CHAPTER XXII.CHARLES GASPILLER.I HAD avoided writing my name in the register of the hotel, for I did not wish to leave any recorded traces of my presence in the city. It occurred to me that perhaps Lilian had told her name to her new-made friends, but they would soon be in the tropics, and out of the reach of detectives. I regarded myself as very shrewd, and I could not exactly see how it was possible for any one to obtain a trace of me, after the steamer had departed.I had given my name at the steamer office as Charles Gaspiller, and the money for my bill of exchange was to be drawn in London under this appellation. I don’t know how I happened to select this name. It was a French word which probably came back to my memory from my studies at the high school; but I had forgotten its meaning, though I could read French tolerably well. When I came to ascertain its signification, I was not a little surprised to find that it exactly fitted my case, for it means“to waste, to squander, to lavish.” It was entirely by accident that I chose this word, and I certainly should not have done so had I been aware that it covered my case so exactly.But if I succeeded in concealing my identity from others, I could not hide it from my wife. If I was Mr. Gaspiller, she must of necessity be Mrs. Gaspiller. We were not at all fitted to pass ourselves off as French people, for my pronunciation had been so neglected at school, that I could hardly speak a word of the language with which I was tolerably familiar by the eye. Lilian knew still less of it. I knew that doublelin French had a liquid sound, and I called the word Gas-pee-ay. It would be singular that I should have a French name, pronounced with a French accent, and yet not be able to speak the language. I was afraid I had made an unpleasant bed for myself. But I determined as soon as I reached Paris to master the language.How could I have the assurance to tell Lilian that her name was Gaspiller, and not Glasswood. I might convince her that the latter was too commonplace to travel in Europe upon—indeed she was already convinced of that, for she often, in her lively manner, made fun of the cognomen. Icould assure her that, while I was not to blame for my name, the word was so inconsistent, absurd and contradictory, that it would subject me to ridicule. It was no part of my purpose to tell her I was a defaulter, an exile from home, a fugitive from justice. It would break her gentle heart. Yet I was not sure that it would not come to this.After I had completed all my preparations, I was in her presence with my bill of exchange and my passage receipt in my pocket. She was talking with the lady who was going to Havana when I entered. She looked at me, and as soon as she recognized me, she commented merrily upon the change which the loss of my whiskers made in my appearance. She rose from her chair, but her friend talked so fast that she could not at once leave her. I knew how anxious she was to know the final answer of the great banking-house to which I had alluded. Upon that depended the voyage to Europe. As soon as she could decently do so, she tore herself away from her companion, and sat down on the sofa at my side.“Are you going, Paley, or not?” she asked, with breathless eagerness.In answer to this inquiry I inadvertently pulledout the receipt for the passage money, which constituted the ticket. I did not at the moment think that it ran in favor of “Charles Gaspiller,” for I was not quite ready to tell her that I had changed my name.“What is this, Paley?” she asked, blankly. “I don’t understand it.”“Don’t you, my dear? Why, it is our ticket for a passage in the steamer to Liverpool,” I replied, cheerfully.“This? ‘Received of Charles Gas-pill-er!’” said she, reading just what the letters of my new name spelled.How stupid I was! Why had I not told her in so many words, that we were to go, instead of doing the thing in this sensational way?“Precisely so; that is the French for Glasswood,” I replied, laughing as gaily as my confusion would permit. “I don’t want Frenchmen in Paris to call meBois de Verre, which means wood made of glass, or anything of that sort. The name is Gas-pee-ay, and not Gas-pill-er.”“But how does it happen that the receipt is given to you under this name?”“Because I don’t want to be called Glasswood in Europe. But, my dear, we have no time tospare now, and we shall have ten days of idleness as soon as the steamer sails. So we must not stop to discuss this matter at the present time. We must be on board at half-past twelve, and it is after eleven now,” I continued, with sufficient excitement in my manner to change the current of her thoughts.“Then we are really going!” exclaimed she, opening her bright eyes.“Certainly we are; and going immediately.”“Why, I wanted to go shopping in New York, if we were really going.”“Shopping! That’s absurd! Ladies never go shopping in New York, when they are on their way to Paris.”“But I must write a letter to mother.”“Certainly; you have time to do that while I speak for a carriage and pay the bill.”I procured note paper and envelopes for her, and went down to settle my account at the office. The polite book-keeper asked me to indicate the name on the register. I told him I had not written it. I had wound my handkerchief around my right hand, which I held up to him, and declared that I was unable to use a pen. He was kind enough to offer to render me the service himself.“C. Gaspiller,” I added, when he was ready to write.“What is it, sir?”“C. Gaspiller.”He wrote “C. Caspeare,” and I was entirely satisfied.“Three dollars, Mr. Caspeare,” said he; and I gave him the amount, though it was one dollar more than the regular charge.I was confident that I was leaving no trace of myself here. A carriage was ordered for me, and my trunks were loaded. I went up for Lilian, and found that she had finished her letter. She gave it to me to be stamped and mailed. I took a stamp from my porte-monnaie, carefully adjusted it upon the envelope, and put the letter in my pocket. Of course I was not stupid enough to mail it, since it would betray my secret to those who could not see the necessity of keeping it.“This is very sudden, Paley,” said Lilian, as the carriage drove off.“Sudden? Why, I told you this was the way it would have to be done, if it was done at all,” I replied.“I know you did. Won’t dear ma be astonished when she reads my letter?”“Probably she will be,” I answered; but I thought she would be astonished, long before she read it.I confess that my conscience reproached me when I thought of the letter in my pocket, and of the deception towards my wife, of which I was guilty. Her father, mother and sisters would wonder, and be permitted to wonder, for weeks if not for months, that they did not hear from her. It was cruel for me to deceive Lilian, and to subject her family to all the anxiety to which I thus doomed them, but I believed that it was a stern necessity, and I silenced the upbraidings of the inward monitor. With thirty thousand dollars of stolen money in my pocket, it may be supposed that I did not trouble myself much upon such an insignificant matter as the peace of my wife’s friends.We went on board of the steamer and I found our state-room. Being one of the last engaged, it was not the best on board, though it was a very comfortable one. Lilian was delighted with it, and declared that she should be as happy as a queen in it. I was afraid she was mistaken. She had never traveled any except on our bridal tour, and I expected she would be sea-sick all the way.But now she was excited by the prospect before her, and by the busy scene which surrounded us. The steamer was crowded with those who were going, and with their friends who had come to see them off. There was no one to say adieu to Lilian or to me.If, of the multitude on the wharf, there was any one who felt an interest in me, it could only be a detective. I was a fugitive, and I felt like one. While Lilian was full of life and animated by the scene, I could not help feeling depressed. I was bidding farewell to my native land, perhaps forever. It might never be safe for me to return. I could not get rid of a certain sense of insecurity. It seemed to me, after I saw the men casting off the huge hawsers that held the ship to the pier, that those infernal detectives must come on board and hurry me back to a prison cell in the city from which I had fled.Any flurry in the crowd, the arrival of a belated passenger, gave me a pang of anxiety which I cannot describe. It was only when the huge steamer was clear of the dock, and the great wheels began to turn, that I dared to breathe in a natural manner. Even then I was thrown into a fresh agony, when a steam-tug came out to usto put the mails on board. I was sure, until it was alongside, that it had been specially chartered by the detectives to arrest me. I was determined to jump overboard and perish in the waves, in sight of my wife, rather than be borne back to a long term of imprisonment in a dungeon. It was better to die than confront my friends in Boston.I asked one of the officers what the tug was, as she came alongside, that I need not be tempted to do a deed for which there was no real necessity. He assured me it contained only the mails, and I breathed easier; but I was not entirely satisfied that the officers had not availed themselves of this last opportunity to arrest their victim, until the tug had cast off, and the steamer started on her long voyage. I was safe then. My throbbing heart returned to its natural pulsations.But I could not forget the ruin and disgrace which would soon cover my name and fame in Boston. I could not shut out from my view the horror of my mother when she learned that I was a fugitive from justice, and that I had mocked her fondest hopes. I was miserable for the time, and Lilian rallied me upon my gloomy appearance. There was a remedy which I had tried before forthis mental suffering. Leaving my wife for a moment, I went down to the steward’s room, and drank a glass of whiskey. I found that lunch was on the table, and I conducted Lilian to the saloon. I ordered a bottle of sherry, and a few glasses of this, in addition to what I had already taken, soon gave my reproaches of conscience to the winds for the time.I do not intend to describe our voyage. It was an unusually pleasant one, and Lilian suffered but very little from sea-sickness. In a few days, as the distance from my native land increased, I felt tolerably secure from the consequences of my crime; but I found it impossible to get rid of the thought of my mother and other friends at home. Even whiskey and wine soon failed to stupefy me unless I partook of them in inordinate quantities. Lilian told me I drank too much, and begged me not to do so any more. She was so gentle and so tender that I could not refuse, for I had not acquired a decided appetite for the intoxicating cup. I only drank it for the solace it afforded me, and I was fully convinced that the severe headaches and the disordered stomach which troubled me were the effects of this excess. I would gladly refrain, but there was “no peace for the wicked.”I will not attempt to describe my sufferings, though I appeared cheerful and happy to my wife. I could not wholly conceal them from her, and she worried me with her questions, anxious to know what ailed me. We arrived at Liverpool and hastened on to London, for I wished to cash my bill before it was possible for anything to go wrong. I had no trouble in doing so. My signature had already reached the bankers, having come out in the same steamer with me. With the gold which I had brought, I had four thousand five hundred pounds. To prevent any trace being had of me, I went to another banker and purchased a circular letter of credit for a thousand pounds, investing the rest in securities which paid me about five per cent.We spent a month in London, seeing the sights, and Lilian was as happy as a woman could be. I had satisfied her that the change of name was purely a matter of convenience, and she soon became accustomed to it. She wrote letters to her mother and other friends, and gave them to me to be mailed. I lighted my cigar with them. We had rooms at Morley’s, but we saw no one, knew no one in the house, except the servants. One day, after dinner, I went out to obtain sometickets to visit Windsor castle, leaving Lilian in the room. When I came back I found her in terrible excitement. She had a Boston newspaper in her hand, which the landlord, as a special favor, had sent up to our apartments.“O Charles—Paley!” said she; and I saw that she had been weeping. “What does this mean?”“What, my dear?” I asked, appalled at the tempest which was rising.“This paper says there is a rumor of a defalcation in the Forty-Ninth National Bank, and that the paying teller has disappeared. Were not you the paying teller, Paley?”She suddenly ceased to call me Charles, as I had instructed her to do. Evidently she knew more than I wished her to know. I took the newspaper. It was dated about a week after our departure from Boston. The paragraph said it was rumored that there was a heavy defalcation in the Forty-Ninth. The paying teller had been missing for a week. That was all. It was merely an item which some industrious reporter had picked up; and the particulars had not yet been published. Doubtless the detectives were looking for me.With tears in her eyes Lilian again demanded an explanation of the paragraph. What could I say?
CHAPTER XXII.CHARLES GASPILLER.I HAD avoided writing my name in the register of the hotel, for I did not wish to leave any recorded traces of my presence in the city. It occurred to me that perhaps Lilian had told her name to her new-made friends, but they would soon be in the tropics, and out of the reach of detectives. I regarded myself as very shrewd, and I could not exactly see how it was possible for any one to obtain a trace of me, after the steamer had departed.I had given my name at the steamer office as Charles Gaspiller, and the money for my bill of exchange was to be drawn in London under this appellation. I don’t know how I happened to select this name. It was a French word which probably came back to my memory from my studies at the high school; but I had forgotten its meaning, though I could read French tolerably well. When I came to ascertain its signification, I was not a little surprised to find that it exactly fitted my case, for it means“to waste, to squander, to lavish.” It was entirely by accident that I chose this word, and I certainly should not have done so had I been aware that it covered my case so exactly.But if I succeeded in concealing my identity from others, I could not hide it from my wife. If I was Mr. Gaspiller, she must of necessity be Mrs. Gaspiller. We were not at all fitted to pass ourselves off as French people, for my pronunciation had been so neglected at school, that I could hardly speak a word of the language with which I was tolerably familiar by the eye. Lilian knew still less of it. I knew that doublelin French had a liquid sound, and I called the word Gas-pee-ay. It would be singular that I should have a French name, pronounced with a French accent, and yet not be able to speak the language. I was afraid I had made an unpleasant bed for myself. But I determined as soon as I reached Paris to master the language.How could I have the assurance to tell Lilian that her name was Gaspiller, and not Glasswood. I might convince her that the latter was too commonplace to travel in Europe upon—indeed she was already convinced of that, for she often, in her lively manner, made fun of the cognomen. Icould assure her that, while I was not to blame for my name, the word was so inconsistent, absurd and contradictory, that it would subject me to ridicule. It was no part of my purpose to tell her I was a defaulter, an exile from home, a fugitive from justice. It would break her gentle heart. Yet I was not sure that it would not come to this.After I had completed all my preparations, I was in her presence with my bill of exchange and my passage receipt in my pocket. She was talking with the lady who was going to Havana when I entered. She looked at me, and as soon as she recognized me, she commented merrily upon the change which the loss of my whiskers made in my appearance. She rose from her chair, but her friend talked so fast that she could not at once leave her. I knew how anxious she was to know the final answer of the great banking-house to which I had alluded. Upon that depended the voyage to Europe. As soon as she could decently do so, she tore herself away from her companion, and sat down on the sofa at my side.“Are you going, Paley, or not?” she asked, with breathless eagerness.In answer to this inquiry I inadvertently pulledout the receipt for the passage money, which constituted the ticket. I did not at the moment think that it ran in favor of “Charles Gaspiller,” for I was not quite ready to tell her that I had changed my name.“What is this, Paley?” she asked, blankly. “I don’t understand it.”“Don’t you, my dear? Why, it is our ticket for a passage in the steamer to Liverpool,” I replied, cheerfully.“This? ‘Received of Charles Gas-pill-er!’” said she, reading just what the letters of my new name spelled.How stupid I was! Why had I not told her in so many words, that we were to go, instead of doing the thing in this sensational way?“Precisely so; that is the French for Glasswood,” I replied, laughing as gaily as my confusion would permit. “I don’t want Frenchmen in Paris to call meBois de Verre, which means wood made of glass, or anything of that sort. The name is Gas-pee-ay, and not Gas-pill-er.”“But how does it happen that the receipt is given to you under this name?”“Because I don’t want to be called Glasswood in Europe. But, my dear, we have no time tospare now, and we shall have ten days of idleness as soon as the steamer sails. So we must not stop to discuss this matter at the present time. We must be on board at half-past twelve, and it is after eleven now,” I continued, with sufficient excitement in my manner to change the current of her thoughts.“Then we are really going!” exclaimed she, opening her bright eyes.“Certainly we are; and going immediately.”“Why, I wanted to go shopping in New York, if we were really going.”“Shopping! That’s absurd! Ladies never go shopping in New York, when they are on their way to Paris.”“But I must write a letter to mother.”“Certainly; you have time to do that while I speak for a carriage and pay the bill.”I procured note paper and envelopes for her, and went down to settle my account at the office. The polite book-keeper asked me to indicate the name on the register. I told him I had not written it. I had wound my handkerchief around my right hand, which I held up to him, and declared that I was unable to use a pen. He was kind enough to offer to render me the service himself.“C. Gaspiller,” I added, when he was ready to write.“What is it, sir?”“C. Gaspiller.”He wrote “C. Caspeare,” and I was entirely satisfied.“Three dollars, Mr. Caspeare,” said he; and I gave him the amount, though it was one dollar more than the regular charge.I was confident that I was leaving no trace of myself here. A carriage was ordered for me, and my trunks were loaded. I went up for Lilian, and found that she had finished her letter. She gave it to me to be stamped and mailed. I took a stamp from my porte-monnaie, carefully adjusted it upon the envelope, and put the letter in my pocket. Of course I was not stupid enough to mail it, since it would betray my secret to those who could not see the necessity of keeping it.“This is very sudden, Paley,” said Lilian, as the carriage drove off.“Sudden? Why, I told you this was the way it would have to be done, if it was done at all,” I replied.“I know you did. Won’t dear ma be astonished when she reads my letter?”“Probably she will be,” I answered; but I thought she would be astonished, long before she read it.I confess that my conscience reproached me when I thought of the letter in my pocket, and of the deception towards my wife, of which I was guilty. Her father, mother and sisters would wonder, and be permitted to wonder, for weeks if not for months, that they did not hear from her. It was cruel for me to deceive Lilian, and to subject her family to all the anxiety to which I thus doomed them, but I believed that it was a stern necessity, and I silenced the upbraidings of the inward monitor. With thirty thousand dollars of stolen money in my pocket, it may be supposed that I did not trouble myself much upon such an insignificant matter as the peace of my wife’s friends.We went on board of the steamer and I found our state-room. Being one of the last engaged, it was not the best on board, though it was a very comfortable one. Lilian was delighted with it, and declared that she should be as happy as a queen in it. I was afraid she was mistaken. She had never traveled any except on our bridal tour, and I expected she would be sea-sick all the way.But now she was excited by the prospect before her, and by the busy scene which surrounded us. The steamer was crowded with those who were going, and with their friends who had come to see them off. There was no one to say adieu to Lilian or to me.If, of the multitude on the wharf, there was any one who felt an interest in me, it could only be a detective. I was a fugitive, and I felt like one. While Lilian was full of life and animated by the scene, I could not help feeling depressed. I was bidding farewell to my native land, perhaps forever. It might never be safe for me to return. I could not get rid of a certain sense of insecurity. It seemed to me, after I saw the men casting off the huge hawsers that held the ship to the pier, that those infernal detectives must come on board and hurry me back to a prison cell in the city from which I had fled.Any flurry in the crowd, the arrival of a belated passenger, gave me a pang of anxiety which I cannot describe. It was only when the huge steamer was clear of the dock, and the great wheels began to turn, that I dared to breathe in a natural manner. Even then I was thrown into a fresh agony, when a steam-tug came out to usto put the mails on board. I was sure, until it was alongside, that it had been specially chartered by the detectives to arrest me. I was determined to jump overboard and perish in the waves, in sight of my wife, rather than be borne back to a long term of imprisonment in a dungeon. It was better to die than confront my friends in Boston.I asked one of the officers what the tug was, as she came alongside, that I need not be tempted to do a deed for which there was no real necessity. He assured me it contained only the mails, and I breathed easier; but I was not entirely satisfied that the officers had not availed themselves of this last opportunity to arrest their victim, until the tug had cast off, and the steamer started on her long voyage. I was safe then. My throbbing heart returned to its natural pulsations.But I could not forget the ruin and disgrace which would soon cover my name and fame in Boston. I could not shut out from my view the horror of my mother when she learned that I was a fugitive from justice, and that I had mocked her fondest hopes. I was miserable for the time, and Lilian rallied me upon my gloomy appearance. There was a remedy which I had tried before forthis mental suffering. Leaving my wife for a moment, I went down to the steward’s room, and drank a glass of whiskey. I found that lunch was on the table, and I conducted Lilian to the saloon. I ordered a bottle of sherry, and a few glasses of this, in addition to what I had already taken, soon gave my reproaches of conscience to the winds for the time.I do not intend to describe our voyage. It was an unusually pleasant one, and Lilian suffered but very little from sea-sickness. In a few days, as the distance from my native land increased, I felt tolerably secure from the consequences of my crime; but I found it impossible to get rid of the thought of my mother and other friends at home. Even whiskey and wine soon failed to stupefy me unless I partook of them in inordinate quantities. Lilian told me I drank too much, and begged me not to do so any more. She was so gentle and so tender that I could not refuse, for I had not acquired a decided appetite for the intoxicating cup. I only drank it for the solace it afforded me, and I was fully convinced that the severe headaches and the disordered stomach which troubled me were the effects of this excess. I would gladly refrain, but there was “no peace for the wicked.”I will not attempt to describe my sufferings, though I appeared cheerful and happy to my wife. I could not wholly conceal them from her, and she worried me with her questions, anxious to know what ailed me. We arrived at Liverpool and hastened on to London, for I wished to cash my bill before it was possible for anything to go wrong. I had no trouble in doing so. My signature had already reached the bankers, having come out in the same steamer with me. With the gold which I had brought, I had four thousand five hundred pounds. To prevent any trace being had of me, I went to another banker and purchased a circular letter of credit for a thousand pounds, investing the rest in securities which paid me about five per cent.We spent a month in London, seeing the sights, and Lilian was as happy as a woman could be. I had satisfied her that the change of name was purely a matter of convenience, and she soon became accustomed to it. She wrote letters to her mother and other friends, and gave them to me to be mailed. I lighted my cigar with them. We had rooms at Morley’s, but we saw no one, knew no one in the house, except the servants. One day, after dinner, I went out to obtain sometickets to visit Windsor castle, leaving Lilian in the room. When I came back I found her in terrible excitement. She had a Boston newspaper in her hand, which the landlord, as a special favor, had sent up to our apartments.“O Charles—Paley!” said she; and I saw that she had been weeping. “What does this mean?”“What, my dear?” I asked, appalled at the tempest which was rising.“This paper says there is a rumor of a defalcation in the Forty-Ninth National Bank, and that the paying teller has disappeared. Were not you the paying teller, Paley?”She suddenly ceased to call me Charles, as I had instructed her to do. Evidently she knew more than I wished her to know. I took the newspaper. It was dated about a week after our departure from Boston. The paragraph said it was rumored that there was a heavy defalcation in the Forty-Ninth. The paying teller had been missing for a week. That was all. It was merely an item which some industrious reporter had picked up; and the particulars had not yet been published. Doubtless the detectives were looking for me.With tears in her eyes Lilian again demanded an explanation of the paragraph. What could I say?
CHARLES GASPILLER.
I HAD avoided writing my name in the register of the hotel, for I did not wish to leave any recorded traces of my presence in the city. It occurred to me that perhaps Lilian had told her name to her new-made friends, but they would soon be in the tropics, and out of the reach of detectives. I regarded myself as very shrewd, and I could not exactly see how it was possible for any one to obtain a trace of me, after the steamer had departed.
I had given my name at the steamer office as Charles Gaspiller, and the money for my bill of exchange was to be drawn in London under this appellation. I don’t know how I happened to select this name. It was a French word which probably came back to my memory from my studies at the high school; but I had forgotten its meaning, though I could read French tolerably well. When I came to ascertain its signification, I was not a little surprised to find that it exactly fitted my case, for it means“to waste, to squander, to lavish.” It was entirely by accident that I chose this word, and I certainly should not have done so had I been aware that it covered my case so exactly.
But if I succeeded in concealing my identity from others, I could not hide it from my wife. If I was Mr. Gaspiller, she must of necessity be Mrs. Gaspiller. We were not at all fitted to pass ourselves off as French people, for my pronunciation had been so neglected at school, that I could hardly speak a word of the language with which I was tolerably familiar by the eye. Lilian knew still less of it. I knew that doublelin French had a liquid sound, and I called the word Gas-pee-ay. It would be singular that I should have a French name, pronounced with a French accent, and yet not be able to speak the language. I was afraid I had made an unpleasant bed for myself. But I determined as soon as I reached Paris to master the language.
How could I have the assurance to tell Lilian that her name was Gaspiller, and not Glasswood. I might convince her that the latter was too commonplace to travel in Europe upon—indeed she was already convinced of that, for she often, in her lively manner, made fun of the cognomen. Icould assure her that, while I was not to blame for my name, the word was so inconsistent, absurd and contradictory, that it would subject me to ridicule. It was no part of my purpose to tell her I was a defaulter, an exile from home, a fugitive from justice. It would break her gentle heart. Yet I was not sure that it would not come to this.
After I had completed all my preparations, I was in her presence with my bill of exchange and my passage receipt in my pocket. She was talking with the lady who was going to Havana when I entered. She looked at me, and as soon as she recognized me, she commented merrily upon the change which the loss of my whiskers made in my appearance. She rose from her chair, but her friend talked so fast that she could not at once leave her. I knew how anxious she was to know the final answer of the great banking-house to which I had alluded. Upon that depended the voyage to Europe. As soon as she could decently do so, she tore herself away from her companion, and sat down on the sofa at my side.
“Are you going, Paley, or not?” she asked, with breathless eagerness.
In answer to this inquiry I inadvertently pulledout the receipt for the passage money, which constituted the ticket. I did not at the moment think that it ran in favor of “Charles Gaspiller,” for I was not quite ready to tell her that I had changed my name.
“What is this, Paley?” she asked, blankly. “I don’t understand it.”
“Don’t you, my dear? Why, it is our ticket for a passage in the steamer to Liverpool,” I replied, cheerfully.
“This? ‘Received of Charles Gas-pill-er!’” said she, reading just what the letters of my new name spelled.
How stupid I was! Why had I not told her in so many words, that we were to go, instead of doing the thing in this sensational way?
“Precisely so; that is the French for Glasswood,” I replied, laughing as gaily as my confusion would permit. “I don’t want Frenchmen in Paris to call meBois de Verre, which means wood made of glass, or anything of that sort. The name is Gas-pee-ay, and not Gas-pill-er.”
“But how does it happen that the receipt is given to you under this name?”
“Because I don’t want to be called Glasswood in Europe. But, my dear, we have no time tospare now, and we shall have ten days of idleness as soon as the steamer sails. So we must not stop to discuss this matter at the present time. We must be on board at half-past twelve, and it is after eleven now,” I continued, with sufficient excitement in my manner to change the current of her thoughts.
“Then we are really going!” exclaimed she, opening her bright eyes.
“Certainly we are; and going immediately.”
“Why, I wanted to go shopping in New York, if we were really going.”
“Shopping! That’s absurd! Ladies never go shopping in New York, when they are on their way to Paris.”
“But I must write a letter to mother.”
“Certainly; you have time to do that while I speak for a carriage and pay the bill.”
I procured note paper and envelopes for her, and went down to settle my account at the office. The polite book-keeper asked me to indicate the name on the register. I told him I had not written it. I had wound my handkerchief around my right hand, which I held up to him, and declared that I was unable to use a pen. He was kind enough to offer to render me the service himself.
“C. Gaspiller,” I added, when he was ready to write.
“What is it, sir?”
“C. Gaspiller.”
He wrote “C. Caspeare,” and I was entirely satisfied.
“Three dollars, Mr. Caspeare,” said he; and I gave him the amount, though it was one dollar more than the regular charge.
I was confident that I was leaving no trace of myself here. A carriage was ordered for me, and my trunks were loaded. I went up for Lilian, and found that she had finished her letter. She gave it to me to be stamped and mailed. I took a stamp from my porte-monnaie, carefully adjusted it upon the envelope, and put the letter in my pocket. Of course I was not stupid enough to mail it, since it would betray my secret to those who could not see the necessity of keeping it.
“This is very sudden, Paley,” said Lilian, as the carriage drove off.
“Sudden? Why, I told you this was the way it would have to be done, if it was done at all,” I replied.
“I know you did. Won’t dear ma be astonished when she reads my letter?”
“Probably she will be,” I answered; but I thought she would be astonished, long before she read it.
I confess that my conscience reproached me when I thought of the letter in my pocket, and of the deception towards my wife, of which I was guilty. Her father, mother and sisters would wonder, and be permitted to wonder, for weeks if not for months, that they did not hear from her. It was cruel for me to deceive Lilian, and to subject her family to all the anxiety to which I thus doomed them, but I believed that it was a stern necessity, and I silenced the upbraidings of the inward monitor. With thirty thousand dollars of stolen money in my pocket, it may be supposed that I did not trouble myself much upon such an insignificant matter as the peace of my wife’s friends.
We went on board of the steamer and I found our state-room. Being one of the last engaged, it was not the best on board, though it was a very comfortable one. Lilian was delighted with it, and declared that she should be as happy as a queen in it. I was afraid she was mistaken. She had never traveled any except on our bridal tour, and I expected she would be sea-sick all the way.But now she was excited by the prospect before her, and by the busy scene which surrounded us. The steamer was crowded with those who were going, and with their friends who had come to see them off. There was no one to say adieu to Lilian or to me.
If, of the multitude on the wharf, there was any one who felt an interest in me, it could only be a detective. I was a fugitive, and I felt like one. While Lilian was full of life and animated by the scene, I could not help feeling depressed. I was bidding farewell to my native land, perhaps forever. It might never be safe for me to return. I could not get rid of a certain sense of insecurity. It seemed to me, after I saw the men casting off the huge hawsers that held the ship to the pier, that those infernal detectives must come on board and hurry me back to a prison cell in the city from which I had fled.
Any flurry in the crowd, the arrival of a belated passenger, gave me a pang of anxiety which I cannot describe. It was only when the huge steamer was clear of the dock, and the great wheels began to turn, that I dared to breathe in a natural manner. Even then I was thrown into a fresh agony, when a steam-tug came out to usto put the mails on board. I was sure, until it was alongside, that it had been specially chartered by the detectives to arrest me. I was determined to jump overboard and perish in the waves, in sight of my wife, rather than be borne back to a long term of imprisonment in a dungeon. It was better to die than confront my friends in Boston.
I asked one of the officers what the tug was, as she came alongside, that I need not be tempted to do a deed for which there was no real necessity. He assured me it contained only the mails, and I breathed easier; but I was not entirely satisfied that the officers had not availed themselves of this last opportunity to arrest their victim, until the tug had cast off, and the steamer started on her long voyage. I was safe then. My throbbing heart returned to its natural pulsations.
But I could not forget the ruin and disgrace which would soon cover my name and fame in Boston. I could not shut out from my view the horror of my mother when she learned that I was a fugitive from justice, and that I had mocked her fondest hopes. I was miserable for the time, and Lilian rallied me upon my gloomy appearance. There was a remedy which I had tried before forthis mental suffering. Leaving my wife for a moment, I went down to the steward’s room, and drank a glass of whiskey. I found that lunch was on the table, and I conducted Lilian to the saloon. I ordered a bottle of sherry, and a few glasses of this, in addition to what I had already taken, soon gave my reproaches of conscience to the winds for the time.
I do not intend to describe our voyage. It was an unusually pleasant one, and Lilian suffered but very little from sea-sickness. In a few days, as the distance from my native land increased, I felt tolerably secure from the consequences of my crime; but I found it impossible to get rid of the thought of my mother and other friends at home. Even whiskey and wine soon failed to stupefy me unless I partook of them in inordinate quantities. Lilian told me I drank too much, and begged me not to do so any more. She was so gentle and so tender that I could not refuse, for I had not acquired a decided appetite for the intoxicating cup. I only drank it for the solace it afforded me, and I was fully convinced that the severe headaches and the disordered stomach which troubled me were the effects of this excess. I would gladly refrain, but there was “no peace for the wicked.”
I will not attempt to describe my sufferings, though I appeared cheerful and happy to my wife. I could not wholly conceal them from her, and she worried me with her questions, anxious to know what ailed me. We arrived at Liverpool and hastened on to London, for I wished to cash my bill before it was possible for anything to go wrong. I had no trouble in doing so. My signature had already reached the bankers, having come out in the same steamer with me. With the gold which I had brought, I had four thousand five hundred pounds. To prevent any trace being had of me, I went to another banker and purchased a circular letter of credit for a thousand pounds, investing the rest in securities which paid me about five per cent.
We spent a month in London, seeing the sights, and Lilian was as happy as a woman could be. I had satisfied her that the change of name was purely a matter of convenience, and she soon became accustomed to it. She wrote letters to her mother and other friends, and gave them to me to be mailed. I lighted my cigar with them. We had rooms at Morley’s, but we saw no one, knew no one in the house, except the servants. One day, after dinner, I went out to obtain sometickets to visit Windsor castle, leaving Lilian in the room. When I came back I found her in terrible excitement. She had a Boston newspaper in her hand, which the landlord, as a special favor, had sent up to our apartments.
“O Charles—Paley!” said she; and I saw that she had been weeping. “What does this mean?”
“What, my dear?” I asked, appalled at the tempest which was rising.
“This paper says there is a rumor of a defalcation in the Forty-Ninth National Bank, and that the paying teller has disappeared. Were not you the paying teller, Paley?”
She suddenly ceased to call me Charles, as I had instructed her to do. Evidently she knew more than I wished her to know. I took the newspaper. It was dated about a week after our departure from Boston. The paragraph said it was rumored that there was a heavy defalcation in the Forty-Ninth. The paying teller had been missing for a week. That was all. It was merely an item which some industrious reporter had picked up; and the particulars had not yet been published. Doubtless the detectives were looking for me.
With tears in her eyes Lilian again demanded an explanation of the paragraph. What could I say?