It was early in the afternoon the same day, the last Thursday of June. The rain of the night before had been general in the South of England. It had fallen heavily in London, and washed and freshened the dusty, parched streets. Now all London capable of being made fresh and blithe by weather was blazing gallantly in the unclouded radiance of summer. Even Chetwynd Street, a third rate thoroughfare of the less delectable and low-lying part of Westminster, looked gay in comparison with its usual squalor, for it had been scoured clean and sweetened by the waters of Heaven. The wind, and the rain, and the sun of Heaven, were all the friends Chetwynd Street seemed to have. Man had built it. It was man's own, and man seemed to despise his handiwork, and neglect his duty towards what he had made.
Few civilians with good clothes and sound boots visited Chetwynd Street. Policemen go everywhere, and were to be seen in this street now and then, and soldiers often strayed into it, for they are common in all the region. But although the publicans and pawnbrokers of the thoroughfare were well-to-do people, they did not put their wealth upon their backs. It would have been considered ostentatious for ordinary mortals to wear broadcloth within the precincts of the street. The sumptuary laws of the place forbade broadcloth for every-day wear to all except clergymen, doctors, and undertakers. On Sundays, or festivals, such as marriages and funerals, broad-cloth might be worn by the prosperous tradespeople without exciting anger or reproach.
The two most prosperous shopkeepers in the place were Mr. Williams, landlord of the Hanover public house, at the corner of Welbeck Place, leading to Welbeck Mews, and Mr. Forbes, baker, at the opposite corner of Welbeck Place. Mr. Williams's house was all glitter and brightness on the ground floor. He had two large plate-glass windows, divided only by a green and gilt iron pillar, looking into Chetwynd Street, and two large plate glass windows, divided only by a green and gilt iron pillar, looking into Welbeck Place. The door of Mr. Williams's house faced Chetwynd Street. Mr. Forbes was not so lavish of glass or gaslight as his neighbour, of the Hanover. His only window on the shop-floor, looking into Chetwynd Street, was composed of panes of crown glass of moderate size. In Welbeck Place, on the ground floor, he had a blank wall, and farther up the Place, a modest door. In Chetwynd Street, beyond the shop door, was another door belonging to him; the door to the staircase and dwelling part of the house above the shop. The door in Welbeck Place led also to the base of the staircase, and to the bakehouse at the rear. The side door was not used for business purposes of the bakery. The back of the bakehouse at the rear stood in Welbeck Mews, and here was a door through which Mr. Forbes's flour and coal came in and loaves went out. Mr. Forbes had several bakeries in the neighbourhood. He did not reside in the upper part of his house in Chetwynd Street. He used the first floor as a warehouse. He stored all kinds of odds and ends here, including empty sacks, and sometimes flour. One of the rooms he had used as an office, but gave it up, and now kept it locked, idle. It was not easy to let the upper parts of houses to respectable people in this street. It would not suit his business to let the house in tenements to any lodgers who might offer.
For the second floor he had a most respectable tenant, who paid his rent with punctuality, and gave no trouble at all. There were three rooms on the second or top floor. A sitting-room, a bed-room, and a workshop. The sitting-room was farthest from Welbeck Place, being over the hall and part of the shop. The bed-room was over the middle section of the shop. The work-room was at the eastern end of the house. The bed-room looked into Chetwynd Street. The sitting-room looked into the same street. The work-shop looked into Welbeck Place. The bed-room and sitting-room were immediately over that part of the house used by Mr. Forbes as a store or lumber room. The workshop on the top floor was directly over what once served as an office for the baker, and was now locked up.
The man and his wife in charge of the business slept in the bakehouse at the back which opened into the mews. The only person sleeping in the house proper was the tenant of the second floor. At the top of the staircase, on the second floor, there was a stout door, which could be locked on either side, so that the tenant had a flat all to himself, and was as independent as if he owned a whole house. In the matter of doors, he was rather better off than his neighbours, who had whole houses; for he had, first of all, the door of his own flat at the top of the stairs, and was allowed a key for the outer door into Chetwynd Street, and one for the door into Welbeck Place. For the door at the back, that one from the bakehouse into the mews, he had not been given a key by the landlord, nor did he ask for one. When something was said about it on his taking the place, he laughed, and declared, "Two entrances to my castle are enough for a man of my inches."
The tenant of the top floor of the bakery was Mr. Oscar Leigh. The room over the hall was his bed-room: the room over the store was his sitting-room; the room looking into Welbeck Place was his workshop.
Mr. Oscar Leigh made an unclassified exception to the rule of not wearing broad cloth in Chetwynd Street. He never was seen there in anything else. The residents took no offence at his glossy black frock-coat. The extreme oddness of his figure served as an apology for his infringement upon the rules. In Chetwynd Street the little man was very affable, very gallant, very popular. "Quite the gentleman," ladies of the locality who enjoyed his acquaintance declared. Among the men he was greatly respected. They believed him to be very rich, notwithstanding that he pleaded poverty for living so high up as the top floor of Forbes's bakery, and dispensing with a servant. Mrs. Bolger, the old charwoman, came in the morning and got him his breakfast, and tidied his rooms. That is she tidied the sitting-room and bed-room. No one had ever been admitted to the workshop. Mrs. Bolger left about noon, and that was all the attendance Mr. Leigh needed for the day. He got his other meals out of his lodgings.
The men of the district in addition to believing him rich credited him with universal knowledge. "Mr. Leigh," they said, "knew everything." They always spoke of him as "Mr." Leigh because they were sure he had money. If they believed him to be poor or only comfortable they would have called him little Leigh. His appearance was so uncommon they readily endowed him with supernatural powers. But upon the whole they held his presence among them as a compliment to their own worth, and a circumstance for congratulation, for his conversation when unintelligible seemed to do no one harm, when intelligible was pleasant, and he was free with his society, his talk, and his money.
That Thursday afternoon he walked slowly along Chetwynd Street from the eastern end, nodding pleasantly to those he knew slightly, and exchanging cheerful greetings with those he knew better. When he came to the Hanover public-house, lying between him and his own home, he entered, and, keeping to the right down a short passage, found himself in the private bar.
The Hanover was immeasurably the finest public-house in the neighbourhood. The common bar was plain and rough, and frequented by very plain and rough folk; but the private bar was fitted in mahogany and polished white metal. There no drink of less price than twopence was served, and people in the neighbourhood thought it quite genteel and select. A general feeling prevailed among the men who frequented the private bar of the "Hanover" that the only difference between the best West End club and it was that in the former you got more display, finer furniture, and a bigger room; but that for excellence of liquor and company the latter was the better of the two. It was a well-known fact that Mr. Jacobs, the greengrocer who came from Sloane Street to get three-pennyworth of the famous Hanover rum hot, never smoked anything less than cigars which he bought cheap of his friend, Mr. Isaacs, at sixpence each. It was a custom for the frequenters in turn to say now and then to Mr. Jacobs, "That's a good cigar, Mr. Jacobs; my word, a good cigar." At which challenge Mr. Jacobs became grave, took the cigar out of his mouth and looked at it carefully while he held it as though making up his mind about its merits, and then said "Ay, sir; pretty fair--pretty fair," or other modest words to that effect. He spoke almost carelessly at such times, as though he had something else on his mind. About once a month the thought he was reserving followed and he added: "I bought a case of them from my friend, Isaacs of Bond Street. They come to about sixpence each." After this he would put his cigar back into his mouth, roll it round carelessly between his lips, and take no more heed of it than if he had bought it for twopence across the counter.
When Mr. Oscar Leigh found himself in the private bar, neither Mr. Jacobs nor anyone else was there. Behind the bar in his shirt-sleeves was the potman who attended to the ordinary customers, and Mr. Williams, the proprietor, in a tweed coat of dark and sober hue.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Williams," said the new-comer, wriggling up on a high cane-seated stool, pulling out a white handkerchief and rubbing his face vigorously, puffing loudly the while.
"Good afternoon, Mr. Leigh," said the landlord in a gracious and pleasant voice. "Very hot walking out of doors."
"Very. Will you have a brandy--a split?"
"It's almost too hot. But I will for the sake of company, as you are kind enough to ask me."
The landlord busied himself getting the drinks, and then set them on the counter. Mr. Leigh took his up, nodded to Williams, saying laconically, "Health," to which the other responded in due form. The hunchback drained his glass at one draught, the landlord sipped his.
"I wanted that badly," said Leigh. "It's good stuff. Anything wrong?" "Well, Mr. Williams, it is my breakfast and dinner--up to this."
"Ah. That's bad. Why didn't you get your breakfast. A man isn't any good unless he eats a hearty breakfast, I say. What's the matter, Mr. Leigh. Anything wrong down in the country?"
"No, no. I feel better already. As you say, that's fine brandy. Give me another. I'm tired. I've had such a morning. I feel better, a good deal better. Isn't it hot?"
"Blazing. So you have had a busy morning?"
"Yes. Oh, very busy morning, Mr. Williams, No breakfast yet, but this," tapping the second glass of brandy and soda. "I must be careful not to knock up my digestion, Mr. Williams. When a man's digestion is upset he isn't fit for figures, for calculations, you know. It takes a man all his time, and the coolest head he can saw off a brass monkey, to make calculations such as I deal in."
"You're a wonderful man, and I always say it." Mr. Williams was a personable, good-looking man, with a large white face and lardy skin. He believed that Mr. Leigh knew a vast number of things, and that he himself had a great reserve of solid wisdom which, for reasons undefined to himself, he kept inactive for his own secret pleasure, as a man might hoard a priceless jewel, gloating over the mere sense of possession. He had a firm conviction that if it were only possible to mould Mr. Leigh's mind and his own into one, the compound might be trusted to perform prodigies, always provided that Mr. Leigh had little or nothing to do with the direction of its activities.
Up to this point of the conversation it had been obvious the two men were not speaking freely. Williams was hesitating and laconic beyond his custom; Leigh was too vivacious, tired, exhausted. During the pauses of their talk the pair frequently looked at one another in a way which would have provoked enquiry.
Mr. Williams at last made a backward jerk of his head at the potman, and then a sideway nod of his head towards the door leading into the bar-parlour. The gesture meant plainly, "Shall I get rid of him?"
Leigh nodded quickly and cordially.
"Tom," said the landlord, turning fully round and putting his back against the bar, "the bitter is off. Go down and put on another."
"Right, sir," said Tom, as he hurried away.
As soon as he was out of view, and before he could be heard among the casks and pipes, Mr. Williams turned round and said, leaning over the counter and speaking in a whisper: "He's gone. No one can hear now."
Mr. Leigh sprinkled some eau-de-cologne from a tiny silver flask in his palm, buried his face in his hands and inhaled the perfume greedily. "Hah! That is so refreshing. Hah!" The long lean hands, with the glossy shining black hairs, shook as he held them an inch from his face. The withdrawal of the potman seemed to have relieved him of restraint.
"Well," he said, laying both his thumbs on the pewter top of the counter, and pressing hard with his forefingers under the leaf of the counter, "you were saying, Williams----?" He looked into the face of the other with quick blinking eyes and swayed his misshapen body slowly to and fro.
"I wasn't saying anything at all," said the landlord, raising his black, thin, smooth eyebrows half-way up his pallid, smooth, greasy forehead.
"I know," whispered Leigh eagerly. He now drew himself up close to the counter "I meant what you were going to say. Did you watch?" keenly and anxiously.
"I did."
"At between twelve and one?"
"Yes."
"And did you see anything?" tremulously.
"I did," stolidly.
"What? Tell me what you saw?"
"You told me a man was to come and wind up your clock, as near to twelve as could be, and you asked me to watch him, and keep an eye on him, to time his coming, and see that he was sharp to his hour and that he wound up the machinery by the left-hand lever close to the window."
"Quite right, quite right. I wanted to find out if the fellow would be punctual and do my work for me while I was away in the country, down in Millway. Did you see him come? Did you see him come in through the shafts and straps and chains?" The blinking of the eyes had now ceased and Leigh was staring fixedly, with dark devouring eyes upon the pallid, lardy, stolid face of the publican.
"No, I did not see him come. The window," pointing up to the top window of the house at the opposite corner of the road, "was dark at twelve by our clock."
"Byyourclock. Butyourclock is always five minutes fast, isn't it? You didn't forgetyourclock isalwaysfive minutes fast?"
"No, I did not forget that. Our clock is fast to allow us to clear the house at closing time. But I thought he might be a few minutes too soon."
"He couldn't. He couldn't be a minute too soon. He couldn't be a second too soon. He couldn't be the ten thousandth part of a second too soon."
Williams smiled slightly. "Couldn't be a second too soon, Mr. Leigh! What's a second? Whythat!" He tapped his hand on the pewter top of the counter before and after saying the word "that."
"Let me tell you, Mr. Williams, he couldn't have been there the one millionth part of a second before the stroke of twelve. But go on. Go on. I am all anxiety to hear if he was punctual. Tell me what youdidsee." His eyes were blazing with haste.
"Well, you are a strange man, and a positive man too. At twelve by my clock the room was dark. We were very busy then. I looked up again at six minutes past twelve bymyclock here, a minute past twelve by my own watch, which I always keep right by Greenwich, and it's a good chronometer, as you know----"
"Yes, yes," interrupted the little man hastily. "It's a good watch. Go on!"
"Light was in the room then. A dull light such as you have when you're at work."
"Yes, dim on account of my weak eyes. And by the light you saw----?"
"I saw the man sitting in your place, and in a few seconds he began to wind up the machinery by the lever on the left near the window."
"You saw him working at the lever?" in a voice almost inaudible.
"Yes."
"You saw him often between that and closing time? between that and half-past twelve?"
"Well, yes, I may say often. Three or four times anyway."
"And each time he was winding up the machinery?"
"Now and then."
"Hah! Only now and then."
"About as often as you yourself would, it seemed to me."
"And, tell me, did you see his face. Did he waste any of his precious time gaping out of the window into the bar?"
"He turned his head towards the window only once, while I was watching, and I saw him plain enough."
"What was he like? Very like me?"
"Like you, Mr. Leigh! Not he! Not a bit like you! Stop, are you trying if I am speaking the truth?" Williams became suddenly suspicious, ready to resent any imputation upon his word.
"No, no, no. My dear Williams. Nothing of the kind, I assure you. Only I am most desirous to know all facts, all you saw. You know how well I have guarded the secrets of my great clock. I am most anxious that no one but this man who wound the clock for me last night should learn anything about it. Suppose he let several people into the room, I should have all my secrets pried into and made common property."
"And can't he tell everybody if he cares to betray you?"
"Not very well. He cannot. He is deaf and dumb, and can't write," with a triumphant smile. "Describe what the man you saw was like."
"Well, you are a wonderful man, Mr. Leigh. He was a broad-shouldered big man with fair hair and beard. He wore a round hat the whole time, and, like you, sat very steady when he was not winding up.
"That's he! That's he to the life! I told him how to sit. I showed him how to sit. And tell me, when closing time came he stood up and wriggled out of the clock?"
"I did not see. We were shut a minute before half-past twelve by my own watch. I kept my eyes on him until half-past twelve. He must have turned out the light before he got up, for the gas went out at half-past twelve, just as he stopped working the lever."
"Yes. And did you watch a while after, to see there was no danger of fire?"
"Yes, a minute or two, but all kept dark and I knew he was gone."
"Hah! Thank you, very much, Williams. I am very, very much obliged to you."
"Oh, it's nothing."
"Williams, it's a great deal. If you want to do me another favour say nothing about the matter. I don't want anyone to know this man was in my workshop. A lot of curious and envious thieves would gather round him and try to get some of my secrets out of him."
"All right. I'll say nothing."
Leigh took out his little silver flask of eau-de-cologne, moistened his hands with the perfume and drew the pungent fragrant vapour noisily into his nose. "So refreshing," he whispered audibly, "So refreshing." Then lifting his face out of his hands he held the flask toward the landlord, saying, "Try some. It's most refreshing."
"Pah, no," said Williams with a gesture of scorn, "I never touch such stuff."
"Hah! If you were like me you would. If you were always reeking with oil, steeping in the fish-oil of machines, you'd be glad enough to take the smell of it out of your nose with any perfume. I told you I have been busy this morning. The want of my breakfast, and the business I was on, pretty nearly knocked me up. Bah! The dust of that job is in my throat still."
"Drink up your brandy and soda and have another with me," said the landlord encouragingly.
"No, no. I won't have any more. Hah! it was a dusty job."
"What was it, Mr. Leigh, may I ask?"
"Well, you have done me a good turn in keeping your eye on that fellow for me, and you're going to do me another good turn by saying nothing about it; so I'll tell you. Have you ever heard anything of Albertus Magnus?"
"Albertus Magnums? No, I never heard of magnums of that brand."
"Hah! 'Tisn't a wine, but a man. Albertus Magnus was a man who studied magic, one of the greatest of the magicians of old. He attributes wonderful powers to the powdered asphaltum of mummies."
"Oh, magnums of Mumm? Of course I have heard of magnums of Mumm."
"No! I don't mean wine; the mummy coffins were filled with a kind of pitch, and Albertus attributes wonderful powers to this old pitch which the ancient Egyptians poured hot over the dead. It was used by the Egyptians to prevent the ravages of time upon the faces of the dead. Now, I am going to paint the dials of my clock with mummy-pitch to prevent time ravaging the faces of my clock. Do you see? Hah!"
"I always said, Mr. Leigh, that you were a wonderful, a most wonderful man." Williams's mind had been plunged by the words of the other into a dense mist. He could see nothing and he was sure there must be a wonderfully profound meaning in the speaker's words because he could make nothing of them.
"And to-day I bought a mummy, the mummy of a great Egyptian prince, for I must have good mummy asphaltum to preserve the faces of my clock from the influence of time. Asphaltum is a bituminous pitch, as you know," said Leigh, getting down off the high stool and preening himself like a bedraggled raven.
By this time Williams began to realize that the dwarf had, for some reason or other, with a view to use in some unknown way, become possessed of a mummified prince. He had never before spoken to any one who owned a mummy; he knew, by report, that such things were to be seen in the British Museum, but he had never been inside the walls of that crushing-looking fane of history. It was utterly impossible for him to imagine any way in which a mummy could be employed; but this only went to prove how necessary to Leigh a mummy must be. Now that he came to think of the matter he found himself surprised Leigh had not had a mummy long ago. His face relaxed into a smile. "And what are you going to do with his royal highness?" he asked, chuckling.
"I only want the asphaltum as a pigment."
"But what are you going to do with his royal highness?" he repeated, being slow to relinquish this cleverness of his, which to him had the rare glory of a joke.
"Oh," said Leigh, preparing to go, "I am told they burn beautifully. What do you say to burning him as a guy in Welbeck Place on the fifth of November? Ha-ha-ha!" and with a harsh laugh the little man hurried out of the Hanover, leaving Mr. Williams pleased and puzzled.
When Mr. Oscar Leigh emerged from the door of the public house, he crossed to the other side of Welbeck Place and moved rapidly along the front of Forbes's bakery until he reached the private entrance to that house. Then he opened the door with a latch-key and entered. In the hall there was nothing but a small hand-truck standing up against the wall. He ascended four flights of stairs, found himself opposite the door of his flat, opened that door with another latch-key, and went in.
The door at the head of the stairs rose up from the edge of the topmost step so that there was no landing outside it. The whole depth of the landing was enclosed by the door and belonged to the tenant. The little man slammed the door behind him and went down a passage leading east. He came to the sitting-room, passed through it, then through the sleeping chamber beyond and thence into a completely dark passage, out of which opened two doors, one into the sleeping chamber from which he had come, and one into the workshop or clock-room. The latter door he unlocked with a small patent key. He pushed the door open very cautiously. Before the space between the edge and the jamb was an inch wide, some small object placed on the inside against the door, fell with a slight noise. He now pushed boldly, entered, and closed the door behind him. It shut with a snap and he was locked in.
The noise of some object falling had been caused by the over-turning of a small metal egg-cup on the floor. It had been so placed that the door could not be pushed open from the passage without upsetting it, for a strip of wood two inches wide was fixed on the door an inch and a half from the ground and this ledge touched the egg-cup while the door was shut and pressed against the upper rim of the cup the moment the door began to move inward. Around the spot on which the vessel had fallen spread a little pool of liquid on the floor.
Leigh stooped, dipped the tip of his long thin left forefinger in the liquid and then touched the top of his tongue with the wet tip of his finger. A gleam of satisfaction and triumph shone on his face. "Sweet," he whispered, as he straightened his crooked figure. "Sweet as sugar! Any fool who wanted to find if his sanctuary had been defiled by strange feet during his absence might think of placing a vessel of water against the inside of his door There is nothing easier than to draw it up close to the door from the outside. All you have to do is to place the vessel on a long slip of paper in the line of the door, and then, having shut the door, draw the paper carefully under the door and away from beneath the vessel. The ground must be level and the paper smooth, and you must have a nice ear and a steady hand. Any fool could manage that.
"Then if defiling hands opened the door and overturned the vessel and spilt the water, and the hands belonged to a head that wasn't that quite of a fool, the hands could replace the vessel full of water against the shut door as it had first been placed there. But the sugar was a stroke of genius, of ray genius! Who that did not know the secret would think of putting sugar in the water?" Leigh touched his tongue again with the tip of his finger. "Sweet as honey. Here is conclusive proof that my sanctuary has been inviolate while I have been from home. Poor Williams! A useful man in his way; very. One of those men you turn to account and then fling on a dung-hill to rot. A worthy soul. I have succeeded in my first great experiment. I wonder how it goes with my dumb deputy of last night? Ha-ha-ha!"
He turned away from the door and confronted a thicket of shafts and rods and struts and girders and pipes and pulleys and wheels and drums and chains and levers and cranks and weights and springs and cones and cubes and hammers and cords and bands and bells and bellows and gongs and reeds, through all of which moved a strange weird tremulousness and plaintive perpetual low sounds, and little whispers of air and motion, as though some being, hitherto uncreate, were about to take visible life out of inertia, and move in the form of a vast harmonious entity in which all this distracting detail of movement would emerge into homogeneous life.
From where Oscar Leigh stood, contemplating his machine, it would be absolutely impossible for anything stouter than a wand to reach the one window through the interminable complicacies of the clock.
Again a look of satisfaction and triumph came into his narrow swarthy face as he muttered, "Even if anyone had got as far as where I stand, he could stir no further without unintentionally blazing his way as plainly as ever woodman did with axe in Canadian forest."
The framework of the clock consisted of four upright polished steel pillars, one at each angle of a parallelogram. The pillars touched the ceiling of the room about nine feet from the floor. One side of the parallelogram measured twelve feet, the other ten. The sole window in the room was in the middle of one of the larger sides of the parallelogram, and could be approached only through the body of the clock itself. The body of the clock close by the window was not fully filled up with mechanism, and this free space, combined with the embrasure of the window, made a small interior chamber, in which were a stout high-backed easy Windsor chair, and an oak watchmaker's bench. The framework of the clock was secured to the floor by screws.
From the outside, where Leigh now stood leaning his back against the wall, it was impossible to approach the window except through the body of the clock; for the mechanism filled all the space from floor to ceiling, and with the exception of the bay around the window, all the space from the outer pillars to the wall.
The main body of the mechanism within the four polished steel pillars filled about half the room. In the remainder, which took the form of a narrow passage running round three sides of the clock, were small pieces of mechanism, some detached from the main body, some connected by slender shafts or tiny bands. This passage contained a single chair, a small oak table, and a narrow stretcher bed.
After a long and searching look through the metallic network of the machine, Oscar Leigh sat down on the one chair, and resting his elbow on the table, gave himself up to thought.
The ticking, and clicking, and clanking, and whizzing, and buzzing of the machinery made altogether no louder sound than the noise of a busy thoroughfare in London, and there was no perceptible vibration. In that room Leigh was completely unconscious of sound. While all the machinery went as designed, he heard nothing of it unless he bent his attention upon hearing. If any movement became irregular, or any movement that ought to go on suddenly stopped, he would have been as much startled as though a pistol had been exploded at his ear. So long as all went well he heard nothing of it. When he began to work at the clock he indulged in the habit of telling himself aloud what he was meaning to achieve with the mechanism; later he altered his method, and told the clock what it was going to do, speaking to it as if it were a docile child of enormous potentialities. Later still, he spoke much aloud to himself on many subjects when in the loneliness of his isolated lodging; he knew that distance from people secured him from being overheard, and the sound of his own voice mitigated his solitude. Here in this place, the sound of his own voice was often the only way he had of assuring himself that he had still power independent of the machine, that all his movements were not because of some weight or spring involved in the bewildering intricacies of the clock.
"Ay," he said, this Thursday afternoon, crossing one of his short legs over the other. "I have succeeded so far in my labours here. I began my clock as an excuse, as a cloak to cover"--he waved his hand as if to waft aside smoke before his eyes, although he was not smoking--"to cover any other matter that might come my way. It has grown on me from day to day, from week to week, from month to month, from year to year, until it has swelled in size and efficacy altogether beyond my original designs or desires. I wished to have a slave that might be used as an excuse for solitariness and eccentricity in dealing quietly in precious metals and precious stones, and now I find myself face to face with a master. Whither will this master lead me? I do not know. I do not care. I first intended this room as a chamber of mystery; it has become a cave of magic. My heart ought to be drunk with joy. My heart would be drunk with joy only for----"
He paused and waved his hand once more before his eyes as if to clear the air before him. "Only for that girl. This mere girl, this mere Edith Grace, this mere Edith Grace whom I have seen but----"
He paused and rose. An unusual sound in the street, aroused him.
"What noise is that in the street? Something out of the common in Welbeck Place."
He caught hold of one of the polished steel pillars that formed the framework of the breathing machine and dropped his chin on his misshapen chest. "With care I could now become rich--no matter how. A fortnight ago I brought all my arrangements to perfection. I have hit upon a plan for transcending the wonders of mystery gold with its tin and platinum and copper imposture. I have hit upon the plan of making miracle gold! Ay! miracle gold, the secret of which will die with me when it has served my purpose. I can be rich and give my poor old mother every luxury and pleasure riches may secure for one so old and so afflicted. A fortnight ago I had made up my mind to go on with the manufacture of miracle gold. I am but a weak, fickle creature, I who had been so firm and strong, and whole hearted! I who had been as whole hearted as I am marred bodied! I advertise for a companion for my poor old mother and I see this girl, this Edith Grace, with her airs and graces and high notions.
"I took that sight of her as a sign, as a bid for my soul, for my better self. I said to myself, 'Will you forego the miracle gold and cleave to her instead?' I would have given all the fair gold and foul gold in the world for her, with her airs and graces and high notions. A man must fill his heart with something, no matter in what kind of a body that heart may be lodged. I had made up my mind to fill it with the god of wealth. I had made up my mind to erect the throne of Plutus in my soul. I would make gold, some way, and I had lighted upon an ingenious method, an original method, an old alchemy under a new name, and then I saw her, and my resolve was shaken, it crumbled down with Plutus and his throne.
"And now she will not have me, she will not rest under the roof to which I am free, she flees from me as from vile contagion, and I am driven back upon this miracle gold. Timmons will be here with some of it tonight. That is the first step on the way Down----
"There's that noise again below. Let me see what it is."
Meanwhile two unusual things had taken place in Chetwynd Street; from the western end (the street ran nearly due east and west) the canons regarding broadcloth had been violated once more, for John Hanbury, twenty-six years of age, of independent fortune, had entered it in a black frock coat and low black felt hat, with Dora Ashton, aged twenty, to whom he was privately engaged to be married. Dora had never seen any of the poorer parts of London, and he, after much expostulation and objection, consented to escort her through Chetwynd Street, not a mile distant from Westminster Abbey.
At the eastern end, William Sampson, Negro, and Street Entertainer, had entered, passed down the street until he came to Welbeck Place, and there prepared to perform, hoping to win a few coppers from the loungers about the mews and the Hanover public-house. Men with faces blackened by pursuit of various trades and arts were common in Chetwynd Street; but a black man, wholly a product of nature, was a rare visitor.
"I--I never was in a place of this kind before, Jack," said Dora Ashton, clinging more closely to Hanbury's arm as they moved along the left-hand side of the street.
"I should think not," he said shortly. He did not like the expedition at all. He was not accustomed to wearing a round topped hat when escorting a lady in London; but on this occasion he put one on rather than provoke the inhabitants to throw brickbats at him. When Dora suggested that he should wear a tweed coat he declined point blank. A line most be drawn somewhere.
"I'm--I'm not in--in the least afraid, Jack," she said with grave tremulousness in her fresh voice.
"Not in the least, of course!" he said ungraciously, scornfully. "But youwouldcome, you know. Nice place, eh? Nice looking houses, eh? Aren't you glad you came?" His manner was contemptuous, almost fierce. Jack Hanbury had the reputation of being, clever, extremely clever. He was very fond of Dora, but like many clever young men, he had a great scorn of women when they assumed, or took an interest in things out of their sphere. Dora knew the impetuous, volcanic nature of Jack, and, under ordinary circumstances, admired and smiled at his outbursts, for she knew that while they might be provoked by her, personally, they were not directed against her personally, but against her sex generally.
"Indeed, Jack, you wrong me, if you think I am alarmed. I am only surprised, not frightened."
"You would come, you know," he repeated, a little softened. The heart of the man would be hard indeed, if he could be insensible to the beauty of her face and her voice, and the touch of her trembling, confiding, delicate, brown-gloved hand.
With a little shudder of reassurance, she looked round, "And, Jack, are these the people who live here?"
"Yes," he answered, moving his eyes from right to left in disdain, "these are the people who live here. I told you they weren't nice. Are they? How should you like to live here inthispart of Westminster?"
She shuddered again and pressed his arm to convince herself of his presence and protection. "It is of no consequence whether I should like to live here or not----"
"No; because you are not obliged to live here."
"That is not what I was going to say. It is of no consequence whether I should like to live here or not. What is of consequence is that these poor people have to live here, Jack."
"They aren't people at all, I tell you. Thepeopleof no country are people in the sense of fine ladies."
"Jack!" she said, in protest and expostulation.
"They are not people, I say. It is only philanthropists and other idle men, and those who want the applause of the crowd, who call them people. Look at him, for instance. There is a creature who is more than one of the people. He is a Man, and a Brother too. Ugh!" Hanbury turned away in disgust.
William Sampson, the negro, a tall man with round shoulders and restless eyes, was gesticulating violently, at the open end of Welbeck Place, and addressing loud speech, apparently to the first-floor windows of the houses opposite him in Chetwynd Street.
"What is he, Jack?" asked the girl, whose composure was gradually returning.
"Can't you see, he's a Nigger?"
"I know. But what is he going to do? Why is there a crowd gathering about him?"
The two drew up under the windows which the Negro seemed to be addressing. A couple of dozen people had drifted near the Negro, who was now declaring, in stentorian voice, that he undertook to perform feats hitherto unattempted by man.
"I don't know what he's going to do, at first. Collect money in the end, I am certain. Conjuring; balancing straws or chairs; fire-eating, or something of that kind. Would you like to stay and see, Dora?" His manner softened still further, and he bent his body towards her in a caressing and lover-like way.
She looked up and down, apprehensively. "Yes, if you are not afraid."
"Afraid! Afraid!" he laughed, "afraid of what? You do not think he is a cannibal? and even if he were, they don't permit Niggers to eat harmless English folk in the public streets of London. The days for that kind of thing are gone by here," and he laughed again.
She looked at him protestingly. "You know I didn't mean any such folly. You ought to know what I did mean."
"I confess I don't. Tell me what you did mean."
She coloured slightly. "I meant did you think this is a fit place for me to stand still in?"
He became grave all at once and glanced hastily around. "No one of your acquaintance will see you here, if you mean that."
"Then I will stay," she answered with a little sigh. She had not dreaded any one seeing her. Jack was very dull, she thought.
He caught a look of disappointment on her face, and gathered from it that he had not answered her question as she expected. He added quickly: "They will not molest you, if that is your doubt."
She shook her head. "I cannot bear--it's very silly, I know--I cannot bear to hear people say dreadful things. Will that Negro swear, Jack?"
He laughed. "That Negro swear! Oh, dear no. The Lord Chamberlain would not license the piece if there were any bad language in it. Let us cross over, Dora, if you would really care to see. You may be sure he will use no bad language. He would not dare go half as far in that way as the writer of a comedy for a Quaker audience."
The two crossed and stood in front of Forbes's bakery, a few yards from the thin crowd around the Negro. The people noticing that the young girl and her companion were well dressed, fell back a little right and left to leave a clear view of the performer. The people did this not from servility or courtesy, but that the Negro might benefit by the contribution from the well-off strangers.
The Negro turned his face towards John Hanbury and Dora Ashton. He had beside him, on the ground, two cubes of stone, one the size of an iron half-hundredweight, the other somewhat bigger. In his hand he held a small square of thin board.
"Yes, ladies and gentlemen," said he, "like a great opera singer, I earn the bread I put into my mouth with the mouth I put it into. I have a lovely mouth," opening an enormous cavern and showing a magnificent set of teeth, the lower row of which projected half an inch beyond the upper.
Dora shuddered and clung closer to her companion. Hanbury straightened his back and squared his shoulders, and whispered: "Don't be afraid, Dora." He was tall and powerful, and solid-looking for a man of six-and-twenty. He could have answered for any man among the spectators. The Negro stood half-a-head taller, and looked powerful and stubborn. Hanbury surveyed him curiously and finished his examination by thinking, "I shouldn't mind taking him on. I dare say he knows how to use his fists." He himself had taken lessons with the gloves, and was a creditable amateur in the art. Young amateur boxers always look on every strange man as a possible antagonist. Hanbury felt great pleasure in his own physical prowess when he thought of the hand of the young girl on his arm and looked down at the pale olive face and into the confiding hazel eyes. "Don't be afraid." he murmured.
"Yes, ladies and gentlemen," the Negro went on, "I grind my own corn with my own mill-stones," showing his fine, large, white teeth. "Men in Parliament are celebrated for their jaw, so am I. I am like them all round. With my teeth and my mouth and my jaw, I get my living. Here is my stock in trade," patting his chin and cheek and teeth, "and I never can sell them that puts faith in me, as the Parliament men do, for these here things of mine would be no use to anyone else, and I couldn't sell 'em the same as votes if I would." He made a hideous grimace, at which there was another laugh mingled with a cheer.
This laugh brought Mr. Williams, landlord of the Hanover, to his door, and finally into the street. He glanced at the Negro and the crowd with benignant toleration, then turning his eyes upwards he saw Leigh at the window, whither he had been attracted by the noise of the crowd. The window was open, and Leigh was leaning out and watching the group below.
Williams called out to the hunchback, "His trumpeter isn't dead," nodding to the Negro. "Come down Mr. Leigh, and see the fun." A man who could afford to give good English money for a dead Egyptian prince would surely be interested in a living African black, whom he could see and hear for nothing.
Leigh hesitated for a moment, then called out, "All right," and disappeared from the window.
Meanwhile the athlete was continuing his harangue. Such artistes are prodigal of personal history, reticent of the feats they intend to perform. This one told the audience his name was William Sampson, but that the President of the United States, King Ja-Ja, and the Emperor of China, called him Black Sam, when he dined with them in private. "The ladies, who are to a man fond of me, call me Black Sam too. You may laugh, but you won't see me blush when you laugh at me. You don't find this Nigger so green as to blush because he's popular with the ladies. Not me! I was born at midnight, in the Black Country near Brummagem, that accounts for my dark complexion, and I'm in mourning for my great grandfather, Adam, which accounts for my being called Sam, and also for my nobby head of hair."
He paused awhile, and walked round the two cubes of stone which he had placed on the ground. He surveyed them as though they were living animals of priceless value. Then he returned to his first position facing Welbeck Place, and resumed:
"I carry them stones there about with me to prove to any man, who won't take my word for it, that I am the strongest jawed man in all the world. Ladies and gentlemen, when I was last in America, I went out West. You have often heard of the Rocky Mountains--there," pointing to the stones, "there they are. Now I am going to prove my words to you."
"What will he do with the stones, Jack?" whispered Dora, with some apprehension of danger.
"Eat them," answered Hanbury in a whisper. "Didn't you hear him say so?"
At this point Oscar Leigh opened the side door of Forbes's bakery, the door in Welbeck Place, and stepped into the street.
"You're just in time," shouted Williams, across the street, "He's going to begin."
John Hanbury, with Dora Ashton on his arm, was standing at the curb on the footway in Chetwynd Place against the blank wall of Forbes's bakery.
About fifty people, men, women, and children, were now gathered at the head of Welbeck Place. Half-a-dozen men stood behind the Negro, between him and the gateway of Welbeck Mews, at the end of the Place. There was a clear view of the Negro from where Hanbury and Miss Ashton stood, and from where Williams the landlord lounged directly opposite. When Leigh reached Williams's side nothing intervened between him and the stranger except the Negro.
Leigh took up his place by the landlord, without a word, and stood leaning heavily on his stick. He fixed his quick, piercing eyes on the Negro.
Black Sam had finished his introductory speech, and was getting ready for his performance. His preparations consisted in violent gestures menacing the four cardinal points of the heavens, and then the four cardinal points of earth, and finally the two stone cubes on the ground in front of him.
Leigh watched with a cynical smile. "What is he going to do with the stones, landlord?"
"Try which is the hardest, his head or them," said Williams, with a laugh. He had a great turn for humour when in the open air near his house.
"Then the stones are going to have a bad time?" said Leigh.
The Negro first took up the smaller block, tossed it high into the air, and let it fall on the road, saying, in a defiant voice, "Eighteen pounds." Then he took the larger block, and treating it in the same way, said, "Twenty-four pounds. The two together forty-two pounds!"
"And not an ounce more taken off for cash down?" said a man in the crowd.
"Any gentleman that doubts my word is at liberty to weigh them. If I am a pound out, I'll stand a bottle of champagne to the men, give a shilling's worth of jujubes to the children, and present each lady here with a gold wedding-ring." The people laughed.
"And a husband?" asked the man who had spoken before.
"And the best husband in this whole country--meaning myself." He placed his hand on his heart and bowed profoundly.
The people were in the best of good humour, except the children, who thought that a serious matter, such as jujubes, was being treated with disgraceful levity.
Then Black Sam began a series of tricks with the stones. Before starting, he placed on the ground the square piece of white thin board he held in his hand. It was about a quarter of an inch thick, and six inches by four. Then he balanced a stone on the point of the first finger of each hand, and then jerked the lesser stone from the point of his left fore-finger to the top of the larger stone, still balanced on the fore finger of his right hand, and kept both upright on the point of his right fore-finger for half a minute.
Suddenly he dropped both towards the ground together, and kicking away the heavier one as they fell caught the lighter one on the toe of his left foot, flung this stone into the air, and received and retained it on his right shoulder.
"That must hurt his shoulder dreadfully," whispered Dora.
"Padded and resined," said Hanbury laconically, unsympathetically. He was interested in the performance by this time. It was new to him, and an amateur athlete is always wanting to know, although always extremely knowing.
The Negro stooped carefully, seized the larger stone, threw it a few feet into the air, and caught and balanced it on the top of the smaller one still resting on his shoulder.
"Good," said Hanbury, in the tone of a connoisseur, who, although he knows much, is not ungenerous.
The people applauded out loud, and twopence were cast on the ground close to the black man's huge feet. He smiled at the applause, and affected to know nothing of the twopence. The mercenary spirit ought not to exist in the bosom of the real artiste--for pence, anyway.
Black Sam shook his back, and the two stones fell to the ground. Then he stooped once more and took up the piece of flat white board and placed it between his gleaming teeth, rolling back his lips so that the spectators might see the white teeth closed upon the white wood. His lower jaw projected enormously, even for a Negro. By no motion of the lower jaw could its front teeth be made to meet the front teeth of the upper.
"Going to bolt the timber?" asked the landlord of the Hanover, with a laugh and a wink at Leigh.
The Negro took no notice of the question. Leigh did not see the wink. Something more wonderful than the contortions of Black Sam had at that moment attracted Leigh's attention. He had caught sight of Dora Ashton; the roadway between her and him was free save for the Negro, and Leigh's eyes had travelled beyond the burly man of colour and were fixed on the slender form and pale olive face of the girl, with an expression of amazement. He looked like an animal that suddenly sees something it dreads, and from which it desires to remain concealed. He seemed stupefied, stunned, dazed. All the scorn had gone out of his face. He leaned forward more heavily than formerly on his crooked stick. He appeared to doubt the evidence of his senses.
The Negro went on with his performance.
John Hanbury's attention was wholly absorbed in Black Sam. Leigh never took his fascinated gaze off the girl at Hanbury's side. Hanbury was an athlete examining the feats of another athlete. Leigh was a man looking at the incredible, seeing the invisible, beholding in full daylight a ghost whom he must not challenge, and whom he cannot leave. Dora was watching with mingled fear, disgust and pity, the dangerous gyrations of a man of pathetically low type, a man who seemed in his own person connecting the race of man with the race of beasts, as put forth in recent theories.
With a piece of wood in his mouth, Black Sam made the circuit of the little crowd. The line of gleaming white teeth upon the line of white wood in the distorted ebony face made the head seem cut in two at the line of the folded back upper lip, and the polished upper part of the head with its rolling eyes, as if placed on a trencher.
At length he took up his position in the centre of the ring. Then he stooped, raised the lesser stone, and placed it on the piece of white board, now at right angles to the ebony glittering face, and parallel to the horizon.
Then he did a thing that looked horrible.
Still keeping the piece of white board parallel to the horizon, he began slowly leaning his head back. This he did by gradually opening his huge mouth from ear to ear, the piece of wood being jambed in the angle of the jaws, and resting on the teeth of the huge undershot lower jaw. He bent back the upper part of his head until his eyes stared vertically into the unclouded blue sky of the June afternoon. It appeared as if the Negro's lower jaw had been torn down from the skull by the weight of the stone, and would presently be rent from its place and dashed to the ground. The red palate and arch of the gullet were visible above the white tongue of wood lying on the teeth, and jambed into the angles of the jaws above the invisible red tongue of the mouth.
All eyes were fixed on the Negro, all eyes but those of Oscar Leigh. His eyes were rivetted on the face of Dora Ashton.
The crowd watched the Negro in breathless expectancy. Oscar Leigh watched the girl in amazement, incredulity, fear.
With both hands Black Sam bespoke attention. All saw and responded, all but Oscar Leigh. He had eyes for no one, nothing but the girl opposite him. He was in a trance of wonder.
Suddenly, while the head remained motionless, the lower jaw of the Negro swept upon its hinges, the piece of wood was brought into swift contact with the upper teeth, and the stone, impelled from the catapult formed by the muscles of the jaws, flew over the Negro's head, and fell to the ground a dozen feet behind his clumsy heels.
There was a shout of applause from all.
Dora drew back with a sigh of relief.
"I never saw anything like that," said the landlord of the Hanover to Oscar Leigh, with the Negro in his mind.
"Nor I," said Oscar Leigh, "anything like it," having the girl opposite in his mind. "Pray excuse me!" He crossed the road, and placed himself on the curb within a couple of paces of where she stood, and stared at her furtively with unbelieving eyes.