Miracle Gold (Vol. 3 of 3)

ghts re

NTE

ATE STREET, LINC

GSTON-O

TEN

H

- New R

Leigh at

rong Smell

ora Asht

inding up

The Morni

igh confides

- The W

- The

Open Co

I.--

Doctor Shaw

Patient a

he Two

- Fug

-- Th

CLE

CLE

TER

RELA

ter Square from Grimsby Street that evening, the l

ight before. He wound up his note by telling her he was still, even after the night, so confused and hurried in his thoughts that he would make no comment on the discovery

s though the news into which they had just come was no more interesting than the ordinary surprises that awaken interest once a week in the quietest family. Beyond an embrace of more warmth and endurance than usual, th

n the place, and the shop in which her father formerly carried on his business in wool can still be pointed out, unaltered after a hundred and thirty years. There is Gracedieu itself, a small house in a garden, such as a man who had made money in trade in a country town would retire to. There is also the tradition that Grace, th

ces still live at

almost as incredible as the subject of my father's letter. No longer since than yesterd

" said Mrs. Hanbury. "Yeste

s," said the youn

, or not, all the circumstances of his going to Grimsby Street yesterday. He had no inclination to speak now of the quarrel or disagreem

across them? Wha

ong a tale to tell now. Indeed, it would take hours to

quick that we lose all sense of their importance. Tell me

a troubled voice. He was afraid she wa

become too excited or carried away,

r, I am not going to lose my head or knock myself up

resentatives

men too; though I should t

circumstances are all the drawback they

d, of course, no notion whatever that they were in any way related to us. I took no particular notice of them beyond observing that they were

the mother

said, a pe

why do you

t," he laughed lightly, and coloured imp

urls, and teaches the piano in that awful Grimsby Street. Neve

. It is not to say that there is a strong likeness, but, if you s

n, indeed, she must be not only

indistinguishable to the eye, an

t because of this extraordinary resemblance

uaintance. A man who knew us both, and whom I met yesterday by accident, was so struck by the similarity b

met some man there, and he carried you off. Upon my wor

The man who introduced me was at Ashton's, but

nk of doing now? You

n a great hurry any

e wishing to run aw

ished to avoid at any expense just now. There had been a statement that he had met the Graces, and no mention of Leigh. His mind had been in a wild whirl. He had in the first burst of his interview with his mother magnified to himself the unpleasant episodes of yesterday, as far as Leigh was concerned at all events. Now he was more a

if you don't take care. To judge from your father's letter to you he attached on practical importance to the secret it contained, to

e see. What can we talk about? Of course I can neither think n

why you think them not well off. That may have a practical u

ved and so on, and found out that Mrs. Grace who was making the inquiries was the very Mrs. Grace I had met yesterday. I told Coutch that I was the person he was looking for, that I represented the other branch of the Grace family, and that I was most anxious to befrie

hance there might be ever so remote a chance of tracing the other branch of the family with a view to finding out if by will or failure of that line some property might remain to those who bore the name of Grace, and were direct in the line of the wool-dealer of the eighteenth century. I then told him that I was not either exactly poor o

have will be yours legally one day, and in the mean time is yours with my whole heart and soul. Apart altogether from my desire to aid in this matter because these people are your people, it would, of course, be m

comparatively quiet state of mind, but as he drove in the hansom his imagination took fir

lone in the twilight. In a hasty way he described the interview between himself, Mrs.

, I think we had better ke

aving heard that the Hanburys were related to people called Grace, and I suppose if I did not hear it, no one among our friends did. I hope you cautioned Mrs. and Miss Gra

nd took my news very well. Good news or news of this kind tries people a g

le and well-bred, and good-

are all that,"

e only thing to consider John, is, will they g

t on with the most disag

le. At all events I'll do my best. Do you intend stayin

day. I am too restless to stay in the house and the club seems too trivial for an e

e is

n anything to-night. I'll just go for a stroll and think about n

ther and

his mind from hurrying by walking at a leisurely rate, and he tried to persuade himself he was thinking of nothing by employing his

h empire, but a king of an ancient and powerful state which stood powerful and stubborn in the heart of fierce, military, warlike Europe and held its own! Poniatowski was no doubt an elected king, but so were the others, and he was a Lithuanian nobleman before he became King. The kingdom over which he ruled exists no longer except in history, and even i

etensions. The family estates and honours had been vapourized before that last of the Poniatowskis fell under Napoleon. So my fath

best for him to think of nothing at all, but to watch the gas lamps and the

fe. Could Dora ever forgive him? It was more than doubtful. If she did, what assurance had he for the future? How would Dora take this discovery about the husband of Kate Grace in the eighteenth century? She would think little or nothing about it. She had no respect for hereditary honours or for old blood

because he had not yet done anything important, had no

little. He did not attach much importance to his old Lithuanian blood or the transient gleam of kingship which had s

mp is very convenient; it saves the trouble of assaying and weighing every piece of yellow metal we are offered as gold, and Burns himself, in his letters

f anyone had said there was a remote cousinship between the girls all who saw would say cous

see them together

them togethe

l,

the least jealous. But she could scarcely help wondering how he felt towards another

n which I take a great interest. I sometimes cross him and thwart him, but then he is my lover, and, though I despise rank, I am his social superior in England now anyway. How would it be with him

not care to enter. Or it might be she would not

rdly weakness and vacillation during the afternoon, and my unpardonable outburst after dinner, she may not

way from my though

ome to live with u

e of pity. There are good points in my character, but I must take care of them or they might deteriorate into baseness. I

particular. It was quite plain his reflection

ER XX

AT HIS

even heard of that weakness by that name. He was a burglar and a thief without any code at all, except that he would take anything he wished to take, and he would die for John Timmons. He did not look on dying as a very serious thing. He regarded imprisonment as a monstrous calamity, out of all proportion to any other. He would not go out of his way to kill a policeman, but if one sto

r quarrelled with any man, he never ill-treated his wife, he never cheated anyone. When drunk he was invariably amiable and good-natured, an

. You could do nothing whatever with him; he could rob and murder you. If he had all those policemen in that high-walled court he would not have inflicted any torture upon them. He would have shot them with his own hand merely to make sure the race was extirpated

police, and that this postponement of buying the gold from Timmons

even formulate the dwarfs death to himself. He had simply decided that Leigh mean

in a trap! Not he! Business was bu

ad particularly clear. He would lay aside his ordinary avocation until this affair was finished. The weather was warm, so he turned into a pub

? There could, of course, not be the least doubt that Timmons had been deceived, imposed upon in some way. But how was it done? Timmons knew the dwarf well, knew his figure, which could not easily be mistaken, and knew his voice also. They had met several times before Timmons even broached the gold difficu

and wouldn't lie. He had said the plan of getting rid of the gold was to be that Leigh was to pretend to make it and sell it openly or with very little secrecy. That was a goo

ome in his way of business. Leigh might know of or have invented something more sudden and powerful than chloroform and have asked Timmons to smell a bottle, or have waved

explanation. In fact it was the explanation and

b him of the gold he had with him, or call the police? That was a question of nicer difficulty and w

ith his tobacco and beer and

't up to anything. What was it Timmons hadn't? Why, papers, of course. Timmons hadn't any papers about Stamer or any of them, and the only thing Leigh would have against Timmons, if he gave him up then, would be the gold, out

ays with him, and that he was ever sniffing up the contents of the bottle? Might not he carry another bottle

man's clock? They said that when the clock was wound up by night the winding up _always_ took place in the half hour between midnight and half-past twelve, and furthermore that on no occasion but

lay. He would go to the Hanover and early enough to try some o

tamer's thinking, though no

Chetwynd Str

He is too clever for an honest, straightforward man like Timmons. It isn't right to have a man like that prying into things and disturbing things. It isn't right, and it isn't fair, and it must be stopped, and it shall be stopped soon, or my name isn't Tom S

o there when people were in the private bar, some time about the dinner hour would

as no one in this compartment. The potman served him. As a rule Williams himself attended to the private compartment, but he was at present seated on a chair in the middle of the bar, re

f to show he was quite at his ease, about to enjoy himself, and in no hurry. Then he took off his blue spectacles, and while he wiped

he top window opposite, working away with a file on someth

was watching him. He was unconscious that the file was in his hand, and that the part of the bar on which he was working gradually grew flatter and flatter beneath the fretting rancour of the file. He w

od. Now he had shaved it down flat, and the rod and the purpose for which it had been intended were forgotten. The brazen dust lay like a new-fallen Dan?e shower

thinking of go

blue glasses the man at the window above. He too was thinking of a metal, but not of the regal, the imperial

he dwarf's file like a thin, down-

orld. In my Miracle Gold there would be found an alloy of copper and silver. Yes, a sad and poisonous alloy. Copper is blood-red, and silver

ngation of life and transmutation of the baser metals into gold side by side in importance. And all the time the

o make gold while gold was being made all round them in prodigal profusion! They seared up their eyes with the flames of furnaces and the fumes

as fruit of the garden of the Hesperides. The world will applaud the man who has climbed the wall and rob

this gold for profit; but f

. From my Miracle Gold I want the fame of the miracle not the profit of the gold. But why should I labour

e and I must make the

be found in the cruci

uld invent a dangerous movement merely to set me going in ha

at is poured out of it. We are not rich by what we get, but

in the world for a little bread and wine or for the

en shower from

others for all who will stretch forth their hands and take it. It is ready made in the

e lips of lo

in the breast of a hunchback if it might seem

den sparks of brass. Then he worked his intricate way deftly through the body of the clock and locking the d

TER

SMELLIN

of the hot rum, in the order of a second glass, had almost melted the host into the benignity of conversation with the shabby-looking stranger. On the appearance of the dwarf, Williams rose bri

tment and directly opposite Stamer. "Even at the expense of getting more dust than I can manage well with, I thin

and then you could leave the window o

ould come through. But if I soaked the blind in oil, a non-drying oil, it would catch all the dust and insects. Dust is as bad for my clock as steel filings from a stone are for the lungs

ere, Binns, just put on your coat and r

d, got his instructions and money from the clock-maker and skipped off

Leigh as he was handed a glass of shandy-gaff, "but at

tay there long at night. No more

in bed. I often get up in the middle of the night persuaded something has gone wrong. I begin t

" he added, "give it up altogether if you find it too much for you?" If Leigh gave up his miserable clock, Leigh and Williams mig

n twenty-four hours." Then he added significantly. "The only man whom I wo

write," added Williams wi

rite," said the dwarf, nod

tle man with the secret of the strange winder of two nights ago. Then he added, by way of impressing on Leigh his complete trustwo

aw you. I no

here how wonderfully particular you were about time, and how your clock would go right to a fraction of a second. If I am not mistaken th

and I saw the gentleman at the windo

rkable thin

slowly and quite silently a round, shabby, brown hat stole upwards over the partition, followed by a dirty yellow-brown forehead, and last of all a pair of gleaming blue eyes that for a moment looked into the private bar, and then sil

rivate bar saw

ve a breath of air to-night when I am winding up. I am free till then. I think I'll go and loo

, and poured a few drops from it into his hand an

I needn't ask you, Williams. I know you never to

au-de-cologne

with eyes that blazed balefully behi

aid in a timid voice, holdi

arrested it a moment, and then let it fall in out of sight, saying sharply: "

ect on the dwarf, for as he explained, he was accustomed to it, but on a man who had never inhaled it before the effect wou

is stool and was standing within a few feet of him. "Well, I have no more in the flask. That was the last drop, but I have some in this." Out of his other waist

uld do no harm. There was plenty of help at hand, and nothing at

f, holding out the bottle towards

d put his nose over the bottle. With a yell he threw his arms w

unter and cried: "What's thi

r into the public bar, and rush

drew himself up once more and stared a

he replaced the stopper

he could stand strong salts. I gave h

ound, propped him against the wall and f

did not, considering his false beard and whiskers, care for any more of the potma

lowing a dense cloud of cigar-smoke from his mouth an

ounter inside the bar and staring at Leigh with frightened eyes that

like a man like him. You see, he was impudent and intruded himself on me when he had no right to do anything of the kind, and he insisted on smelling my strong salts. Well, he had his wish, and he came to grief, and he picked himself up, or rather Binns picked him up, and he never said anything but went away. He knew he was in

u know. He does look a bit down in the world, seems to me an undertaker's man ou

owever, you fancy the poor chap is out of work and he comes back

lliams, thawing thoroughly. He was a kind-hearted man, and did thi

and a person who knew of what had taken place in the private bar, and seeing him move slowly up Welbeck Place with his left shoulder to the wall and his eyes on the window of the workshop, would think

hugging himself with delight at the notion that he would not have to break Leigh's window. No, there would not be the least necessity for that. As the window was now no doubt it would be necessary to

which he had watched the winding up of the clock last night. His eyes, now wanting the blue spectacles, explored and e

looked with care unmingled with anxiety at the gable or rather second side of the Hanover. Then he passed slowly on. It might almost

found employment about the mews. These houses Stamer observed closely also, and then passed under the archway into the mews. Here he looked back on the gables

gables, Stamer pulled his hat over his eyes and struck out bri

inspection and left

sides, Timmons is not as strong a man as I. It is a wonder it did not kill him. I felt as if the roof of my skull was blown off. I felt inclined to draw and let him have an ounce. But then, although he may be playing into t

? It will take him the longest half-hour he ever spent in all his life! Th

ngs to men of even the most depraved character who have never "done time." He had arrived at his deadly intent not from feelings of revenge but from motives of prud

tall man with grizzled, mutton-chop whiskers and an exceedingly long, rusty neck. He wore a round-topped brown hat, and tweed clothes, a washed-out blue

ce the man about whom he was inquisitive. He had sent a boy for Stamer's wife and left her in charge of his marine store in Tunbridge Street, saying he was unexpectedly obliged to go to the Surrey Dock. He told her

nd that if Tom came back during her absence he would be furious, as she had left no word where she was to be found. To this Timmons replied shortly that he didn't suppose Stame

ce he began walking up and down

saw Leigh wind up the clock at the time Leigh was standing with me under the church tower. The landlord of that public-house says he saw him, and

aught after my years of care and caution by a mannikin like that, I'd slit his wizand for him. I did not like his way last night, and the more I think o

d out something more about last night. Well, a nice thing he did find out. What infernal stuff did the dwarf give Stamer to smell? It was a mercy it did not kill the man. If

mell in broad daylight, and in the presence of witnesses, would not stick at a trifle in the dark and when no one was by. Ye

affair? Will he cherish an

he will

Timmons thought, but they represen

new blind Binns, the potman, had bought for him. He had not intended returning that day, b

nd nailed it in position, raised the lower sash of the window about two feet from the sill. The muslin was double, and the two sheets were kept half an inch apart by two rod

e with this Miracle Gold. I am committed to nothing, and anything

treet, and wande

ver designed and executed by one man. It will be classed among the wonders

y great work will suffer. Sometimes I see those figure of time all modelled and fashioned and in their proper dispositions executing their assigned evolutions. At times I am in doubt a

its proper place and troubled me no more. Now, when I am away from my clock, when I cannot see a

tion enough for a score of hands and ten stout b

uberant chest and twisted trunk, and

journeyman, to put it as some one does, and

glanced around with scorn

a man's voi

ooke

shoulder. The horse's head was flung aloft. The horse sn

e middle of Piccadilly at Hyde Park Corner. He had

ad nearly touched him, took

r the horse's head," said the ge

tick to strike the

sharply away and muttered

ied a voice in terro

s mercy in Heaven!" he cried in a whisper,

o the side of her horse, and said in a hoarse whispe

on his hat, he hastened away through the crowd which had begu

infield as the dwarf disappeare

not. For a moment he terrified

s your

e human! There surely

TER

SHTON

d distressed by the peril of Oscar

where he was going. He would have got across us in good time if he had only kept on; but he pulled up suddenly right under my horse's nose. I am sure I was more frightened than he. By Jove! how he glared at me. I think he would have k

Mr. Ashton, had fallen behind and were als

still pale and trembling. "I don't suppose the poor

arching neck of his bay, "he was within

she said. Her eyes were fixed, and she was speaking as if unconscious she uttered her w

rt, I mean seriously h

but how could he be hurt. Particularly he! You fancy because he is

ured

that he endured pain. They mean that he was injured or disabled in some way. How can y

you do not mean to say you think it would be better he had been

ust be conditions of greater ease and hap

man yesterday and to-day, I am disposed to think he has self-esteem enough

how much of this sel

r it is assumed or not, so

pathetic and sound, I think you have not been taking your lessons regularly under Lady Forcar. She would be qu

deplore it, but she has taken to pigs. Anyway she would talk of nothing but pigs yesterday, at your mother's. And even the improve

ust feel sorely slighted. And w

going to write an article for one of the heavy, of the very heaviest, magazines, and she is going to call her article 'Dead Pigs and the Pigs that eat them,' a

hen it appears," said the girl with a laugh. "Ca

Mr. Leigh started the su

?" said Do

said he was a man who, in the hands of a clever wife, migh

roused anew over the spectacle of his spiritual desolation. He marry! How could he marry? And yet he had told them he had found the model for his Pallas-Athena. She was not so simple as to think the mere intellectual being was represented to him by the model for his Pallas

mother had taken the carriage before luncheon to pay a visit to some people in whom Dora was not interested. The girl had all the afternoon to herself, and she had plenty of thought to occupy it. She threw herself in a large

ugh and admire him greatly, and I daresay--no, let me be quite candid--I _know_ he likes me. I daresay

lectual sides of our characters. I thought I was wiser than other girls in not allowing my fancy to direct my fate. I thought he and I together

s good as my own. Last night was not the climax of what would be. It was only the f

admiration for one another, not loving o

t. No one has been formally told we are engaged, and no one has any business to know. If people have

ound materials for

Mr. Ha

g need be said about its being broken off. I hope this arrangement will be carried out with as little pain to either as possible. I shall not send you back your letters. I am sure getting back letters is always painful, and ought to be avoided. I shall burn yours, and I

que. I shall always think of you, with the greatest interest and respect. I should like, if you

make any attempt whatever to treat this de

very si

a As

e home early and not come back until she had to go straight to her room to dress. After dinner, they were g

emselves engaged to one another only acted with her decision and promptness what an infinity of misery would be avoided. She was almost surprised it had required so little effort for her to make up her mind and to put her decision on paper. She had often heard of the miseries such a step entailed, and here she was now sitting alone in her own ro

he affair had been disposed of in a

th

own, she was not inclined towards company of any kind. It had been arranged early yesterday that she should ride with her father in the Park to-day, and she had not cared to plead any excuse, for she did not want to attract attention to herself, and besides, she did not feel very much in nee

he had the afternoon to herself without any fear of inte

doing of nothing became harder than all that had gone before. She had told herself she was a person of convictions and principles when she was resolving on action and acting on resolve. She had no further need of her convictions and principles. She laid them aside with the writing material

the penetralia of her heart? How did she face the inner chambers of her soul where the statue of her hero stood enshrined for worsh

all had been done, was ten th

hat has the reason to do with the glance of an eye, or the touch of a

weaknesses, and they were little, and only weaknesses after all, and only weaknesses in a giant, not the weaknesses of a man of common clay. If she had loved m

should he not turn upon her and revile her for coming across his path? Who was she that she must irritate him

ubt, but who had set her

aught

the man, and she had tried to make him divine. Not because he was _her_ lover, but because she _loved him_. S

l other sorrows that take large shape, the heroic aspe

l saw other

he always came to Curzon Street on Saturday afternoon, like any other good young man, to see his sweetheart when the shop was shut. She should miss him on Sunday, too, for he always came on Sunday, saying, the better the day the better the deed. On Mondays he ma

sic designed to accompany his words had fined off into silence for shame of its inadequacy. How poor and thin and harsh all voices would sound now. They would merely make idle sounds to the idle air. Of old, of

oy, or laughter. She should miss the gleam of that strange light which, once having caught his eye in moments of enthusiasm, appea

rd--hard to be doom

what she should miss i

in some worthy strife, and coming back in the evening suffused with glory, to draw breaths of peaceful ease in her society, in her home, her new home, their joint home. She had thoug

decay, and going down the hill of life hand in hand togethe

should miss him to-day and to-morrow and all the days of th

not lie by his side in the grave. She s

s. The smell of the flowers in the window-sill was thin and foretold decay. What was the use

e grave--even in the grave where he c

in life if she might count on touching his

TER

UP THE

ng-stick of great thickness and weight. It was not a loaded stick, but it would manifestly be a terrible weapon at close quarters, for, instead of consisting of metal only in one part of one end, it was composed of metal throughout. The seeming stick was not wood or leaded wood, but iron It was not solid, but hollow like a gas pipe

m the ground and laid aside his limp. But where people were few and close observation of him possible, his lameness grew very marked, and not only did his stick seem indispensable, but he put it down on the pavement as gingerly

lling. Stamer touched his hat, thanked the old gentleman for his kindness and his gift, and requested Heaven to bless him. The old gentleman wore a heavy gold chain and, no doubt, a watch. But Stamer had impo

road. He had shillings of his own, and didn't want charity of any man. If he had stolen the shilling that would have been a different affair. Then it would have come to him in a straightforward business-like way, and would, doubtless, be the best he could have done under the circumstances. But now it

come that afternoon after leaving the Hanover. On his previous visit to-day to this locality he had been silent and watchful as a cat, and he had a cat's strong sense of locality. He never forgot a place he was once in; and,

solutely deserted. They were a cabman's mews and no one would, in all likelihood, have business there for a couple of hours. The nig

ch formed one half of the northern boundary of the yard, he paused and listened. He could h

o be aroused in case of any man returning because of accident, or a horse knocked up by some long and unexpected

hed the crook of his heavy stick to a belt he wore under his waistcoat, he laid hold of the waterpipe that descended from

awled in a few yards from the edge and then reclined against the sloping slates of the roof to rest. The ascen

for a while with the weapon he carried. Overhead the stars looked pale and faint and wasting in the pall of pale yellow c

Welbeck Place was no more from house to house than fifty feet. The distance from the wall of the house he should be on then, and the wall of Forbes's bakery could not be more than sixty feet. The weapon he carried was perfectly trustworthy at a hundred, a hundred-and-fifty yards, or more. He had been practising that afternoon and evening at an old hat at forty yards, and he had never missed it once. Forty yards was just double the distance he should be from that window if he were on a parapet instead of being at the

he better, for it made no difference to the aim or bullet, and it would preven

for then there would be the less time for anyone in the Hanover to spy out anything wrong, At half-past would come the

ne was likely to be upstairs in the public-house until after closing time

good job when

ast twelve, for then everything would be more favourable

ountry there were some things st

house. Three or four of the men present were old frequenters, but it lacked the elevating presence of Oscar Leigh, who always gave the assembly a

ding their time profitably attending to the improvement of their minds. They had no views on any subjects ever discussed. They had, with reference to the Hanover, only one opinion, and it was that the finishing touches of a liberal education could nowhere else in London be so freely o

, for first Mr. Jacobs came in, smiling and bland, and then Mr.

substance, and then, knowing no one else by name, greeted the remainder

he sat down on a seat that ran along the wall, took out of his pocket a cigar-case, opened it carefully, and, having selected a cigar, examined the weed as though it was not uncommon to discover protruding through the side of these particular cigars a dia

and a tall, thin man, with enormous ears, wearing long mutton-chop whiskers, a brown

h. "Ten minutes to twelve by your clock, Mr. Williams, that means

and referring to his clock. "We always keep our clock a few minutes fast to avo

ocer, as though he hadn't the least n

hat is an excellent c

though he was now pretty certain this particular one did not exude either priceless diamonds or deadly drugs, and said with great modesty and sa

n, but by the case! If a man bought cigars by the case from a friend in Bond Street at the rate of sixpence each, what would be the retail price of them across the counter? It was impossible to say exactly and dangerous to

Sloane Street, with the intention of sharing his conversation fairly between t

orking at it now. But I am daily engaged upon it, and be

to wind it

d between twelve and one, and I have made it a rule to wind it in the first half hour. My one does not want nearly so much power as St. Paul's. It is wound by a lever

d, the most wonderf

rlds sir. It is the most wonderf

forgot to wind it u

no fear

great care o

that I may be able to keep the window open

of fire up there and

is little or no danger of fire

to happen, it is so high up

mes through the wall, from the chimney. When it is shifted no one will be able to stir bolt or nut but me. _I_ must do it, sir. No other man living knows anything about it. No other man cou

quickly out of the bar. It was now fiv

e private door of Forbes's in Chetwynd S

until he came opposite the window of the clock-room. Here he stood still, thrust his hands deep down in his trou

lly grew illumined until the light came full through the transparent oiled muslin

e. He was walking away from this place with me at this hour last night as sure as I am here now. But what did he say himself to-day? I should

ain! I must be going mad. I begin to think last night must have been all a dream with me. I don't think he's all right. I don't believe in witchcraft, but I do believe in devilry, a

r--w

's that o

ked up, but

young fello

back at t

goes the gas out. I suppose the clock is wound up now. Well, it's more than I can understand and a great deal more than I like,

nd yet Leigh's light is out. I suppose his half ho

t. He must have put it out by mistake or accident

hing. No, my eyes deceive me. There is no light.

the half-ho

out of Welbeck Place, an

TER

RNING

u employ your brain and your hands it will very soon be all over with you. Still, he held that the appearance of indulgence or luxury was most unbecoming in any place of business, and particularly in a marine store, where transactions were concerned with so stern and stubborn things as junk and old metal. He dealt in junk, but out of regard for the feelings of gent

on a chair in a marine store as a token of dangerous softening of manners. If a man al

and uncomfortableness, and besides, it gave the solvent air of a counting house to the place. It had also another adv

spread out before him on his knees. Sometimes articles in which he dealt were offered for sale in that sheet, and once in a way he bought a paper to have a look at this sheet, and afterwards, if he had time, scan the news. He made it a point never to look at the reports of the police courts or criminal trials. Every man has

out of the advertising sheet. None of the articles offered at a sacrifice was at all in his way. When he had finished t

for the twentieth time o

education nor the insolence to call his brains intellect. But he was very proud of his brains, and his brains were completely at a loss. As with all undisciplined minds,

t all. There was a great deal about this scheme he did not unders

e company under the seal of secrecy that Leigh on one occasion entrusted the winding up of the clock to a deputy who was deaf and dumb, and not able to write. That, no doubt, was the person they had seen in the clock-room the evening before, and not the dwarf. Leigh had not taken him into confidence respecting this clock, or this man who wound it up for him in his absence, but Leigh had taken

ed more than doubtful. His talk about telegraphing and all that was only bunkum. The whole

any more of the matter for a week or so. He s

this time with a view t

ever. Then came the law courts which he shunned. Finally he came upon the place where local London news was given. His eye caught a large heading, "Fire An

floor of the establishment is used as a baker's shop and the floor above as a store house by Mr. Forbes. The top floor, where the fire originated was occupied by Mr. Oscar Leigh, who has lost his life in the burning. The top floor is divided into three rooms, a sitting-roo

tleman excused himself, saying he hadn't a minute to spare, as the clock required his immediate attention. After this, deceased was seen by several people working the winding lever of the clock in the window. At half-past twelve he was observed to make some unusual motions of his head, so as to give the notion that he was in pain or distress of some

rapidly, and before an hour had elapsed the w

hopman and his wife. This bakehouse also took fire and is burned out, but fortunately the two occ

t of a fit or sudden seizure of some other kind, and that in his struggles some in

er with a shout, crying "D

old of the store, and Stamer, with a scowl and a stare, s

are you shoutin' about?" he said again, as he passed Timmons and slunk behind th

tement, and taking no notice of Stamer

street. His voice was hollow, his eyes bloodshot and starting out of his head. Notwithstanding the warmth of the morning, his teeth were chattering in his head. His bloodshot eyes

ht to see this lank, grizzled, repulsive-looking man capering around the store, and exulting in the news he had just read, of a man on whom he had fawned a day befo

your noise and antics. Do you want to have the coppers down on us?--do you, you fool?" He fl

that they attracted his attention at last. "What's the matter?" he asked,

you're shouting and capering as if you wanted to tell the whole w

immons, catching up an iron bar and t

it at once, and if you have any regard for your health, for your life,

ief? Have they just let you out of Bedlam, or are you on your way there? Anyway, it's luc

o you no harm. I don't w

ol mean? I tell y

d him? If you can't, _I_ c

ing back, and not quite unde

you knew or guessed. Curse me, but I am a fool for opening my mouth! I thought you knew,

ed, bending his head forward and beginning to tremble in

the clothes of last night, but was without the whiskers or beard. All the time h

and leaned his back against it, and

a word to me. Call me a fool, or anything you like, but don't stand there staring at me like that. If 'twas you that did it, you couldn't be more scared. Say a word to me, or I'll blow my brains out! I haven't been home. I am afraid to go home. I am not used to this--yet. I thought I had

rched and open. The sweat was rolling down off his forehead. He was trembling no longer. He w

eak to me, only not too loud. No one can hear us. I know that, and no one can listen at the door, without our seeing him. You don't know what I have gone thro

derous v

I am more afraid of my wife than of anyone else. I don't know why, but

han

w all. When you do,

r foolis

raid he'd betr

vil

when he was working at the lever, I fired, and

, you mu

he neck! Yes, I knew the neck w

at I should liv

, and it was in one way. For he

stop it, I'l

s running I heard him running after me. I heard him running after me, and I saw his head

on't stop

d his lame feet kept running after me, and I couldn't stop the feet or the head. I don't know how long I ran, or where I ran, but I

a moment to wip

the air. "Do you hear? Will you believe me now? The steps

ad

ool! I told

d dwarf came into the opening and

tamer fell for

ER XX

NFIDES I

y from the wall fled to the extreme end of the

I am disposed to think that, though the idea is original, the frequent practice of such scenes would not tend to increase the confidence of the public in the disabled anchors, or shower-baths, or invalid coffee-mills, or chain shot, or rusty fire-grates, it is your privilege to offer to the consideration of customers. Hah! I may be w

he shock had, for the moment, co

. I should like to have a few moments' conversation with you, if your friend and very able suppo

ords of the hunchback, although uttered in jest, had a

providing board and lodging and raiment for his wife and little ones. But, Mr. Timmons, in all conscience, don't you think you ought to put an end to this farce? When I came in I judged by his falling down and some inco

ate man di

rt and tried to move forward, but had to put

nd touched him with his s

mons. What do you mean by running away to the other end of the place?

aggered forward. Leigh bent over Stamer, b

s faculties. "He has only fainted," said

wn the street. There the two parted without a word. By the time Timmons got back he was comparatively composed. He felt heavy and d

d Leigh impatiently

ar

gain the man I had been in treaty with. I not only saw him but heard a great deal about him, and I am sorry to say I heard nothing good. He is, it appears, a very poor man, and he deliberately mi

e tryst. He had not at this moment any interest in the mere business about which they had been negotiati

th it, and I feel bound to say that after this disappointment in Birmingham, I feel great

do

ing." He sniffed up noisily some he had poured into the palm of on

I suppose we are

cise

Leigh, is that you do not see

t I do not see my way

ger any need for caution with this goblin, or man, or devil, or magician. If Leigh had

sterday. May I ask you by

y in the a

me back thi

I drove straight h

day until now. You were out of London yester

suspect me of saying anything that is not strictly true?" said Leigh, th

ou of saying anything th

Leigh's attention. He drew himself up ha

frowning heavily, "not that I suspect you of lying, but that I am sur

own and said nothing. He could not tell

r rum hot, and you went away at close to twelve o'clock to wind up your clock. I went out then and saw you at the windo

start, it was so weird and unexpected. Then the dwarf cried, "Why you,

deaf and dumb man, who can't write, and is as

tion or not. Anyway, I'll give you this much of an explanation. I have two deputies. One

Timmons thought, "Stamer when he fired must have missed Leigh, and Leigh must have gone away, after, for some purpose of his own, setting fire to the place. He is going on just as if the place had not been burned down last night, why, I am sure I d

evidently he was for a moment at a nonplus. Suddenly he looked up, and with

y yesterday. I was at the Hanover last night just before twelve, and I did go into Forbes's bakery as you say. But I swear to you I left London last night by the twelve-fifteen, and I swear to you I di

," said Timmo

powers, both in my art and among men, are great and exceptional. Wh

dev

ty, but his name procured for me, my dear Mr. Timmons, all the information I desired. I was able to learn all I needed, and catch the first train back to town. You see now how faithfully I h

tain, the curtain was oiled, and I could see as if there was no curtain, and the gas was up and shining on you--I say _at fifteen minutes after twe

ick to wh

immons contemptuously. "You

that does not affect the substance of my explanation about Birmingham. I told yo

m early in the interview, but now he was in no fear. If this man intended to betray

ay? Through the front-door in Chetwynd Street

ugh the door of the ba

might account for Stam

it, Mr. Leigh--I saw you do it, sir,

enjoyed the privilege of Mr. Williams's acquaintance should know. But of my second deputy I never spoke to a soul until now, until I told you this moment. The other deputy is a man extremely like me from the waist up. He is ill-formed as I am, and so like me w

account for this man, whom Stamer said he had shot, being here now, uninjured. This would make the later version of the tale about Birmingham possib

te deputy's name?" he

will n

quest, to-day or to-morrow, or

?" asked Leigh,

n the paper it was you that

voice which shook the unceiled joists above their

Forbes's bakery was burnt out last night, and

TER

WRON

ly the strength to walk away, and he certainly had not the desire to go. He had borne two extreme phases of terror within the last twenty-four hour

his midnight depredations, but he had not, until he formed the resolve of putting Leigh away, c

mons. Both articles were concerned, inextricably bound up, in Leigh's life. He saw in the dwarf the agent, the ally of the police--the police, absolutely, in a more malignant form than the stalwart detective who, with handcuffs in his pockets, runs a man down. This Leigh was a traitor and a policeman together. It seemed as though it would be impossible for

n the silent shot was sped and the air-gun disposed of by being carefully hung down the inside of a chimney and hooked to a copper-wire tie of the slat

hould never because of any compunction be sorry for his act. No sooner was he at the bottom of the water-pipe than he found he had no longer any control over his thoughts, or more correctly that the thoughts in his mind did not belong to him at all, but were, as

d yet to learn that the blow of the murderer endows the victim with inextinguishable vitality. He had yet to learn that all things which live die to the mind of a murderer except the man who is dead. He had yet to learn that in the mind of a murderer there is a gradually filling in and crowding together of the images of the undamned dead that in the end blind and block up the whole soul in stifling intimacies with the dead, until the murderer in his despa

eck growing thinner and thinner as the neck descended into the collar. He could see the wrinkles about the eyes, and a peculiar backward motion of the lips before the dwarf spoke. He could see the forehead wrinkled upward in indulgent scorn, or the eyes flashing with insolent self-esteem. He could see. He could see the swift, sharp up-tilt of the chin when a deep respiration became necessary. There was nothing about the dwarf that he could not see, that he did not see, that he c

dwarf. But what signified footsteps behind him, or the ordinary ghost one heard of, which could not take shape in day-light, or linger after cockcrow, compared with this internal spirit of the

arf go by, it was with a feeling of relief. This was the vulgar ghost of which he had heard so much, but which he had always hel

upon his smarting sight, and after that long night, which was a repetition of the first f

Stamer w

to be that the dwarf was about that morning, seemingly uninjured. As Leigh was not dead, or hurt, he had nothing to fear at present. He would rest somewhere

reath, in the direction of London Road. Stamer kept his eyes on the little man until he saw him hail a c

chambers of his spirit had been exorcised, by th

n when he had got behind the shutters. This time he did not stand up with his back against the wall; he sat down on th

Timmons. "Worse job,

Mr. Leigh here, than to know he was lying on the floor under the win

k; and as sure as you're alive, Tom Stamer, you'll get it,

ng could satisfy Timmons this morning. First he was furious because he h

he might be able to go to Birmingham and places on _our_ business, and seem to be in London and at his own place, if it became necessary to prove he had not been in Birmingham, if it became necessary to prove an alibi. And you, you blundering-headed fool, go and shoot the very man Leigh had hired to help our business! You're a useful pal, you are! You're a good working mate, you are! Are you proud of yourself? Eh? You not only put your head into the halter of your own free will, and out of the cleverness of your own brains, but you round o

not hear and understand, but in orde

er the principa

listened q

coolly enou

It was an

immons, drawing up in front of Stam

ns? Of course, it was an accident. Why

you

_ prove _I_ rounded on a pal. I can g

esses they

rs _know_ I'm

t's someone from Portland would give you a

at was flying across the street. You don't suppose, my lo

"But the man is dead,

down, and am ready to lay it down now or any time it may please your lordship--unless Mr. T

ugh half-closed critical eyes at Stamer

n for a friend in

amer, yo

hed Timmons. "You'll shake

and. "And now," he added, "I don

ha

akery was burned

lord, you haven't a single bit of evidence against Tom Stamer. My

TER

RU

d. Mrs. Grace was there first. Edith had been too excited when she went to bed after the young man's disclosures to sleep,

aden hopelessness she had never known before. Now all was changed. Then she was the last of a race of shopkeepers; now she had for cousin a man whose ancestor had been a king. Whatever fate might do against her in the future, it could neve

not an account of the disaster at Chelsea, because of the late hour at which it occurred. Mrs. Grace's paper was one that did not get the news in time for inserti

the Poles." Without a word or comment she handed the paper to

ing, flushed, and then r

er whose reign the death-struggle of the Polish nation began, and its last hero, Prince Joseph Poniatowski, who fell as one of Napoleon's generals when bravely attempting to cover the retreat of the French at the battle of Leipzig. The Tzar Alexander, with a generosity which did him credit, allowed

only the younger branch of Mr. Hanbury's family. It is all more lik

merely said it was wonderful, and that Mr. Han

d not know much of the family. I must cut

pressed a vague hope that they might be better friends. Edith knew no practical importance was to be attached to this man's parentage, as far as honours went; but still it could not be that he would move about as freely

s position. Would his mother make up in stateliness what he left aside? She would drive up between three and five with powdered footmen. The arrival of the carriage, and the footmen, and Mrs. Hanbury, mother

houghts. They had nothing to do that day, for Edith had made up her mind to do nothing about a n

finished. As the little clock on the mantelpiece struck the hour the landlady's

. Whom co

Han

e at the door, and a tall, stately lady, with white hair and dressed in

ted her to ente

y visit this morning is as inconveniently early as his last night was late. But the discovery of the relationship between us is so extraordinary, and so pleasant to me, that I could not deny myself the happiness of calling at the very earl

der of the table, they should have no reason to feel anythi

you as a favour to make allowances for these infirmities. I have made up my mind that the best thing for us to do is to hold a little family council, and I have grown so used to my own room I never can feel equal to discussing family matters anywhe

or Chester Square. "And now," said Mrs. Hanbury, as they walked along, "that I have tasted the delights of conquest, I mean to turn from a mild and seemingly reasonable suppli

emurs were more ve

capacity of tyrant, I decline to argue

most particularly engaged, and could see no one. On enquiring for her son, she heard with surpri

What ought he to do in the matter? Had he not acted badly to her in not wr

the contents of it drove all other matters into the background, and made it seem that they could easily wait. Now he had been to Derbyshire, and knew all that was to be learned at Castleton, and ha

owardice the other day, and he fully deserved her reproach. That is, he fully deserved the reproach of an impartial and passionless judge. But was the attitude of an impartial and passionless judge exactly the one a man expected from his sweetheart? Surely the w

arded her as a future wife more than a present sweetheart. He had felt that she would be a credit and an ornament to him and that they should get on well together. He had never for an hour been carrie

had not moved him to adopt that unfamiliar form of expression. He had nothing in his mind about her that he could not express in prose. This alone was a sus

the woman he wants to marry, isn't in love at all. There may be fifty words describing beautifully the excellence of his intentions towards the young woman, but love

the servant brought the letters to his door. He recognis

hed he folded it up deliberately and put it back into the envelope. H

ways right. She would always be right, and I when I differed from her always

went. When he roused himself he learned that his mother had gone out. He did not want to meet her now. He did not want t

Now he thought of her with anger, now with affection, now with sorrow. He had no thought of t

d they were by-and-by to be good frien

ey had gone to, the balls, and theatres, and galleries and meetings they had been at with one another. He thought of the last walk they took, the wa

ome this way, she leaning on his arm. What a wonderf

been a crowd too. Was there always a crowd here? By Jove! there had been a fire. And, by Jove! t

utted, standing a mere shell, with its bare, roofless walls open to the light of Heaven. All

ruins. "First that unfortunate nigger meets with an accident t

g. Presently the cry of dismay changed to a cheer, and the crowd at the corner of the Hanover swayed and ope

a view of the bakery. When he reached Hanbury's side, he stopped, looked up,

drew back

e, wheels and pulleys, and levers, and shafts, and chains, and drums, and bands. Even the very frame itself, with its four stro

of seven years. The result of

allen but that Hanbury cau

arf was led into the private bar in which his learning an

s set upon it with his back to the window, so that h

eft! The work of seven years day and night!

lliams, in a low and very kindly voice,

it be worse? There

It was said in some of the papers and we

f I was? I

It is not right to say that. You ou

? I! Who should be grateful th

ried out with fear first, for they thought you were a ghost, and didn't you

this whole world. It was the savings bank of my heart,

ou have plenty of money still," said Williams i

ood is money to me more than to get me food and drink for my body? and what a body! Who will feed my soul? What will feed my soul? How am I who am

p after you left this, and you nodded to us as usual, wh

minded nothing but my clock it would be

you escape,

ime to the young man. "Whatever way you are going I should like to go, if you wou

" said Hanbury, who was sincerely moved at

or would you pr

Ay, I have lost my crutch, my stick, my pro

ry glad to be o

anbury, Oscar Leigh limped out o

TER

CONFE

ined the open air n

d Hanbury, "I'll fetch a cab. I can

. I could not bear to stay near this place any longer. Is it not strange that you shoul

d." The manner of Leigh had changed in a marked manner since they emerged from the door of the Hanover. His steps had b

get along quicker. I have had a great shock

. I assure you I have a

do in this world again. Sir, this slow p

e your clock must have been a ter

hat the clock

clock is past repair, but

going away shorn of the growth of all my labours. Men of my make are never long-lived. When they meet a great shock and a great loss such as this they die. There is a hansom, but don't call

ite a young man

ill fight. He must either play the part of the subtle beast, or go under, and a man who cannot ever stand up and fight for hi

another great clock,

about to regain his old insolent combativeness. "

hingly. He was beginning not only to take an interes

pt me from falling. I want you to be my friend. I have no friend on earth excepting my poor mother, who is more helpless than I myself. I know what I am asking when I say I want you for my friend. I would not ask you to be my friend the day before yesterday. I wo

hing I can for you. Please let

I have found a friend. I would much rather have my clock, ten thousand times rather have my clock, than you, but then I knew it so long and so

l bitterly the loss of

rs of my mind. Well, while I had the clock, I had a friend in which I could confide. The clock is gone past recall. My mother cannot,

nk you

nothing more than conversational fripperies, and had been laid aside with the spirit of aggression. The manner of aggression still prevailed in the form of thought and manner of expression. "You will be astonished to hear that I was attracted towards

shall treat as a secret of my own--as a secret i

devising things that are not. I lied because I had imagination. I lied because I had vanity. I lied because people are such fools. How could a man tell the truth to a creature like Williams, the owner of that public-house? The creature could not appreciate it. Besides, lying is so amusing,

apologies. You said what you s

. Did you not see I had a contempt for you?

nk you made

. I am very glad you saw I had a great contempt for you. This is my death-bed confes

te candid no

in its unspoken mind. What I said about

essed

Miracle Gold was

new

tive any more than _prove_ it, except by the evidence of your

not get into

making it was a lie. I was about to enter into a league with thieves to take stolen gold,

gerous kind

ough not in its applicati

get into a discussion on mora

ock was independent of my hands for winding up. You heard Williams, the publican, s

said he

nderstand how necessar

y confess

nged to connect all the movements, which had hitherto been more or less independent, awaiting removal to a tower. I said I was going to get all my power from one force, weights in the chimney. Hitherto I had said I used springs and weights. I said this change would involve half-an-hour's continual winding every night, with a brief break of a few seconds in the middle of the half hour. The clock was to be wound up by a lever fixed near the window, at which I sat when at work, the only window in the room. Night after night I worked at this lever for half-an-hour, turning round exactly at a quarter-past twelve t

learly. But

place in which I sat in my chair, turned up the gas, which had been dimmed to the last glimmer that would live, and then released the weight in the chimney and set the figure moving as if working the lever, instead of the lever working it. Thus you see

genious

that is to say Wednesday night, I tried my f

ct of this figure? Why had y

ar, but I changed my mind. I went to the country instead, and imparted as a secret to the landlord that I was to have a deputy that night, and that he was to keep an eye on him and see he did not shirk his work. I knew Williams could no more keep a secret of that kind than fly. I did not want him to keep it.

ng to his strange tale, had prevented him recollecting the connection between Edith Grace and Lei

ent, and gave the word for the first lot of the gold to be delivered at my place at midnight exactly. You know how my afternoon was spent. While at Mrs. Ashton's, my better judgment and my

as-At

did not go upstairs. I went through the house and out into the mews at the back. I was supplied by the landlord with keys for the doors into Chetwynd Street and Welbeck Place, but had not one for the bakehouse door into the mews until I got one made unknown to anyone. Thus the landlord and the people all round to whom I spoke freely would never dream of my going through into the mews. It was my intention they should have a distinct impression I could not do it. Thus I had the use, as it were, of

I saw y

es

hav

sterday a

N

ed. "I am done," he said. "I can go

right again. Here is a ca

ll not desert me, Mr. Hanbury. I have only listened to the voice of the tempter. I have not gone the tempter's ways, and mind, I was not tempted by the love of lucre. If I had had a voice, and stature, and figure like yours I might have been able to win fame in the big and open world, as I was I could win it only in the world that is little and

st. I am quite willing to go with you. Where shall I tell the man to drive

address, and th

ge man shrink from contact with the dwarf. But then Hanbury remembered that the secret had been divulged by the clock-maker in a moment of extreme excitement, and after what to him must have been an enormous c

ion of trading in stolen goods was a thing most people would shun. But, then, were most people right? This man had claimed his good offices, first, because Hanbury was in his power, and now Leigh claimed his good offices, because he was in great affliction and prostration. Certainly Han

his motive for keeping with him was not wholly pure. How many mo

troduce the subject of the Graces, and, for

"You have not seen

shall I e

ot quarrelled wi

am going home, that this is a funeral; my home is not in Grims

12, Barnes Street, Chel

marry a wife, and that I should like to marry her. She was to go to my mother on Wednesday. I was to test my automaton on Wednesday night. I ran down to my mother's place, and was at Eltham when Miss Grace arrived. My appearance there, after saying she should see me little, must have frightened her. I have often heard children call me bogie. At all events, she came back to Town next day. Ran away, is the truth. Ran away from the sight of me, of bogie. If she had staid with my mother, I should have had something to think of besides Miracle Gold. It was upon seeing her and arranging that she was to go to Eltham, that my interest in Miracle Gold began to diminish, and I grew to think that my clock alone would suffice for my fame, and that I might marry and leave London, a

ed I

ow? To-morrow

-morrow. I shall come

ainst the area-railings for support. His breathing was terrible,

erhaps you may

id not want to make h

not," he said.

r your goodness. You know w

es

ho

thena, of

cour

ER XX

R

morning. The burning down of Leigh's place and the destruction of the wonderful clock, and the meeting with the unfortunate clockmaker, would afford a story to be told when

ith bringing about the understanding between the two of them. They had been quite as free in their choice of one another as though they had been the heroine and hero of a pastoral. He had never been a fool about Dora and she had never been a fool about him. In his life he meant to be no cypher among men; it would never do for him to be a cypher in his own home. Dora and he had acted with great reasonableness t

ing-room with Mrs. Hanbury. The presence of the two visitors and the general nature of the conversation necessary to

and Miss Grace away from that awful Grimsby Street. We have had a good long chat, and, although I have done my best with Mrs. Grace, I can

quite firm. Back they must and would go. Why, if no other consideration would be allowed to wei

meeting that morning with the dwarf, and the conviction of the latter that he would not long survive the de

apprehend accurately. She had hesitated in her answers like one afraid. The table was small, and laid

lk of Leigh had carried her mind back to the country, back to Millway and Eltham House, and to the unexpec

he familiar streets, and the sustaining companionship of her old grandmother, who had been all the world to her. She heard this story chanted, intoned in this low, monotonous voice, an

under trees heavy with leaves, alone on a lonely road by night. The rain fell unseen through the mute warm air. A thick perfume of roses made the air h

ashing of water. It was not the voice, for the voice had cease

hastily put one hand to her left side, and the other

hispered, but co

she would have fallen

old woman excitedly. "She

rble, in the young man's arms. Her eye

as stood at hand were applied, but she did not quite recover

ever seen her in any such state before. To

en he came back, the girl had been got upstairs. She was still

patient's life was in no imminent peril. She had simply been overwrought and weakened by want of food, and jarred by suppressed and contending emotions. There was no organic disease, but the heart had been functionally affected

moved? Mrs.

termination, but it would most assuredly enhance h

she re

t of going to that uncongenial home, and the long walk the morning she left, and the lack of food had weakened her

passed would she b

likelihood under Heav

n her life? No weak place?

e quite as well as if this had never happened. The key to her recovery lay in the one word, Quiet. Af

prescription and h

pon her here. How would it have fared with her down in that lonely Eltham

matter, because the street was detestable, and to be ill in lodgings must be much worse than to be ill in a public hospital, for in hospital there was every appliance and

picture such things. And fancy, if these poor ladies had not enough money for a good doctor and what the poor weak child wanted! Fancy if they could not pay their rent and were obliged t

he druggist he reverte

not disgraceful from his point of view. If I had met him under happy circumstances, I might have brought him to a Thursday at Curzon Street. He was interesting, with his alchemy and clock and omniscience and insolence and intellectual swagger. Of course, I did not at the time know he was in treaty with a fence. Ac

I have behaved badly in not doing so before. I'll write the moment I get home. Yes, I must wri

g than at first. That was the only change he noticed in the effect of the letter upon him. It was as cool and business-like and complete as could be. He was too much of a gentleman to give expression in his mind to any fault-findin

fore him, but it must be done. Whe

r Miss

. I feel most bitterly that no apology of mine can obliterate the impression my insanity must have made on you. To say I am profoundly sorry is only to say that I am once more in my right mind. I must in the most complete and abject manner beg your pardon for my shameful violence on Thursday evening. I must not even try to explain that violence away. I ask your pard

very justly say, the least said now the better. I shall say not a word to anyone about the immediate subject of this letter except to my mother. On that you may rely. I must tell her. You, I suppose, will inform Mrs. and Mr. Ashton (if they do not know of it); nobody else need hear of the abandonment of our designs. Let us by all me

e may meet again, but not j

er most s

Hanb

d tries to alter, and finally tears up. I am satisfied that if I tried all day long I should do no better than this. I shall post it myself when I go out. T

om. Mrs. Grace was with Edith in a room

We are not to expect much change for a while. She has quite recovered consciousness, but is very weak, and the doctor says s

ink you must have seen that I have been a

oo. That letter must have

you know about that letter? Who told you? Have you se

You make me very uneasy. What has Dora Ashton to do with it? Miss Grace may,

etter. Upon reflection I quite agree with you and my father in attaching little

moment she thought her son's head had been turned by

apidly now. "Well, the fact

ff

es

do you

. The fact is we had a scene on Thursday evening. I lost comm

ed the mother

I was carried quite beyond myself and said things

ra Ashton that no man ought to say to any girl! Impossible! Thank God, I know my son better than to believe

y too true. I need not repeat w

could she dispute with you? Dispute with you! It is nonsense. Why the

used an unha

eaningless word

etely lost my temper and told her in the end that i

. You never said such a childishly cruel thing to Dora Ashton?

mad,

wicked

folly and madness. She has broken off the engagement, for we were engaged, and I have written saying I cannot disapprove of her decision.

e my own daughter, but I suppose I must become reconciled. If you and she have agreed to part no on

er and he was going to post his last letter to Dora he felt relieved. The news had doubtless greatly sur

f the letters he had written to Curzon Street, he felt an ugly t

ER XX

SHAW'S

hment, and the spectacles he wore over his green grey eyes seemed ever on the point of being thrust forward out of their position by the large round prominent dancing eyes of the

is simple early dinner, as Leigh knocked. When he heard who the visitor was he r

Mr. Leigh, wha

g heavily, noisily, irregularly. "I have come," he

cried the doctor approaching the clockmake

e to die, I

ive the opinion--not you. You are to state the fa

chest. "In the excitement I kept up, but I know 'tis all over. You will remember your promise about the quicklime. I never let anyone pry into the ma

at happened. Where

hest a little at the l

ho

es

ha

f seven years, has be

or. You need not be afraid. No one comes at this time. Yes, I'll pull the blind down too. Stand up

elf! After standing fo

es

ou facts and law

re not

m dy

re ver

etter go

be more res

r me to go to Millwa

N

you think I

te impossi

ou

, y

ay

es

ee

h ca

nth

d. I'll see the room got ready. You feel very

I cann

u are now suffering from reaction. After y

u send for your solicitor

ungry, and when the clockmaker knocked he had been thinking of nothing but his dinner. His dinner still lay untasted. He had forgotten all about it. He was the most k

couraging smile, when he again came into the surgery. "We shall try to make you as com

wife I shoul

only ungallant thing I ever h

you and be je

are by ourselves. I suppose your mother

out now, except in

come to see you? This house you wil

t my mother, so long as I know you. The only friend likely to call I

, and we like to have all the help we can. But I daresay we shall get on famously as we are." He would like to have heard all

room was ready. Shaw withdrew from the surgery, and for half-an-hour the lawyer and the clockmaker were alone. T

ody else long. I never say thanks or make pretty speeches, but I am not ungrateful all

the little man, and displaying his greatest pleasure by allowing his large d

for the first time last night. I had put up a curtain for the first time last night. If any boy had thrown a stone, and the stone got through the curtain, there is no knowing what it might not do among the machinery; the works were so close and complicated, it might have brought something inflammable wi

and I think it is a good thing for you t

, by-and-by, killed me. How, then, do

his involuntary reversal of the movement I should have ad

ve declined to t

in that. I can get ten people to take my

ty there would be, Sha

e your old self again. I must run away. I shall see you in an hour o

was lef

e in contact with the gas-jet. If they once caught fire the wax would burn--

s of it. I never let anyone examine it, and the things it could do will not be credit

gold. Fame is for the dead. What are the dead to us? What shall I be when they bury me to myself, who walked in the sunlight and saw the trees and the flowers, and the clouds and the sea, where there were no men to remind me of my own unshapeliness? Nothing. Why should a man care for fame among people he has never seen, among the dim myriads of faces yet

s better than they, I was willing to be worse. Shaw is right. I am much easier here. I feel rested. I feel quiet. I have really done nothing harmful to any man. It will b

end was upon him. He did not think, he did not sleep. He lay simply gathering quiet for the great sleep. He was learning how to rest, how to lie still, how

TER

T AND

things being reasonably taken care of, a young man of twenty-six ought to marry and settle down to face the world in the relations and surroundings which would govern the remainder of his life. There had

was excellent. She was one of the most beautiful girls in London, she was extremely clever, and although she and he did not seem fully in accord in their views of some things, they agreed in the main. She was extremely clever and accompl

on. She knew he was haughty, and at rare times even scornful. She knew he had no mean estimate of his own merits, and was restive under control. But what were these faults? Surely nothing to affright any gentle and skilful woman from uniting herself with him for life. Most of his faults were those of youth and inexperience. When he was pr

elp thinking of the matter, and they would be sure to form no favourable estimate of John's conduct in the affair. The rest of the world would be certain to say that John ji

ew days ago, in the eyes of every one outside this house still. Stanislaus II. may have been everything that was weak and contemptible, and been one of the chief reasons why his unfortunate country disappeared from the political map of the

t so. Sometimes they put him in prison, and sometimes they put him on the throne he claimed. She knew that her son would no more think of laying stress upon his descent from the Poniatowskis than of asking to be put in that padded room. But others would think of it and set value on it. Exclusive doors might be closed against the clever speaker

ious for his years if he offered himself for Parliament. Younger men than he, sons of peers, got into Parliament merely by

mething in i

rupt, that forced election to the throne of Poland, he was a Poniatowski, _the_ Poni

England that could refuse an alli

r that he might be the freer to direct his public career towards some lofty goal. She knew her son too well to fancy for a moment any such unworthy thought could find a home in his breast; but

There was not, the doctor said, the least cause for uneasiness so long as the patient was kept quite free from excitement, from even nois

o their lodgings to fetch some things needed, and to intimate that they were not returning for the present. Mrs. Hanbury volunteered to sit in Edith's room while the old woman

irl. Speaking was strictly forbidden. Mrs. Hanbury took a book to beguile the time, and sat wi

hite face lying in the midst of it as white as the linen of the sheet. Her breathing was very faint, the sligh

al act or the subject of successive processes. But the whole time she kept saying to herself in a way that did not weary her, "How strange that Leigh should lose everything and I gain so much, and that both should be lying ill, all in so short a time!" This went on in her mind over and over again, more like the sound of a melody that does n

Dora. How very like Dora, but she is more beautiful even than Dora. Dora owes a great deal to her trace of colour and her animation. This face is the most lovely one I ever

nds were stretched ou

bent and kissed the one near

rl trembled slight

ck afraid. She had p

the end of the long lashes, and a tear

awaken

was a

ou in

Oh,

re wee

hand Mrs. Hanbury had kissed,

you,

hen Mrs. Hanbury looked down upon

into the girl's heart than all the muffling in the house o

my hand," thought the girl. No quiet such

PTE

WO PA

h Grace. The spirituality lent by illness still more refined the delicate beauty of the girl, and when the colour came back to th

was not so much of physical weakness as of mental excitement. There was now no need to watch h

ndmother had told her that Mrs. Hanbury had insisted on making good t

. I put it to you in this way: Do you suppose if my husband were making his will at this moment and knew of the misfortune which had come upon you and the child, he would insert no provision for you in his will? And do you mean to say that I am to have no regard to what I know would be his wish if he were alive? Remember, you represe

h that Mrs. Hanbury had t

wn mother, and that all her married life she prayed for a girl-baby, but it was not given to her. And now that she has found you, dear, and me, she says she is not going to be lonely for womenfolk ever again, for although we are not of

the quiet greater in the g

there and then Mr. Hanbury conceived the notion of trying to find out if, in that great portrait-painting age, any portrait had been painted of the beautif

Mr. Hanbury had often visited, was a portrait of "Mrs. Hanbury and child," believed to be one of the Hanbury-Williams family. Mr. John Hanbury

e Grace, that married the man afterwards a king, opened up fields for speculation and regions of dreams so different from those possible when she was fronting decaying fo

ght of having to face uncongenial duties among strange people. She had all her life denied herself f

id not think of money as those girls Edith met at Streatham. The girls she met were, first of all, the daughters of rich fathers, and then they were people of importance next. Mrs. Hanbury was, first of all, intensely human. S

for her from feeling belittled in the presence of these plutocrats. She would set all store by pedigree, and make no friends. A beggar may have a pedigree equal to a H

t at Miss Graham's moved, in which any girl she had ever met there would give anything she possessed to move. Mrs. Hanbury's father had been a baronet, and he

pedigree going back no one knew how far. The family had been ennobled for centuries, an

would have been the greatest height of her hope a week ago, not as an acquaintance to whom Mrs. Hanb

way from that odious necessity for going among strange and dull people as a hired servant! There was n

ich had made her schoolfellows say she ought to be a queen, had faded, and left scarcely a trace behind. There was no need to wear an air of reserve, when there was nothing to be guarded against. She was Mrs. Hanbury's relative, and to be reserved now would seem t

was too blessed a deliverance to be put aside. Up to this there had been no del

ng to the summons he had received. The kind-hearted and energetic doctor saw no reason to alter his original opinion of the case. The end was approaching, and not

said Leigh. "H

f your mind was at rest. Anx

derstand. How long do y

er, and your mind is quite free, your chance is

aw, and straight-backed grandchildren, and soon she will not have even a cripple son! Poor old woman. Well! well! But, Shaw, send to Chester Square for my friend, Mr. John Hanbury, the man who brought me here, you k

came a

ou are the only man who knows all the secret of Mystery Gold,

for you with pleasure, if I can possibly," said Hanbury, shoc

fe in the miserable fire that destroyed my clock. Go to Timmons, and tell him that no one was lost in that fire, that the winder of the clock is alive, that I am dying, and that the best thing he can

message from such a man to such a man. It looked like shielding a criminal. Lei

he showed any disposition to rebel, you could drop a word that would convi

me too much. I

r promise of

ld assist the esca

t me thin

nd to give him up. I would do anything I could, in reason, for you; but is it reasonable to ask me to ca

y. I fancied you would like to

I think you are in duty

not; and honour is more bi

any honourable bond w

mong thieves? Even t

hat you want to shield y

u I have no conscience, at least nothing that people are accustomed to

out the fruits

that way. When a man has no

the law of the la

r address. I gave you merely a fictitious name and address. Whom did I say? The Prince of Wales, wa

bury, "can I do

to Curzon Stree

anding with his back to the light. "T

ou goi

ith all this, but who could be angry wit

have some money of my own. I have made my will since I saw you. After my mother's death all will go, I mean the yearly inte

ave done better with it,

was getting too much for me. Often when I was away from it, and when I was in bed, the movement was reversed, and all went backwards until the weights were wound up so tight against the beam, that something must give way if the machinery did no

n very great. I wonder it

es

gas lighting. I know it is not fair of me to keep you here. You want to go. Say good-bye to her before she leaves town. This is We

eld out his hand,

did no

ot to sha

in a m

"I am going now. You h

had

ay. He would say no more

TER

ITI

s. He went near no club and kept in the house a good deal. When he went abroad he drove.

d-daughter were under his mother's roof, and they were the only persons besides his mother in whom he

Mrs., and Miss Ashton were leaving for a tour in N

eaking to Oscar Leigh, the Ashton

was at an end, and realized the knowledge. But she had not said anything of it. When she got his answer a

ope, which she would not acknowledge to herself for a moment, that he might disregard her request and insist upon her re-consideration. But with the advent of his letter, that hope vanished wholly, and she felt more

"Of course, mother, you knew that there w

ton in surprise that grew

to put an end to it; we have come to the conclusion it would not

was fully arranged that you were to be married

e. He and I understand each other fully. This is no mere quarrel. At my suggestion the affair has been broken off. I wrote to him, sayi

r you are not very much distressed, I cannot

dship between us. You see, mother, there are a great many things upon which we don't agree, and most likely never should, and it would never do to risk life-long bickering. I assure you we behaved more like two elderly people with money or something else practical in vie

g. My darling Dora.

and her voice. "Do not speak to me again about this until I sp

, child. It will

not. And mother, don't treat me in any other way tha

darl

e all don't be more affectionate. T

romi

the mother burst out crying, and the girl hushed her and petted he

'll try; but it's v

ut bear up for

ed. We shall not stop here

st what you pl

to stay here and

t once. Look at me how brave I am. Do not

try--I w

mother's, and the duty of conso

most hurt noble natures, and the

Sir Julius Whinfield months ago that he was making up a party for his yacht to go north that summer, and that the Dowager Lady Forcar and Mrs. Lawrence, Sir Julius's mar

knew. Against this course prudence suggested that perhaps the name and address given were imaginary, and that there was no such man or street. He was not anxious to pass through streets in which he was known, and he was glad of anything to do. How better could he employ an hour than by driving to London Road and trying to fi

idly driven to London Road, and ali

, Marine Store Dealer." But how did one get in, supposing one wan

p-ended carts. He had the wheel off a

this place, please?"

so. Ay,

know h

the place hasn't been open since Monday, and

y notion whe

wheel and looked up curiously

t ya

and Yard,

people been here f

n hanging about that place, and they do say that if they're catched they'll be hanging about somewhere else. So if you're in with that lot, you'd better clear out too. They say Timmons has got out of the country, but they'll ke

TER

E

ut down his newspaper. "I see," he added, "they have given

pping him on his way to the breakfast table and lay

of important things on my mind," said he, looking d

t not to forget the duties of your lips.

d, or on my lips, Edy, as your kiss, dear."

at compliments as

, deeper

monplace kind of

monplace sweetheart--

ite a middle-aged wife, and my ring wher

oo easily--worn a metal to marry you with, Edith. It should have been a

ng a speech to wi

ut of my heart to ke

envy you only

hat is

ove that y

there, for I give

ms so much ric

. For what I give is yours and you cannot he

o be only your own going back and I long--oh, my darling, I do long--to show you that when all you gave me is gi

do to soothe my

en think few people k

ve is more than content, more than joy, and not delusive with rap

er when you are near? And it often seems to me that it is not exactly you as you are I love, but something

byl! M

waiting, and I should not wa

ways shall be. You are not

of your going away and caring for som

eed. No,

w that there was nothing in all my heart but you? Your pity would not let you do that. Yo

mer of ho

heard that people think it is a sign of foolishness. But it can't be. Where, I think, the harm is that people harden their natures against it before it has time

me from some blessed place, you have come to

no better place for me. I am where

had the same witchery in appearance as that village beauty of the days of George II., and that some quality of the blood which flowed in his veins made him succumb at once to her; for otherwise how

reason. All she knew was that at first she was disposed to worship him because of his illustrious origin, and gr

ing in one at all like Dora that it counted for more than an even still more wonderful beauty of another type. Then he had been chiefly drawn towards the girl during her tardy convalescence because of her weaknes

hen she and Whinfield are married, there will not be a happier couple in England excepting Edith and me. When I heard that Dora was to be one of the part

ld not, and her political views had a serious interest for me, and I was perpetually trying to

at any time she said what I did not approve, I was ready to stop and argue the point. I did not know what love was then

not, so long as I saw she was happy. There was no refinement in the other feeling. It was sordid and exacting. With Edith a delicate subtlety was reached, undreamed-of before. An inspired accord arose between us. She leaned upon me, and I grew strong enough to support the burden of Atlas. I flung myself aside, so that I might not be impeded in

n he was not quite so abstract or figurative, he would say to himself, "It is sympathy, nothing mor

E