Seeing FitzHoward gave me just a little something of a turn. I got then and there the first faint glimmer at the mistake I'd made. But as it's a motto of mine to put on an extra size in smiles each time I'm downed, I just sat tight and wondered who he was. There didn't seem to be much in the wonder line about him. He came sailing straight across at me, his hand stretched out. 'Mr. Babbacombe!'
His tone betokened joy. I knew FitzHoward. I wasn't responsive.
'Who's this person with his hat on his head? Has it become the rule here for men to enter a room with their hats on?'
This was one for Reggie as well as Fitz. Both hats were off before I'd hardly finished. Fitz's enthusiasm seemed a little damped. His hand went back.
'Mr. Babbacombe, I--I was afraid you were dead.'
'What are you talking about? Foster, I hope I don't happen to have dropped into the wrong house by any chance. First I'm mistaken for a ghost, then--for the deuce knows who.'
Fitz kept staring at me as if he couldn't stare enough.
'You're either Montagu Babbacombe or his ghost!'
'Sorry, but I don't chance to be either. And as I've not the pleasure of your acquaintance, and don't desire your intrusion here, allow me to remind you that the street's handy. Foster, touch the bell.'
Foster touched the bell. Reggie interposed.
'Twickenham, this gentleman, Mr. FitzHoward, has rendered me a very great service in exposing the fraud that has been practised.'
I sat tight. A footman appeared.
'Show Lord Reginald's acquaintance to the front door.'
Poor Fitz was all of a fluster.
'I'm a man who requires no second hint that my room's preferred to my company, but if you're not Montagu Babbacombe I'll eat my hat.'
He clapped it on to his head as if to illustrate his meaning. Reggie stopped him as he was going.
'I am very much obliged to you, Mr. FitzHoward, for what you have done for me; and trust to be able to avail myself of an early opportunity to tender you my thanks in a more suitable form.'
'My lord, you are welcome. Any little service I may do you I am always yours to command.'
Out marched Fitz, with banners flying. I turned my attention to Reggie.
'Reggie, to save trouble later on, may I call your attention to two points? The first is, that I'm not dead. The second is, that I should be obliged by your not using my house as if it were your own. As I have still something which I wish to say to Foster, will you have the extreme kindness to allow me to say it?' He was turning away with--I'll bet a pound!--unfraternal feelings in his breast--strange how little brotherly affection some men have--when a thought occurred to me. 'By the way, where's Douglas?'
'He's ill.'
'Ill? Since when?'
'Since this morning.'
'I asked you where he was.'
'He's at home with Violet.'
'Violet? Is that that young sister of his?'
'Young? She's old enough to be my promised wife.'
As I looked at him he eyed me with quite a disagreeable expression in his eyes. I whistled.
'Is that so? Indeed! I really think that I begin to see how extremely desirous it was that I should be dead. What a happy family you would have been! So sorry I'm alive. Dead men's shoes always are slow travellers. Thank you, Reggie. I shall perhaps see you again a little later on.'
I feel convinced he'd have liked to hit me as he went out. There's an utter lack in some people's bosoms of that true sympathy, the absence of which strikes a fatal blow at the very root of the family system. It's a fact; I've noticed it before. Why, because your brother merely twists your nose off your face, should you resent it? It's that kind of feeling which tears an united family asunder.
I improved the occasion with Foster; filling him, I feel sure, with a profound conviction that there wasn't much difference between the Marquis of fifteen years ago and his lordship of to-day. I had to be him all the way along; and I was. When I'm playing a character I like to be thorough. When I'd been thorough enough I shunted Foster.
I felt a sort of desire to be alone. I'd been in some funny places, but this did seem as though it was going to be the funniest. It looked as if this was going to be the Julius Cæsar kind of thing. As if there wasn't to be any opposition at all. I'd only had to hang up my hat in the hall to become king of the castle. When I'd wanted all that a chap had got I'd always been game to fight him; but I wasn't used to his handing it over to me, without so much, even, as a trifling argument, with a remark that it was mine. It looked as if I was in for a real good thing.
And yet--human nature's a freak; you never know where to class it!--and yet, I wasn't sure that I felt so inclined to kick up my heels as I expected. The Marquis of Twickenham was an uncommonly fine person to be: for those who liked to be the Marquis of Twickenham. I hadn't been him much more than an hour, and already I was beginning to wonder if I did. There were houses and lands, and money at the bank, and servants to kick, and sacred duties to play old Harry with; but--well, I was starting to doubt if there was freedom. The kind of freedom I was used to, which has always been to me like the air I've breathed. On my davy, I didn't wonder that lying scoundrel made a bolt of it. A chap like that would have been clean wasted in Twickenham House. Maybe he wasn't all the fool I took him for.
One thing was sure, I was going to be as free as I could manage. What was the use of being lord of all if I wasn't above grammar? If there came over me an inclination to dine in my shirt sleeves he'd be a bold man who would try to stop me. And yet, as I went up again to that oak room, I was uncomfortably conscious that, after all, circumstances might prove too strong; and that underneath that roof I'd have to be decent. It wasn't an inspiriting kind of thought, and I plumped down into an armchair with the solemn conviction strong upon me that the first thing the Marquis of Twickenham had got was the hump.
I hadn't been there two minutes before old Gayer came in and wanted to know if he should valet me. Here was an occasion on which it was necessary to begin where I meant to go. The idea of having that old fossil messing about gave me the twitters. So I spoke to him like a father.
'Gayer, you're a man in the prime of life.'
I stopped, so as to give him his chance.
'I'm an old man now, my lord.'
'Oh, no, you're not; and I'll tell you how I know. If you'd seen one twenty-fifth part as much of the world as I have, you'd know at a glance that I am the kind of man who does everything for himself that can be done. It's because you're so young that you don't see it.'
'But your lordship will have a body servant?'
'What'll you bet on it? Come! I don't like the man who won't stand shoulder to shoulder with his own opinion; what are you laying?'
'Well, my lord, I'm not a betting man.'
'Sorry to hear it, Gayer--because I am. Lay my boots against yours on any little game you like. A man of your age ought not to have allowed the higher branches of a religious education to remain so neglected. Good-bye. When I want you I'll ring; I suppose there are bells to be broken. And I don't want you, or any one, till I do ring. Hear, and then bear that carefully in mind.'
He'd hardly gone, with something about him which seemed to say he couldn't altogether make me out--I've noticed that look on people a good many times; I don't know how it gets there; I'm sure I'm simple to the breaking point--I say that dear old Mr. Gayer had hardly gone, when somebody started fumbling at the handle of the door, and presently open it came with a rush. When I saw that handle start jigging about I said to myself--
'Here's Gayer's venerable grandfather come to know if he can curl my hair. From the way he's playing upon that handle, I should say he'd got a touch of the shakes. I'll give him another touch before I've done with him.'
It struck me that the old-servant ticket was going to be run for all that it was worth. The sooner I buried the entire boiling, whether at Cressland or elsewhere, the more comfortable the Marquis would be. This conviction had me at grips; and I was just about to give it due and proper expression, when who should come flying into the room but--Jimmy! My Jimmy!
I do believe that that was the first time in my life I was ever really taken by surprise. I'm not the sort of person that's easily amazed. Always expecting the unexpected I get used to meeting it when it comes. But that time it had me fair. As we stared at each other I don't know which of the two was the more astonished. But he's a spry kid, is Jimmy. He knows his father when he sees him. And when he had got it clear that it was me, he came at me with a run.
'Dad!' he cried. 'Dad!'
Now I was in a quandary. I was getting into the region of the unusual. I wanted to put my arms about that boy, lift him on to my knee, and say, 'Hollo, Jimmy!' But if I went on like that, the show'd be busted. He'd go about telling people that I was his father. One of his father's two thousand and forty-five names was Montagu Babbacombe. I'd faced it out that I wasn't acquainted with any party of that name; supposing, when I said so, that I'd counted the cost. But this was an item which hadn't figured in the bill as I'd got it down at all. If I wasn't careful the Marquis would have to walk downstairs. So I kind of compromised.
'Little boy, whose little boy are you?'
'I'm your little boy--yours! yours! yours!'
He put his hands on my knees, and began to caper about as if he was happy. Now I'd been in the habit of playing with that small child a kind of a game in which I'd ask him whose little boy he was, pretending I didn't know; and he'd say, 'Yours! yours! yours!' He thought I was playing that game with him then. Which was where he was wrong.
'You take a good deal for granted, young gentleman.'
'I don't! I don't! I don't!'
He flung himself against me, still thinking I was playing the game.
'I say you do. May I ask how you've come here!'
'I came with Pollie.' Before I could stop him or guessed what he was going to do, he was off to the door, which he had left wide open, and had started to bawl,' Pollie! Pollie! Here's dad! Here's dad!'
Children have a pleasant habit of bawling. But I don't think I was ever so struck by it as I was then. I was after him like a shot.
'Here, I say. You mustn't make that noise!'
I might as well have talked to the wall. When he'd got a thing to mention he was bound to mention it--at the top of his voice.
'I'm playing hide-and-seek with Pollie, and she won't know where I am. Pollie! Pollie! Here's dad!'
I had to throw him up in the air before he'd stop. By then it was too late. Tearing down the stairs came Pollie, my heart in my mouth for fear she'd tumble, and if I'd shut the door in her face she'd have dashed herself against it. I had to let her in, and shut the door behind her when she was in, and hope that there was nobody about with long ears and sharp wits.
'Allow me to ask what you young persons mean by behaving in this extraordinary manner; for whom do you take me?'
'You're dad! dad! dad!'
There they were, bouncing about me like two indiarubber balls. They still thought I was playing the game. The worst of it was, I almost felt as if I was, myself. I could hardly keep my countenance, in spite of the stake which was dependent on it.
'Pray may I inquire why you call me dad?'
'Tause you are!' cried Pollie. 'Give me a tiss!'
I picked up the small bundle of girl and kissed her; till her laughter might have been heard on the other side of the square. While I was still engaged in this operation the door was opened again. When I turned to see who might be this fresh disturber of my privacy, there was Mary.
Then I knew the fat was in the fire. This was quite a different kettle of fish. Playing the fool with those two children was one thing. Admitting myself to be Mr. James Merrett, after my repudiation of Mr. Montagu Babbacombe, was altogether another. I hadn't time to consider; to ask myself what was the meaning of her presence there. It was a case of act first and think afterwards. That was what I did.
A smile lit up her face when she saw me standing there with Pollie in my arms. With the prettiest cry she came towards me, holding out both her hands. There never was a lovelier woman in this world than my Mary; nor a better shaped. And her movements are in keeping. I'm keen on grace in a woman. If there's anything more graceful than she is, whether she sits, or stands, or moves, it's in a picture. I'll swear it isn't flesh and blood. As she came, with her arms stretched towards me, I thought that I'd never seen her looking better.
'James!'
I'd have given a trifle to have been able to take her in my arms. But I didn't dare. I drew back--civility itself.
'I beg your pardon?'
She came closer.
'James!'
'I think there must be some mistake.'
When I said that, her arms dropped to her sides; the smile vanished; her face went white. It hurt me to see how she changed. I asked myself if there was any game going in which the stakes were worth all this.
'Don't you--don't you know me, James? I'm--I'm Mary.'
'Mary?' How the very name rang in my heart as I repeated it. 'I'm afraid I'm hardly entitled to address a stranger by her Christian name.'
'A stranger? I'm--I'm your wife.'
'My wife?' Lord! how glad I was to know it. Never man had one so good. 'I'm afraid that, unlike many men who are more fortunate, that's an article I don't possess.'
I could see that she pressed her finger-tips into her palms. I had never seen her look more lovely than she did then, in her bewilderment and distress. My heart cried out to me to take her and to hold her fast. But I didn't dare.
'What does it mean? You know my children, and you don't know me?'
'Your children?' I was still holding Pollie. On this I put her down. 'This young lady and gentlemen address me as dad, but I fear that that is an honourable appellation to which I have no title. There would seem to be a singular confusion. It appears that there must be some one in existence who has an uncomfortable resemblance to myself. Already this morning my identity has been mistaken. I was addressed as Mr.--really at the moment I forget the name, it was rather an uncommon one, something like--Babbincombe.'
'Do you deny me, James?'
'I don't see, madam, how I can be said to deny you when this is the first time I have had the pleasure of encountering your charming personality. Nor is my name James. I am the Marquis of Twickenham.'
'Daddy, I want to have a game with you.'
This was that rascal, Jimmy. I'm sure I was quite as ready for a game as he was. Only at that particular second I didn't altogether see my way. Mary caught at his words, with a sort of sob, which brought a lump into my throat.
'He knows his father!'
'They say it's a wise child which knows its own father. It would seem, madam, that your little boy is not overstocked with the quality which King Solomon so ardently desired. You seem to take this matter somewhat to heart. It is the humorous side of it which appeals to me. Suppose I had taken advantage of your innocent misapprehension, what a vista of tragedy suggests itself! I think that when you return home you will probably find that your husband is awaiting you. And it is then that the humorous side of the situation will appeal to you.'
'I don't understand! I don't understand!'
'Nor I. I have been away from home for something like fifteen years, and have returned to find there are two or three things which I don't understand. I am taken for a ghost by some; for a Mr. Babbington, or some such person, by some one else; for their father by those two dear little children; and for her husband by the most charming lady I have had the honour of meeting. You will allow, madam, that these circumstances present a concatenation of misunderstandings which are not unlikely to confuse the rather befogged brains of a wayfarer who has so recently returned to the purlieus of civilisation.'
I was beginning to believe that I had brought off the greatest feat which I had ever yet essayed--I had almost persuaded Mary that I wasn't me. She certainly couldn't depose on oath that either voice, manner, or language was her husband's. It was, of course, impossible to convince her altogether; at least, as she stood before me there and then. That I recognised. Complete conviction would require time and--well, we'll say other circumstances. But I had managed to shake her faith--to instil a doubt in her mind as to whether she mightn't, in some altogether incomprehensible way, be wrong. I knew my Mary. She was one of those not infrequent persons who are bewildered by an appearance of calm assurance. You had only to tell her, with an air which suggested that you were stating the merest commonplace, that two and two make five, and if you persisted long enough she'd begin to wonder if the thing could possibly be. When she began to wonder she was lost; at least while the wonder continued. Her mental processes were never clear ones. And the simple explanation of her credulity was that she preferred to distrust her own senses, rather than believe that there was such a liar in existence.
It was a failing on virtue's side, and I loved her for it. I protest it cut me to the quick to play the scoundrel with her on such lines. I'd never done it before, I'd not have done it then had not the situation developed in such unexpected directions that I saw no other way. While her white face, quivering hands, and trembling form were almost tearing me in two--and--hurting me the more because I dare not show it--the situation was fortunately relieved by the advent of Miss Desmond.
All at once she stood in the open doorway, observing the picture we presented.
I went to her upon the instant.
'Surely it is Cousin Edith?'
'Twickenham? Leonard. What does it all mean?'
'That, cousin, is the question which I asked myself. I return, after, it is true, a somewhat lengthy absence, to find all sorts of things. For instance, a lady whom I have never seen before claims me as her husband.'
'Then she is not your wife?'
'Cousin! I have no wife!'
'Then you are not Montagu Babbacombe?'
'Who on earth is Montagu Babbacombe? Is that this lady's husband's name? Have I had the pleasure of addressing Mrs. Babbacombe?'
'Come!'
Miss Desmond put her arm round Mary's shoulders, and with Pollie attached to her disengaged hand, and Jimmy hanging on to her skirts, escorted my family out of the room. Which was nice for me. I might have succeeded in throwing dust into Mary's lovely eyes, but the knowledge that, for the time at least, I'd possibly gained my ends, didn't puff me up unduly. If it were not for the fact that I'd made it a rule of my life never to quit a position I've once taken up till driven from it at the bayonet's point, the Marquis of Twickenham would have been sent flying, and James Merrett would have gone hopping up those stairs to make love to his wife.
That first day as a marquis didn't come up to my expectations. I know that first impressions are not to be trusted. That which begins in a fog ends, occasionally, in a blaze of sunlight. But I didn't feel as if there was going to be much shine about this little racket.
I went down to the library, sent for Miss Desmond, and caught her just as she was going to shake the dust of Twickenham House from off her trotter cases. We had atête-à-tête. Talk about the glacial period! It was warm compared to her. I said one or two nice things, or tried to, but the cold she radiated was altogether too much for their vitality. I made one or two friendly inquiries about how the family had got on, and she in particular; but for all I could scrape out of her it didn't seem as if there had been any family to get on. She'd kind of brought into that apartment a wall about twenty feet thick and a hundred high; she'd set it between us, and kept me on the other side of it. It was no manner of use my trying to jump up so as to get a peep at her over the top, because I couldn't do it. When I showed a mild curiosity as to the personality of the lady who'd mistaken me for her husband, the way in which she received my fugitive observations I didn't like one little bit. I'd a dreadful notion that right inside of her she'd a suspicion that I'd been treating Mary as no man ought to, and that I now proposed to add desertion to the rest of my offences. It did make me feel funny, the idea that she should think a thing like that. Of my Mary, too! That quiet-speaking female had such a way of making me understand that whether I was or wasn't the Marquis of Twickenham she didn't set much account on me anyhow, that I was glad to see the last of her. If the other members of the House of Twickenham were going to model their behaviour on hers, we should still continue to be a divided family.
Old Foster came up to dine with me, as per invitation. He wasn't what you'd call exciting, but he was amusing. He'd got some interesting things to talk about, and assisted me in cramming up family details at a rate of which he had no notion. The style in which he took it for granted that there was no deception this time was to me a cause of perpetual surprise. He was a long-headed man, and, in a general way, if you'd wanted to get on his blind side, you'd have had to get up early. But Reggie and Howarth had put his nose out of joint. They'd given him to understand that he was to have the kick because his conduct during my fifteen years of absence hadn't suited their convenience. No man likes to have the Order of the Boot as a reward for his fidelity. My re-appearance meant his triumph over his enemies. His appreciation of that fact I rather think tended to blunt his faculties of observation. In the first flush of his joy he was perhaps naturally unwilling to spoil the situation by any show of impertinent curiosity.
At the same time let me hasten to add that his opinion of the Marquis of Twickenham didn't seem to be much higher than Miss Desmond's. He didn't say so in so many words, but it was easy to see that morally and mentally he didn't rate his lordship very high. It was painful to me to reflect that I'd come back to a family whose good opinion of me I should have to level up; if there was any of it to level. Because, so far as I could gather, there wasn't any one anywhere who thought anything of the Marquis of Twickenham at all.
For instance, when I asked in a casual sort of way, as the conversation seemed to lag: 'And how are all my old friends?' Foster looked at me curiously out of the corners of his eyes; then down at his glass. There was a dryness in his tone as he answered,
'I didn't know your lordship had any.'
Now that wasn't a pleasant answer to receive. The Marquis of Twickenham ought to have some friends. What made it worse was the way in which he said it. However I dissembled my emotions.
'Not one?'
'Whom would your lordship have called a friend of yours?'
Although there was the suggestion of a sneer, which I resented, it was an inquiry which I was quite unable to answer. I wanted all the information to come from him. I endeavoured to cap his sneer with another.
'Well, if it comes to that, I don't know that there was any one who owed me money.'
'I should imagine that there was not.' Directly he said that, I knew that I had blundered--that, in fact, it had been only too notorious that the owing was all the other way. Presently he added something which did not tend to sweeten my temper.
'By the way, my lord, it is only right that I should tell you--since I should not be doing my duty were I to withhold the information--that there are certain matters in which your lordship was concerned which have not been forgotten--one in particular which your lordship will probably bear in mind.'
When a man hits me, I hit him back. When the discussion's over I ask him to explain his reasons; not before. Business first, pleasure after. If a man makes it his business to decorate my features, I make it mine to endeavour to induce him to wish he hadn't. It had been growing on me that the Marquis of Twickenham was a blackguard on lines which weren't just mine, and that I'd no intention of bearing the burden of sins I was not inclined to. I leaned my elbows on the table, and I eyed my man of affairs.
'Foster!'
'My lord?'
'Look at me!'
'I am looking, my lord.'
He was, with, I fancied, a certain surprise.
'You remember the sort of man I was?'
'I do.'
'I'll tell you the sort of man that I've become. Are you listening?'
'Your lordship sees I am.'
'I've become a man who resents any attempt on the part of any other man to take a liberty. You understand?'
'I trust, and believe, that your lordship will not find a trace of such a disposition in me.'
'You have taken more than one liberty since you've been inside this room.'
'My lord!'
'Do you remember what a nauseous little brat you were when you were two?'
'I!--My lord, I don't understand!'
'No?--Perhaps your memory doesn't carry you so far back. Mine doesn't carry me back fifteen years. In my presence don't let yours. Do you understand that? Another point. I don't quite know why I've come back. I may go away next week for another fifteen years.'
'I cordially hope that your lordship won't.'
'I hope, Foster, that you're not getting old. Old men are apt to dodder.--How do you like the expression of that hope? Sounds personal, doesn't it? In the same sense, yours did to me.--We're apt to hope that other people won't do what they want to, but we resent that hope when it's applied to us. I hope you're not getting old. But as the relations which exist between us hardly justify me in attempting to interfere with the tribute which you pay to the passing years, I trust that I retain a remnant of courtesy sufficient to induce me not to meddle with matters with which I have no personal concern. I feel sure that, in that sense, you have almost as much courtesy as I have. Oblige me, Foster, by keeping a small stock of it on hand.--I was saying that I may go away again next week for another period of fifteen years; or I may not. It may amuse me to take up what is called my proper position in the country. If I choose to do so, I assure you that, with my money, and my rank, and the way I shall set about doing things, fifteen years ago won't count. Don't let them count with you.'
All the same I could see that there was something which had happened in the days of auld lang syne which was slithering about on the end of his tongue; and, to be frank, I was a trifle curious to know what it was. But after the sesquipedalian sentence I'd discharged at his head, for very shame's sake I couldn't ask, nor let him say. So I got rid of him instead.
The next day we journeyed together down to Cressland, to see how things had gone since the last time I was there. What a place for a man to have all his own! Twenty thousand acres in the heart of England, with a mediæval castle in which to sleep o' nights. There was another great property in Scotland, something in Ireland, and a villa at Cannes; besides oddments here and there. When I remembered that the principal part of my income came from London ground rents I thanked my stars that I hadn't to keep all the land I owned clean and wholesome with just my own pair of hands.
When I'd made an end of spying out some of the wonderful things which I possessed, back I came to town with Foster. When we parted at the station I dare say he thought I was going straight back home--that is, to the family mansion in St. James's Square. But I wasn't: I didn't. My objective was Mary. But I had to cover my tracks on the road to her. It wouldn't do to have it discovered that directly the Marquis of Twickenham disappeared at one end Mr. James Merrett came out at the other. That night I spent in Brighton. In the morning up to town. Dropped into a little crib where I store a few trifles which I'm not peculiarly anxious that other people should know about, and changed into the garments of James Merrett. Got on to the top of an omnibus. Then outside another. Landed finally in the neighbourhood of Little Olive Street.
I was well aware that, use whatever precautions I might, I was still taking on a pretty considerable risk. But then I'd got to be a kind of a dealer in hazards. Been gambling in them my whole life long. And since I'd turned myself into a family man some of them had assumed rather curious shapes. They say that the pitcher which goes often to the well gets broken at last. Maybe. Perhaps I'd had a chip or two already. But that's part of the game.
I sailed along the pavement as if I hadn't a thing in the world to fear. I'm sure that no one who'd taken stock of me would have supposed my conscience wasn't as clear as the average. Reached No. 32. Turned the handle of the front door, and walked right in. There was Mary in the sitting-room, with a pile of sewing on a table in front of her, just as I expected.
'Well, my girl,' I said, 'how's things?'
I put my hat down on a chair; up she jumped, over went the sewing, and into my arms she flew.
'James! James!'
I got my arms right round her, and I held her tight; you bet I did. I didn't say much, but I supplied the deficiency in another way. Presently I did make a remark.
'Why, my girl, you look--well, I really think you're getting pretty.'
'James!'
She turned the colour of a strawberry that's just getting ripe--the cream showing through the red. Every time I pay her a compliment she seems to tingle right to the roots of her hair. It's an old joke, my pretending to discover that she's getting pretty--as though she hadn't always been that vision of all that's fair in woman, of which, until I met her, I had only dreamed!--but every time I make it she looks that sweet she reminds me of a meadow on the slope of a hill, in which the spring flowers are tipped with dew.
I gave the youngsters a turn.
'Hollo! I do believe you're that little boy of mine whose name was Jimmy.'
'Dad! dad! I knew you'd come home soon, 'cause I did ask God so hard last night to sent you.'
'And--isn't that girl named Pollie?'
'Tourse it is! tourse it is! Ooo know it is.'
There they were, dancing about me, as fine a pair of youngsters as you'd meet in a long day's journey.
'It's a most extraordinary thing; what does make these pockets of mine stick out? I wonder what it is inside.'
Then there was the business of turning those pockets of mine inside out, and discovering that there was something in every one of them. Amazing how such things could have got there. Ah, there's nothing like these family reunions. There wasn't a happier home than ours in the whole of that great city. Mary on my knee--how glad I was to have her there again--the children divided between their delight at their new possessions, and their joy at seeing father--it's only in such moments that we really live.
And such a tale as that wife of mine had to tell. Dear! dear! it's a strange world, and the most incredible things do happen.
It seemed that she had been anxious about me.
'Now, Mary, haven't I told you not to be anxious? Can't you understand that the very thought of your anxiety increases mine?'
Down came her pretty head.
'Sometimes I--I can't help it, James.'
This time she hadn't been able to help it to a very considerable extent. She'd actually thought that I was dead. That was, FitzHoward had been putting ideas into her head. And there was something about a man named Smith. But the tale got pretty considerably mixed; she never was much of a hand at telling a tale, my Mary. I couldn't make sense of it at all. My saying so, and laughing at her, didn't make it any plainer. Somebody--a Miss Something-or-other--had actually made her think that I was a nobleman. That idea did tickle me so, and I put it in such a way, that I started her laughing at it herself. And then when she'd once started she wouldn't stop; she's a keen sense of humour, Mary has. And she does look so pretty when she's laughing. It does me good to see her. Then the children joined. Oh, what a laugh we had at the idea of my being a British nobleman!
But the most surprising part of the story was that she'd actually been to some great house, and there fancied that she'd seen me. I couldn't follow all the ins and outs of the business as she told it, but what I did understand fairly took my breath away.
'Do you mean to tell me,' I said, 'that you mistook another man for your own husband?' She was ashamed. No wonder. 'What would you think if I mistook another woman for you?'
'James!'
Down came her face against mine. Was there anything I wouldn't forgive her when the touch of her cheek filled me with so sweet a rapture?
'Do you know, Mary, I don't understand all you've been talking about--though I know I ought to, considering what a gift for narrative you have.'
'James!'
'But what I do understand makes me think of something that happened to me--ah, years and years ago. Have you ever heard of a place called San Francisco?' She nodded. ''Pon my word, I don't think there's anything you haven't heard of. You're a much greater scholar, wife of mine, than you care to own.' She laughed, and snuggled closer. 'Once upon a time I was in San Francisco.'
'James, I do believe that you've been everywhere.'
'There's only one place where I've ever wanted to be, and that's in your heart.'
'You know you're there.'
'Mary!'
Then there was an interval. There were a good many intervals before I'd finished my remarks. Nothing like an interruption now and then to give you what I call zest.
She listened with the prettiest interest. Just as she'd have listened if I'd recited one of Euclid's propositions. She cared nothing for my story. All she wanted was to know, and to feel, that I was there. The consciousness that her evil dreams had vanished was sufficient. When she pressed herself against me, and felt how my heart kept time with hers, and how her tremors set me trembling, that was all the explanation she required. A woman's love has nothing to equal it in its power of forgetting. If she loves you you needn't ask her to forgive you; she forgets that she has anything to forgive.
We had tea, and Pollie and Jimmy and I made toast, and she superintended the proceedings. She considered that we weren't so good at it as we ought to have been; so she showed us how to improve. When I said that the chief thing she'd toasted was her cheeks, she whispered that I wasn't to say such things; so I kissed them instead. Whereupon she asserted that that piece of toast was spoilt; but we ate it all the same. And I declared, as I was eating it, that I could detect, from the taste, the exact spot on which she was engaged when the accident occurred. Which statement she positively asserted that she didn't believe.
I dare say it's a funny thing to be in love with your wife. I don't know. It's not too common a form of humour. And perhaps I'm not a judge of what is comical. But I'm glad that I'm in love with mine. I'm glad that she's my sweetheart--although she is my wife. The exigencies of a life which is not entirely commonplace prevent my devoting so much time as I could wish to my domestic duties, but this I may safely say, that however far away from each other we may be, the consciousness that my wife is my wife is ever with me; and the knowledge fills me with that complete content which makes me equal to any fortune.
After tea we had a romp with the children. I helped to bathe and put them to bed. And when they'd gone, and we'd told each other love tales by the fire, we, too, went up to rest. On the way we went into the youngsters' room, and stood side by side, looking down upon them as they slept.
'Don't you think,' asked Mary, 'that Pollie's pretty?'
'Well,' I said,' she's a little bit like you.'
She pressed my arm.
'Jimmy's just your image.'
'Poor lad!'
'James! How can you talk like that? Can anything be better for him than to be like his father?'
'There are better men.'
'I don't know where. Nor any a hundredth part as good. I can't imagine why you don't think more of yourself--when you're the most wonderful man in the world.'
This assertion caused me furiously to think.
'Mary, I shouldn't be surprised but what you're right.'
'I'm sure I'm right.'
'I also have an inclination to be sure. I must be the most wonderful man in the world, because I've you.'
'James!'
The rest is silence ... What does that writing fellow say about 'Sweet music, long drawn out'? Is there any music like the silent pressure of a woman's lips?
After all, there's something in being in love with your wife.
Mr. Gayer met me in the hall. 'A gentleman, my lord, wishes to see you.' He spoke in a half-whisper, as if he was afraid of being overheard. There was something in his face I didn't understand.
'A gentleman? What gentleman?' Gayer came closer.
'Mr. Acrodato. We told him your lordship wasn't at home, and tried to keep him out, but he made so much disturbance we thought we'd better let him in. He's been walking all over the house, and behaving very badly.'
As Gayer imparted his information, with an air half of deprecation, half of mystery, there came through the dining-room door a gentleman. He was big. His huge beard and mop of hair were tinged with grey; his top hat was on the back of his head; his hands were in the pockets of his unbuttoned overcoat. He surveyed me with a look which did not suggest respect, speaking in accents which were not exactly gentle.
'So you've come.--Well?'
A feeling of resentment had been growing up within me with every yard which I had been placing between Mary and myself. I had been telling myself that this Marquis of Twickenham game was hardly worth the candle, and that if I had to choose between Mary and the marquisate, the dignity might go hang. Only let his lordship withdraw from his banking account thirty or forty thousand pounds in cash, and it was not improbable that he might disappear for another fifteen years. In which case Mr. and Mrs. James Merrett would take a trip abroad.
This loud-voiced, blustering bully had caught me in a dangerous mood. What he might want with the Marquis of Twickenham I had no notion. But the contrast he presented to the sweet saint in Little Olive Street offered me just the opportunity I needed to take it out of some one. I walked past him into the dining-room. He followed, leaving the door wide open.
'Have the goodness to shut the door.'
His response was the soul of courtesy.
'Shut it yourself! I'm not your servant.'
Directly he said that, I remembered where I had seen him last, and the name by which he had been known to me; the recollection gave me the most genuine sensation of pleasure. The Marquis of Twickenham should be avenged.
'Mr. Fraser, shut that door!'
When I called him by that name he started.
'Who are you speaking to?'
'To Andrew Fraser--who lately carried on one of the branches of his usurer's business at 14 Colmore Road, Birmingham. I have a statement referring to you, which was made to me by Isabel Kingham, also of Birmingham, half an hour before she died. That statement will supply the police with some information they are very anxious to receive. If you would like me to provide any one who may be listening outside with spicy details of your connection with the lady, I am willing.'
It's not often you are able to bag a man with the first barrel, especially a man of the type who was then in front of me. But when you do succeed, the sensation is delicious, as I experienced on that occasion.
That he had come to crush the Marquis of Twickenham was obvious; having good reasons for believing that that fortunate peer was his to crush. That he was the kind of individual who enjoyed crushing any one or anything was as plain as the fact that he was likely to resent with the utmost bitterness any attempt which might be made at crushing him. Nothing, probably, had been further from his mind than the idea that his intended victim would essay so hazardous a feat. He thought, possibly, knowing his man, that all he had to anticipate was his more or less abject humiliation. That first shot of mine was not only unexpected, but hitting him even before he was fairly on the wing, it bowled him completely over. The look of amazement which was on his hirsute countenance was distinctly comical. He shut the door with almost acrobatic rapidity.
'What the devil are you talking about?'
'So Andrew Fraser and Morris Acrodato are the same persons. With what gratification the press, the public, and the police will receive the news. We all know that Morris Acrodato carries on his business of blood-sucking under various aliases, but it is not generally known that Andrew Fraser is one of them. Every hand is against the most extortionate usurer in England, and at last one of them--the hangman's hand--will get it right home.'
He was so used to bully others, that the idea of being effectually bullied himself was beyond his comprehension.
'Don't--don't you try to bluff me.'
'Not at all. On the contrary, Mr. Fraser, I propose to have you hanged.'
He glanced round the room as if he feared that the walls had ears.
'What nonsense are you talking?'
'Nothing will give me greater pleasure. I once had an acquaintance who called herself Isabel Kingham. She died in great agony. At the inquest the medical examination showed that the immediate cause of death had been the administration of certain illegal drugs; but by whom they had been administered it was admitted, in the Coroner's Court, that there was not sufficient evidence to show. More than sufficient evidence is, however, in my possession that they were administered by Mr. Andrew Fraser.'
'It's all a lie.'
'At that time I had not sufficient leisure to justify me in seeing the business through. Although there was no moral doubt as to the person from whom the medicine came, you had so managed affairs as to leave me without actual proof. It is only within the last few weeks that I have had the pleasure of meeting a gentleman named Matthew Parker.'
'When did you see him?'
'It appears that Mr. Parker was once a clerk in the employ of Mr. Andrew Fraser. He distinctly remembers being instructed by his master to purchase a bottle of a certain mixture, and to forward it to a certain lady.'
'I'll wring his neck.'
'The missing link in the chain of evidence being thus supplied, I still had to learn what had become of Mr. Fraser. Now that I have had the pleasure of this fortunate encounter all that remains is to place the entire matter in the hands of the police.'
As I observed the looks with which Mr. Acrodato favoured me, I was conscious that he was struck, as others had been, by some development in the Marquis of Twickenham's character which he found himself unable to explain. And I realised, not for the first time, that there were, as was after all only inevitable, marked points of difference between the Two Dromios. His conduct was evidently actuated by reminiscences of what his lordship used to be, and he endeavoured to buoy himself up by the pleasant delusion that any alteration which might have taken place in an inconvenient direction could only be superficial after all.
'Look here, my lord. You bolted fifteen years ago because you'd got twenty-five thousand pounds out of me by forging your father's signature. And it seems that you've only come back now because you hope to beat me again by chucking this cock and bull story in my face. Don't you make any mistake. I'm going to have my money--with interest; proper interest, mind; and no silly nonsense--or I'll have you!'
So that was how I came to meet my double in San Francisco. He had made a little mistake with a pen. Well, his lordship might esteem himself lucky that at least that piece of business had fallen into my hands. I would do him a service right away.
'I have one remark to make, Mr. Fraser----'
'My name's Acrodato. Don't you call me out of my name!'
He positively shouted. I, also, can raise my voice. It was undignified, but I shouted back again.
'I say that I have one remark to make, Mr. Fraser!'
He gave a startled look round; he didn't seem to relish the notion that I might be audible on the other side of the square.
'Don't speak so loud.'
'I make it a rule to reply in the tone in which I am addressed; the pitch, therefore, depends on you. I was about to observe, when you interrupted me, that I have only one remark to make, Mr. Fraser, with reference to the matter on which you have touched. You have been completely misinformed with regard to the authenticity of the signature which is attached to the document in question.'
'Well! You always were a bit of a liar, but that takes the biscuit! Do you mean to say your father's name on that bill isn't a forgery?'
'I do.'
'When you ran for it because he said it was?'
'I had no wish to create a scandal by impugning my father's veracity.'
'You used to have a face before you went; but I never saw anything like the one you seem to have come back with. I don't want to be hard on you, although you treated me so bad. You've got the money now, and I'm willing to let bygones be bygones. Hand over my capital and decent interest and I'll say no more about it.'
'I don't intend to give you a penny.'
'What's that you say?'
'I intend to hang you--unless a spirit of mollycoddleism commutes the sentence to one of penal servitude for life. Look here, my lad. Lord or no lord, don't you take me for a fool. If you don't satisfy me inside five minutes I'll have a warrant for you in an hour.' I rang the bell.
'What's that for?'
A servant came.
'Fetch a constable at once.'
Mr. Acrodato seemed unhappy.
'Don't you--don't you be a fool!'
He turned to the man at the door.
'Don't you do anything of the kind.'
'You heard what I said?'
The servant was withdrawing when Mr. Acrodato became excited.
'Stop! Look here, my lord, don't you do anything in a hurry. You first of all listen to me!'
'See that some one is ready to fetch a constable the moment I ring; two of you remain within call.'
The man withdrew. Mr. Acrodato evidently did not relish my parting injunction.
'We don't want to have any confounded servants listening to what we have to say.'
'Corroboration, Mr. Fraser----'
'Don't call me out of my name.'
'Corroboration, Mr. Fraser, is sometimes useful--you will have to be quick if you wish to say anything before I ring the bell.'
'Look here. Of course I know you're only bluffing me, but I don't wish to make myself disagreeable. You give me those papers you've been talking about and my capital, and five per cent, interest, and you shall have the bill.'
'Mr. Fraser----'
'I wish you wouldn't call me by that name. What's the good of it?'
'I'll tell you what I might be persuaded to do. You give me that bill, and your word of honour that you will contradict any libellous stories you may hear reflecting on the genuineness of my father's signature, and so long as you refrain your own tongue from indiscretion I may keep still.'
'And I'm to lose my money?'
'And save your life.'
'Don't talk silly nonsense. I'm not going to let you rob me with my eyes open. Now I'll tell you what I'll do. You give me thirty thousand pounds.'
'Mr. Fraser, if you don't hand over that bill in sixty seconds I ring the bell. If I ring again, you pass into the hands of the police and the law must take its course.'
'Give you the bill? You don't suppose I've got it on me?'
I stood with my watch in hand. 'Fifteen seconds.'
'My lord, you've had my money--you can't deny you've had my money! And you've had it all these years! A great gentleman like you don't want to rob a man like me!
'Thirty seconds.'
'My lord, listen to reason! I'm a poor man! I really am! I've had the most frightful losses! I've had to do with a lot of thieves!'
'Forty-five seconds.'
'Have mercy, my lord, have mercy! Make it half the money! Say ten thousand! Call it five! You don't want to leave me without a penny, my lord!'
'Sixty seconds. What they call the Birmingham Mystery will now be solved.'
'My lord, don't ring that bell.'
He caught me by the arm.
'Remove your arm.'
'You shall have the bill.'
'Give it me.'
He began to fumble with a pocket-book. 'My lord, I do ask you to listen to reason! I'm sure you don't want----'
'If you say another word I ring.'
He handed me a slip of blue paper. It was a bill, dated some sixteen years back, promising to pay thirty thousand pounds three months after date. It was signed 'Sherrington.' An endorsement was scrawled across it--'Twickenham.' That endorsement was the little accident which had sent my double to San Francisco.
When I had gathered the purport of the document I looked at Mr. Acrodato. Murder was in his eyes.
'What are you going to give me for it?'
'Your life.'
'You cursed thief?'
I didn't like the words, nor the way in which he said them. There are occasions on which the devil enters into me. That was one.
I was a much smaller man than he, but I have physical strength altogether beyond what the average stranger suspects, and a curious mastery of what we will call certain tricks.
On a sudden I took him by the throat, beneath his beard, and with a twist which I have reason to know almost broke his neck, I jerked him back upon a chair. Driving his head against the back of it, I all but choked the life right out of him. It was only when I felt it slipping through my fingers that I thought it time to stop.
'Mr. Fraser, I'm afraid that one day I shall have to kill you. I've a mind to do it now; only it would be difficult to explain your corpse.'
I never saw a man cut a more ludicrous figure. The pain he had had to bear was no small thing. I shouldn't be surprised if for days his neck was conscious of the twist I had given it. But his amazement eclipsed his suffering. Not until that moment had he realised what a change had taken place in his lordship's character, and in his lordship's methods. For some seconds he gasped for breath--as was only natural. When he shambled to his feet he shrank from me like some panic-stricken, half-witted fool. While he was still staring at me, as if I had been some uncanny thing, the door opened and Mr. Smith came in.
'Surely it is Douglas Howarth! My dear Douglas, I am very glad to see you. This is Mr. Acrodato. He tells me that some injurious reports have been current with reference to a bill which my father backed at my request. Here is the bill. He has undertaken, in future, to give any such reports which may reach his ears the fullest contradiction. Mr. Acrodato, you may go.'
He went--and, I believe, was glad to go, even though he left both his bill and his money behind him.