Miracle Gold: A Novel (Vol. 1 of 3)

CHAPTER XIII

IN CURZON STREET

The Honourable Mrs. Ashton's drawing-room would, under ordinary circumstances, be open to any friend or acquaintance brought there by Hanbury. He was a well-received frequenter of the house, and though the relations between him and Miss Ashton had not been announced, they were understood in the household, and any of the family who were within were always at home to him.

Of course, if Mrs. Ashton's had been an ordinary West-end drawing-room, Hanbury would not bring there a man he had picked up accidentally in the street. But Mrs. Ashton's was not by any means an ordinary West-end drawing-room. Neither good social position nor good coats were essentials in that chamber of liberty. So long as one was distinguished in arts, or science, or politics, but particularly in politics, he was welcome, and all the more if he were a violent Radical. Being merely cracked, did not exclude anyone, so long as the cracked man was clever. Mere cleverness or talent, however, would not qualify for entrance. It was necessary to be fairly respectable in manner and behaviour, and not to be infamous at all. Mrs. Ashton was an enthusiast, but she was no fool. She did not insist upon Dukes being vulgar, or Radicals being fops, but she expected Dukes to be gentlemen, and Radicals before coming to her house to lay aside all arrogance because of their humble birth or position. Mrs. Ashton had the blood of a lady, and the manners of a lady, and the habits of a lady, by reason of her birth and bringing-up. To these qualities she had the good sense to add the heart of a Christian and the good taste to reject the Christian cant. She did not employ either the curses or the slangs of any of the creeds, but contented herself with trying to live up to the principle of the great scheme of charity to be found running through all Christ's teachings. She was an Episcopalian, because her people before her had been Episcopalian, but she had nowhere in the New Dispensation found any law enjoining her to hate Mahommedans or Buddhists, or even Christians of another sect. Indeed, although at heart a pious woman, she preferred not to speak of religious matters. But she set her face against impieties. "To put it on no higher ground," she would say, "they are bad taste, bad form. A blasphemy is not worth uttering unless there is some human being to hear it, and the only reason it is of any value then, is because it hurts or shocks the hearer, and to do anything of the kind ought not to be allowed." So that, having found out Leigh was more or less a Radical, and had streaks of cleverness in him, Hanbury was not very shy of introducing him at Curzon Street.

There was another reason why the young man experienced no doubt of Leigh's welcome. This was Thursday, late in the afternoon, and Mrs. Ashton was at home every Thursday from four to seven. In the little crowd of people who came to her informal receptions, were many of strange and interesting views and theories and faces and figures. Leigh's would, no doubt, be the most remarkable figure present that day, but the callers would be too varied and many-coloured and cosmopolitan to take a painful interest in the dwarf. In the crowd and comparative hurry of a Thursday afternoon, Leigh would have fewer chances than at ordinary times of attracting attention by solecisms of which he might be guilty.

Before knocking at the door, Hanbury turned to Leigh and said: "By the way, there are likely to be a good number of people here at this hour on Thursday."

"I know. An At home."

"Precisely. You will not, of course, say a word about what occurred earlier. I mean in that blind street."

"Welbeck Place, you mean; no, no. Why to speak, to breathe of it among a lot of people who are only your very intimate and most dear friends would be worse than publishing it in every evening newspaper. I suppose no one here will mention anything about it."

"No," answered Hanbury. "No one here," was a great improvement in synonyms for Dora upon "your young lady." This halt and miserable creature seemed capable of education. He had not only natural smartness, but docile receptivity also when he chose to exercise it. "Miss Ashton will say nothing about it," he added aloud. "And now, Mr. Leigh, most of the people you will meet here to-day are smart people, and I should like to know if I may say you are the last and the first of the alchemists, last in point of time and first in point of power? or am I to refer to you as a Radical-you will find several Radicals here?"

"Hah! Neither. Do not refer to me as either an alchemist or a Radical. You said there would be politicians?"

"Yes. Undoubtedly politicians'"

"Very good. Introduce me as a Time Server. If politicians are present they will be curious to see a man of my persuasion. Sir, the dodo is as common as the English goose compared with a man of my persuasion among politicians."

"Is not the joke rather a stupid one? Rather childish? Eh? You can't expect to find that intelligent people will either laugh or wince at such a poor pleasantry? They will only yawn."

"Sir, you do my intelligence an injustice when you fancy I try jokes upon men of whose intelligence I am not assured. If there is a joke in what I said, I beg your pardon. I had no intention of making one."

"Oh, all right," said Hanbury with a reckless laugh as the door opened and the two entered the house.

While they were going up stairs, Hanbury asked in a tone of amused perplexity:

"How on earth am I to say 'Mr. Leigh, the distinguished Time Server?'"

"You have said it very well now, for a first attempt. You will say it still better after this rehearsal: practice makes perfect."

When they got into the drawing-room, Hanbury led his companion towards Mrs. Ashton, who was standing talking to a distinguished microscopist, Dr. Stein. He had of late been pursuing the unhappy microbe, and had at last pushed the beast into a corner, and when it turned horrent, at bay upon him and he had thrust it through the body with an antiseptic poisoned in an epigram, and so slain the beast summarily and for ever. The hostess had been listening to the doctor's account of the expiring groans of the terrified microbe, and had just said with an amused smile:

"And now, Dr. Stein, that the microbe has been disposed of, to what do you intend directing your attention?"

"I am not yet sure. I have not quite decided." The speaker's back was towards the door which Mrs. Ashton faced. "I have been so long devoted to the infinitely little I think I must now attack big game. Having made an end of the microbe, I am going to look through the backward telescope of time and try to start the mastodon again. I am sick of the infinitely little-"

"Ah, Mr. Hanbury," said the hostess, seeing the young man and his small companion, and feeling that the words of the doctor must be overheard by the dwarf.

"My friend, Mr. Leigh," said Hanbury, with a nervous laugh, "who wishes to be known as a distinguished Time Server, is most anxious to be introduced to you, Mrs. Ashton. Mrs. Ashton-Mr. Leigh." The latter bowed profoundly.

"I am delighted to meet a gentleman who has the courage to describe himself as a time-server." She was in doubt as to what he intended to convey, and repeated his description of himself to show she was not afraid of bluntness, even if she did not court it in so aggressive a form.

Dr. Stein moved away and was lost to sight.

"Pardon me," said Leigh, bowing first to her and then to Hanbury, "there is no great courage on my part. It is infamous to be a time-server. I am a servant of time."

Hanbury flushed angrily and bit his lip, and secretly cursed his weakness in bringing this man to this place. Before he could control himself sufficiently for speech Leigh went on:

"I am not as great a master of phrases as Mr. Hanbury," (the young man's anger increased), "and in asking him to say time-server I made a slip of the tongue."

"Liar!" thought the other man furiously.

"I should have described myself as a servant of time; I am a clock-maker."

"The miserable quibbler!" thought Hanbury, somewhat relieved. "I dare say he considers this a telling kind of pun. I am very sorry I did not face the newspapers, rather than bring him here. I must have been mad to think of introducing him."

"And what kind of clock do you admire most, Mr. Leigh?" asked Mrs. Ashton, smiling now. She set down the little man with the short deformed body as an eccentric being, who had a taste for verbal tricks, by some supposed to be pleasantries.

"I prefer, madam, the clocks that go."

"Fast or slow?"

"Fast. It is better to beat the sun than to be beaten by the sun."

"But are not the clocks that go correctly the best of all?"

"When a clock marks twenty-five hours to the day we live twenty-five hours to the day: when it marks twenty-three we live twenty-three. There are thus two hours a day in favour of going fast."

"But," said Hanbury, who suddenly recovered his good humour or semblance of it; for Leigh was not doing or saying anything outrageous, and Dora had risen from her seat by the window and was coming towards them. "It does not make any difference whether you go fast or slow, each spindle will wear out in its allotted number of revolutions, no matter what the speed."

"No," said Leigh, his eyes flashing as he caught sight of Miss Ashton "The machinery is not so liable to rust or the oil to clog when going fast as when going slow. Fluidity of the oil ensures the minimum of friction. Besides, it is better to wear out than to rust out."

"That depends," laughed Hanbury, "on what you are or what you do. Would you like, for instance, to wear out our hangman?"

"That, in its turn, would depend to an enormous extent on the material you set him to work upon?" said Leigh with a saturnine smile.

"So it would, indeed, Mr. Leigh, but let us hope we have not in all this country enough worthy material to try the constitution of the most feeble man. Mr. Leigh, Miss Ashton, my daughter."

Dora smiled and bent graciously to him. He bowed, but not nearly so low as when Hanbury introduced him to her mother. There was no exaggeration in his bow this time. He raised his head more quickly, more firmly, and then threw it up and held it back, looking around him with hard, haughty eyes. To Hanbury's astonishment Leigh appeared quite at his ease. He was neither confused nor insolent.

As Hanbury saw Dora approach and meet Leigh, he was more struck than before with the extraordinary likeness between her and Edith Grace. Dora had just perceptibly more colour in her pale olive face, and just perceptibly more vigour in her movements, and just perceptibly more fire in her eyes; but the difference was extremely slight, and would certainly be missed by an ordinary observer.

Was she still angry with him? She showed him no sign of resentment or forgiveness. She gave her eyes and attention to this man whom he had been forced to bring with him. This lying, malignant satyr, who hid the spirit of the Inquisition in the body of a deformed gorilla! Bah! how could Dora Ashton, whose blood went back to the blood of those who escaped the Saxon spears and shafts and blades at Hastings, look with interest and favour upon this misshapen manikin!

"Yes," went on Leigh, turning to Mrs. Ashton, "I am a servant of time. I am now engaged in making a clock which will, I think, be the most remarkable in the world."

"Have you been to Strasburg?" asked Hanbury, because he believed Leigh had not been there.

"Bah! Strasburg, no! Why should I go to Strasburg? To see other clocks is only to see how effects have been produced. With a conjuror the great difficulty is not to discover how to perform any trick, but to discover a trick that will be worth performing. If you tell any mediocre mechanist of an effect produced in mechanism, he can tell how it is done or how it could be done."

"What! Can you construct a clock like Burdeau's, I mean one that would produce the same effects?" asked Hanbury with a scarcely perceptible sneer.

"Produce the same effect! Easily. Burdeau's clock represented Louis XIV. surrounded by upper lackeys, other monarchs who did him homage. Hah! There is nothing easier. It is more fit for a puppet show to amuse the groundlings of a country fair than for a monumental work of genius like a great clock."

"Did not the machinery of Burdeau's clock go wrong upon the occasion of its public exhibition?" asked Hanbury with a polite, malicious smile.

"It did, and the figure of the Grand Monarque, who, like me, was not over tall, instead of receiving homage from the figure of William III., fell down before the effigy of William and grovelled. Bah! there was no difficulty or merit in producing that effect."

"I was thinking of some effect wrought by that public exhibition and eccentricity on the part of the clock."

"You mean getting Burdeau thrown into the Bastille by the Grand Monarque?"

"Yes. Do you think an effect of that kind could be produced in our day by a clock?"

"Upon a clock maker?"

"Suppose so."

"Hah! You would, no doubt, like me to try it?"

"Well, you boasted you could produce any effect."

"Hah! If they did take me and throw me into the Bastille to-day, now, at this moment, I should not mind it, nor would my clock mind it either. It is not in the power of any king or potentate of earth to divorce me from my clock!" He swelled out his chest and flung his shoulders and head back.

"What! Even if he put you in the Bastille? Ha-ha-ha!" laughed Hanbury derisively. "That is too much indeed. Why, it is not clock making, but necromancy."

The little man stepped back a pace, looked at Hanbury contemptuously from head to foot, and said:

"It is true, although you may not be able to understand it." Then turned to Mrs. Ashton. "A clock cannot be made to go for ever quite independent of man. But I think I have invented a new means of dealing with clocks; indeed, I am quite sure my plan is absolutely new. If a constitutional tyrant were to lock me up in any bastile this instant, my clock, I mean what of it is now completed and in working order, would be wound up to-night between twelve and one o'clock, just as if I were there. I admit no stranger into my workshop."

"That is very extraordinary," said Miss Ashton, speaking for the first time.

Leigh made a gesture deprecating extraordinariness.

"I am not going in for any nonsense about perpetual motion. There will be thousands of figures in my clock, thousands of automaton Figures of Time to move in one endless procession. These figures will differ from all others to be found in horloges. They will be designed wholly to please and educate the eye by their artistic virtues and graces. The mechanical movements will be wholly subject to naturalness and beauty. I have been in great difficulty to find a worthy model for my Pallas-Athena. Until to-day I was in despair."

There appeared nothing unpleasantly marked or emphatic in Leigh's manner; but Hanbury knew he meant the model for the donor of the olive had been found in Dora. Good Heavens! this creature had dared to select as model for some imperfectly draped figure in this raree-show of charlatan mechanism the girl to whom he, John Hanbury, was engaged!

Mrs. Ashton understood the implication in the speech by an almost imperceptible reverence of the poor blighted deformed body to her beautiful, shapely, well-born daughter. A look of amusement and tenderness came into her thin, mobile, sympathetic face. "And you have been so fortunate as to find a model for your goddess?"

"Yes, and no. I did not find so much a model for my goddess as a goddess who had strayed down from the heights of Greek myth."

"This must be a lucky day with you, Mr. Leigh," Mrs. Ashton said pleasantly, and speaking as though his words referred to no one in whom she took interest. She was curious to see how he would extricate himself from a direct question. That would test his adroitness. "And when did you meet your divinity?"

"In the afternoon. I saw her in the afternoon." He looked angrily at Hanbury. The latter thought, "He is under obligation not to say anything of the Welbeck Place event; he, the traitorous wretch, will content himself with referring to it, so that Dora and I may know what he means. The false sneak!" He felt his face burn and blaze.

Other people came in, and Hanbury moved off a little and looked at Leigh and swayed his head slightly, beckoning him away.

Dora turned pale. She knew nothing of what had passed between the two men since she saw them last, and felt faint when she thought of John Hanbury's rage if the little man referred to their earlier meeting. Yet she could not believe he was going to speak of that. Why had John brought him here? She had no need to guess who the goddess was. She herself was the deity meant by him. That was plain enough.

"Mr. Hanbury was with me at the time," said Leigh, disregarding the signal made by the other.

Hanbury fixed his eyes on the mechanist with threatening deliberateness. Dora grew cold and paler and faint. She felt there was certain to be a scene, a most unpleasant scene. Mrs. Ashton saw nothing, understood nothing.

"Had we not better move aside, Mr. Leigh? I am afraid we are blocking the way." He thought: "This beast has saved up his poison till now. He will strike here."

"No, no," said Mrs. Ashton energetically. "I shall hear of nothing better all day than a goddess-it is not to be expected I can hear of anything better. Where did you meet this Pallas-Athena?"

"In Grimsby Street," answered Leigh with a bow to Miss Ashton and a look of malignant triumph at Hanbury.

The latter started and looked round him with as much surprise as if he suddenly found himself unexpectedly in a strange place. This man was too subtle and lithe for him. Who could have expected this wriggle?

Dora glanced up with an expression of relief. The colour came back quickly to her face, and the aspect of alarmed expectancy vanished.

Mrs. Ashton turned from one to another with quick, enquiring, puzzled eyes. She saw now there was something unusual beneath the surface in all this. "What is the mystery? You will tell me, Mr. Leigh?"

"No mystery at all," answered Leigh, in a quick, light, off-hand way. "I happened to come across Mr. Hanbury accidentally and we met the lady of whom I speak."

"Oh, then she is a lady. She is not a professional model."

"Hah! No. She is not a professional model. She is a lady, of a Derbyshire family."

"I wonder do I know her. May I hear her name?"

"Mr. Hanbury will, I have no doubt tell you," said Leigh, moving off with a smile. "He was introduced to her at the meeting, I was not. He was as much struck by the likeness as I."

"The likeness! The likeness to Pallas-Athena?" said Mrs. Ashton in perplexity.

"Yes," said the dwarf with another smile, as he made room for two men who were coming up the room to Mrs. Ashton.