the
air of the student than of the pedant about it. All this at the first
glance. It was only afterward you came to perceive what was denoted by
those heavy, seamed brows, the firm, strong mouth, and the square line
of the jaw. These told you of the presence of an indomitable and
inflexible will. Here was a man born to think, and control, and command.
"With that prospect before me," he continued, apparently taking no
notice of the Englishman's close scrutiny, "I must ask you, Mr.
Brand--well, you know, it is merely a matter of form--but I must ask
you to be so very kind as to give me your word of honor that you will
not disclose anything you may see or learn here. Have you any
objection?"
Brand stared, then said, coldly,
"Oh dear, no. I will give you that pledge, if you wish it."
"It is so easy to deal with Englishmen," said Mr. Lind, politely. "A
word, and it is done. But I suppose Lord Evelyn has told you that we
have no very desperate secrets. Secrecy, you know, one must use
sometimes; it is an inducement to many--most people are fond of a little
mystery; and it is harmless."
Brand said nothing; Lord Evelyn thought he might have been at least
civil. But when an Englishman is determined on being stiff, his
stiffness is gigantic.
"If I were to show you some of the tricks of this very room," said this
grizzled old foreigner with the boyish neck-tie, "you might call me a
charlatan; but would that be fair? We have to make use of various means
for what we consider a good end, a noble end; and there are many people
who love mystery and secrecy. With you English it is different--you must
have everything above-board."
The pale, fine face of the sensitive lad sitting there became clouded
over with disappointment. He had brought this old friend of his with
some vague hope that he might become a convert, or at least be
sufficiently interested to make inquiries; but Brand sat silent, with a
cold indifference that was only the outward sign of an inward suspicion.
"Sometimes, it is true," continued Mr. Lind, in nowise disconcerted, "we
stumble on the secrets of others. Our association has innumerable
feelers: and we make it our business to know what we can of everything
that is going on. For example, I could tell you of an odd little
incident that occurred last year in Constantinople. A party of four
gentlemen were playing cards there in a private room."
Brand started. The man who was speaking took no notice.
"There were two Austrian officers, a Roumanian count, and an
Englishman," he continued, in the most matter-of-fact way. "It was in a
private room, as I said. The Englishman was, after a time, convinced
that the Roumanian was cheating; he caught his wrist--showed the false
cards; then he managed to ward off the blow of a dagger which the
Roumanian aimed at him, and by main force carried him to the door and
threw him down-stairs. It was cleverly done, but the Englishman was
very big and strong. Afterward the two Austrian officers, who knew the
Verdt family, begged the Englishman never to reveal what had occurred;
and the three promised secrecy. Was not that so?"
The man looked up carelessly. The Englishman's apathy was no longer
visible.
"Y-yes," he stammered.
"Would you like to know what became of Count Verdt?" he asked, with an
air of indifference.
"Yes, certainly," said the other.
"Ah! Of course you know the Castel' del Ovo?"
"At Naples? Yes."
"You remember that out at the point, beside the way that leads from the
shore to the fortress, there are many big rocks, and the waves roll
about there. Three weeks after you caught Count Verdt cheating at cards,
his dead body was found floating there."
"Gracious heavens!" Brand exclaimed, with his face grown pale. And then
he added, breathlessly, "Suicide?"
Mr. Lind smiled.
"No. Reassure yourself. When they picked out the body from the water,
they found the mouth gagged, and the hands tied behind the back."
Brand stared at this man.
"Then you--?" He dared not complete the question.
"I? Oh, I had nothing to do with it, any more than yourself. It was a
Camorra affair."
He had been speaking quite indifferently; but now a singular change came
over his manner.
"And if I _had_ had something to do with it?" he said, vehemently; and
the dark eyes were burning with a quick anger under the heavy brows.
Then he spoke more slowly, but with a firm emphasis in his speech. "I
will tell you a little story; it will not detain you, sir. Suppose that
you have a prison so overstocked with political prisoners that you must
keep sixty or seventy in the open yard adjoining the outer wall. You
have little to fear; they are harmless, poor wretches; there are several
old men--two women. Ah! but what are the poor devils to do in those long
nights that are so dark and so cold? However they may huddle together,
they freeze; if they keep not moving, they die; you find them dead in
the morning. If you are a Czar you are glad of that, for your prisons
are choked; it is very convenient. And, then suppose you have a clever
fellow who finds out a narrow passage between the implement-house and
the wall; and he says, 'There, you can work all night at digging a
passage out; and who in the morning will suspect?' Is not that a fine
discovery, when one must keep moving in the dark to prevent one's self
stiffening into a corpse? Oh yes; then you find the poor devils, in
their madness, begin to tear the ground up; what tools have they but
their fingers, when the implement-house is locked? The poor devils!--old
men, too, and women; and how they take their turn at the slow work, hour
after hour, week after week, all through the long, still nights! Inch by
inch it is; and the poor devils become like rabbits, burrowing for a
hole to reach the outer air; and do you know that, after a time, the
first wounds heal, and your fingers become like stumps of iron--"
He held out his two hands; the ends of the fingers were seamed and
corrugated, as if they had been violently scalded. But he could not hold
them steady--they were trembling with the suppressed passion that made
his whole frame tremble.
"Relay after relay, night after night, week after week, month after
month, until those poor devils of rabbits had actually burrowed a
passage out into the freedom of God's world again. And some said the
Czar himself had heard of it, and would not interfere, for the prisons
were choked; and some said the wife of the governor was Polish, and had
a kind heart; but what did it matter when the time was drawing near? And
always this clever fellow--do you know, sir, his name was Verdt
too?--encouraging, helping, goading these poor people on. Then the last
night--how the miserable rabbits of creatures kept huddled together,
shivering in the dark, till the hour arrived! and then the death-like
stillness they found outside; and the wild wonder and fear of it; and
the old men and the women crying like children to find themselves in the
free air again. Marie Falevitch--that was my sister-in-law--she kissed
me, and was laughing when she whispered, '_Eljen a haza_!' I think she
was a little off her head with the long, sleepless nights."
He stopped for a second; his throat seemed choked.
"Did I tell you they had all got out?--the poor devils all wondering
there, and scarcely knowing where to go. And now suppose, sir--ah! you
don't know anything about these things, you happy English
people--suppose you found the black night around you all at once turned
to a blaze of fire--red hell opened on all sides of you, and the bullets
plowing your comrades down; the old men crying for mercy, the young ones
falling only with a groan; the women--my God! Did you ever hear a woman
shriek when she was struck through the heart with a bullet? Marie
Falevitch fell at my feet, but I could not raise her--I was struck down
too. It was a week after that I came to my senses. I was in the prison,
but the prison was not quite so full. Czars and governors have a fine
way of thinning prisons when they get too crowded."
These last words were spoken in a calm, contemptuous way; the man was
evidently trying hard to control the fierce passion that these memories
had stirred up. He had clinched one hand, and put it firmly on the desk
before him, so that it should not tremble.
"Well, now, Mr. Brand," he continued, slowly, "let us suppose that when
you come to yourself again, you hear the rumors that are about: you
hear, for example, that Count Verdt--that exceedingly clever man--has
been graciously pardoned by the Czar for revealing the villanous
conspiracy of his fellow-prisoners; and that he has gone off to the
South with a bag of money. Do you not think that you would remember the
name of that clever person? Do you not think you would say to yourself,
'Well, it may not be to-day, or to-morrow, or the next day: _but some
day_?'"
Again the dark eyes glowed; but he had a wonderful self-control.
"You would remember the name, would you not, if you had your
sister-in-law, and your only brother, and six or seven of your old
friends and comrades all shot on the one night?"
"This was the same Count Verdt?" Brand asked, eagerly.
"Yes," said the other, after a considerable pause. Then he added, with
an involuntary sigh, "I had been following his movements for some time;
but the Camorra stepped in. They are foolish people, those
Camorristi--foolish and ignorant. They punish for very trifling
offences, and they do not make sufficient warning of their punishments.
Then they are quite imbecile in the way they attempt to regulate labor."
He was now talking in quite a matter-of-fact way. The clinched hand was
relaxed.
"Besides," continued Ferdinand Lind, with the cool air of a critic,
"their conduct is too scandalous. The outer world believes they are
nothing but an association of thieves and cut-throats; that is because
they do not discountenance vulgar and useless crime; because there is
not enough authority, nor any proper selection of members. In the
affairs of the world, one has sometimes to make use of queer
agents--that is admitted; and you cannot have any large body of people
without finding a few scoundrels among them. I suppose one might even
say that about your very respectable Church of England. But you only
bring a society into disrepute--you rob it of much usefulness--you put
the law and society against it--when you make it the refuge of common
murderers and thieves."
"I should hope so," remarked George Brand. If this suspected foreigner
had resumed his ordinary manner, so had he; he was again the haughty,
suspicious, almost supercilious Englishman.
Poor Lord Evelyn! The lad looked quite distressed. These two men were so
obviously antipathetic that it seemed altogether hopeless to think of
their ever coming together.
"Well," said Mr. Lind, in his ordinary polished and easy manner, "I must
not seek to detain you; for it is a cold night to keep horses waiting.
But, Mr. Brand, Lord Evelyn dines with us to-morrow evening; if you have
nothing better to do, will you join our little party? My daughter, I am
sure, will be most pleased to make your acquaintance."
"Do, Brand, there's a good fellow;" struck in his friend. "I haven't
seen anything of you for such a long time."
"I shall be very happy indeed," said the tall Englishman, wondering
whether he was likely to meet a goodly assemblage of sedition-mongers at
this foreign persons table.
"We dine at a quarter to eight. The address is No. ---- Curzon Street; but
perhaps you had better take this card."
So they left, and were conducted down the staircase by the stout old
German; and scrambled up into the furs of the barouche.
"So he has a daughter?" said Brand, as the two friends together drove
down to Buckingham Street, where they were to dine at his rooms.
"Oh, yes; his daughter Natalie," said Lord Evelyn, eagerly. "I am so
glad you will see him to-morrow night!"
"And they live on Curzon Street," said the other, reflectively. "H'm!
Conspiracy _does_ pay, then!"