BOND AND DEED.
The summer span of days was gone; it was quite dark, and long troops of
withered leaves drifted in rustling trains over the avenue, as Mr. Levi,
observant of his appointment, drove up to the grand old front of
Mortlake, which in the dark spread before him like a house of white
mist.
"I shay," exclaimed Mr. Levi, softly, arresting the progress of the
cabman, who was about running up the steps, "I'll knock myshelf--wait
you there."
Mr. Levi was smoking. Standing at the base of the steps, he looked up,
and right and left with some curiosity. It was too dark; he could hardly
see the cold glimmer of the windows that reflected the grey horizon.
Vaguely, however, he could see that it was a grander place than he had
supposed. He looked down the avenue, and between the great trees over
the gate he saw the distant lights, and heard through the dim air the
chimes, far off, from London steeples, succeeding one another, or
mingling faintly, and telling all whom it might concern the solemn
lesson of the flight of time.
Mr. Levi thought it might be worth while coming down in the day-time,
and looking over the house and place to see what could be made of them;
the thing was sure to go a dead bargain. At present he could see nothing
but the wide, vague, grey front, and the faint glow through the hall
windows, which showed their black outlines sharply enough.
"Well, _he_'sh come a mucker, anyhow," murmured Mr. Levi, with one of
his smiles that showed so wide his white sharp teeth.
He knocked at the door and rang the bell. It was not a footman, but
Crozier who opened it. The old servant of the family did not like the
greasy black curls, the fierce jet eyes, the sallow face and the large,
moist, sullen mouth, that presented themselves under the brim of Mr.
Levi's hat, nor the tawdry glimmer of chains on his waistcoat, nor the
cigar still burning in his fingers. Sir Richard had told Crozier,
however, that a Mr. Levi, whom he described, was to call at a certain
hour, on very particular business, and was to be instantly admitted.
Mr. Levi looks round him, and extinguishes his cigar before following
Crozier, whose countenance betrays no small contempt and dislike, as he
eyes the little man askance, as if he would like well to be uncivil to
him.
Crozier leads him to the right, through a small apartment, to a vast
square room, long disused, still called the library, though but few
books remain on the shelves, and those in disorder. It is a chilly
night, and a little fire burns in the grate, over which Sir Richard is
cowering. Very haggard, the baronet starts up as the name of his visitor
is announced.
"Come in," cries Sir Richard, walking to meet him. "Here--here I am,
Levi, utterly ruined. There isn't a soul I dare tell how I am beset, or
anything to, but you. Do, for God's sake take pity on me, and think of
something! my brain's quite gone--you're such a clever fellow" (he is
dragging Levi by the arm all this time towards the candles): "do now,
you're sure to see some way out. It is a matter of _honour_; I only want
time. If I could only find my Uncle David: think of his
selfishness--good heaven! was there ever man so treated? and there's the
bank letter--_there_--on the table; you see it--dunning me, the
ungrateful harpies, for the trifle--what is it?--three hundred and
something, I overdrew; and that blackguard tallow-chandler has been
three times to my house in town, for payment to-day, and it's more than
I thought--near four thousand, he says--the scoundrel! It's just the
same to him two months hence; he's full of money, the beast--a fellow
like that--it's delight to him to get hold of a gentleman, and he won't
take a bill--the lying rascal! He is pressed for cash just now--a
pug-faced villain with three hundred thousand pounds! Those scoundrels!
I mean the people, whatever they are, that lent me the money; it turns
out it was all but at sight, and they were with my attorney to-day, and
they won't wait. I wish I was shot; I envy the dead dogs rolling in the
Thames! By heaven; Levi, I'll say you're the best friend man ever had on
earth, I will, if you manage something! I'll never forget it to you;
I'll have it in my power, yet! no one ever said I was ungrateful; I
swear I'll be the making of you! _Do_, Levi, think; you're accustomed
to--to emergency, and unless you will, I'm utterly ruined--ruined, by
heaven, before I have time to think!"
The Jew listened to all this with his hands in his pockets, leaning back
in his chair, with his big eyes staring on the wild face of the baronet,
and his heavy mouth hanging. He was trying to reduce his countenance to
vacancy.
"What about them shettlements, Sir Richard--a nishe young lady with a
ha-a-tful o' money?" insinuated Levi.
"I've been thinking over that, but it wouldn't do, with my affairs in
this state, it would not be honourable or straight. Put that quite
aside."
Mr. Levi gaped at him for a moment solemnly, and turned suddenly, and,
brute as he was, spit on the Turkey carpet. He was not, as you perceive,
ceremonious; but he could not allow the baronet to see the laughter that
without notice caught him for a moment, and could think of no better way
to account for his turning away his head.
"That'sh wery honourable indeed," said the Jew, more solemn than ever;
"and if you can't play in that direction, I'm afraid you're in queer
shtreet."
The baronet was standing before Levi, and at these words from that dirty
little oracle, a terrible chill stole up from his feet to the crown of
his head. Like a frozen man he stood there, and the Jew saw that his
very lips were white. Sir Richard feels, for the first time, actually,
that he is ruined.
The young man tries to speak, twice. The big eyes of the Jew are staring
up at the contortion. Sir Richard can see nothing but those two big
fiery eyes; he turns quickly away and walks to the end of the room.
"There's just one fiddle-string left to play on," muses the Jew.
"For God's sake!" exclaims Sir Richard, turning about, in a voice you
would not have known, and for fully a minute the room was so silent you
could scarcely have believed that two men were breathing in it.
"Shir Richard, will you be so good as to come nearer a bit? There,
that'sh the cheeshe. I brought thish 'ere thing."
It is a square parchment with a good deal of printed matter, and blanks,
written in, and a law stamp fixed with an awful regularity, at the
corner.
"Casht your eye over it," says Levi, coaxingly, as he pushes it over the
table to the young gentleman, who is sitting now at the other side.
The young man looks at it, reads it, but just then, if it had been a
page of "Robinson Crusoe," he could not have understood it.
"I'm not quite myself, I can't follow it; too much to think of. What is
it?"
"A bond and warrant to confess judgment."
"What is it for?"
"Ten thoushand poundsh."
"Sign it, shall I? Can you do anything with it?"
"Don't raishe your voishe, but lishten. Your friend"--and at the phrase
Mr. Levi winked mysteriously--"has enough to do it twishe over; and upon
my shoul, I'll shwear on the book, azh I hope to be shaved, it will
never shee the light; he'll never raishe a pig on it, sho' 'elp me, nor
let it out of hish 'ands, till he givesh it back to you. He can't ma-ake
no ushe of it; I knowshe him well, and he'll pay you the ten thoushand
to-morrow morning, and he wantsh to shake handsh with you, and make
himself known to you, and talk a bit."
"But--but my signature wouldn't satisfy him," began Sir Richard
bewildered.
"Oh! _no_--no, no?" murmured Mr. Levi, fiddling with the corner of the
bank's reminder which lay on the table.
"Mr. Longcluse won't sign it," said Sir Richard.
Mr. Levi threw himself back in his chair, and looked with a roguish
expression still upon the table, and gave the corner of the note a
little fillip.
"Well," said Levi, after both had been some time silent, "it ain't much,
only to write his name on the penshil line, _there_, you see, and
_there_--he shouldn't make no bonesh about it. Why, it's done every day.
Do you think I'd help in a thing of the short if there was any danger?
The Sheneral's come to town, is he? What are you afraid of? Don't you be
a shild--ba-ah!"
All this Mr. Levi said so low that it was as if he were whispering to
the table, and he kept looking down as he put the parchment over to Sir
Richard, who took it in his hand, and the bond trembled so much that he
set it down again.
"Leave it with me," he said faintly.
Levi got up with an unusual hectic in each cheek, and his eyes very
brilliant.
"I'll meet you what time you shay to-night; you had besht take a little
time. It'sh ten now. Three hoursh will do it. I'll go on to my offish by
one o'clock, and you come any time from one to two."
Sir Richard was trembling.
"Between one and two, mind. Hang it! Shir Richard, don't you be a fool
about nothing," whispers the Jew, as black as thunder.
He is fumbling in his breast-pocket, and pulling out a sheaf of letters;
he selects one, which he throws upon the parchment that lies open on the
table.
"That'sh the note you forgot in my offish yeshterday, with hish name
shined to it. There, now you have everything."
Without any form of valediction, the Jew had left the room. Sir Richard
sits with his teeth set, and a strange frown upon his face, scarcely
breathing. He hears the cab drive away. Before him on the table lie the
papers.