Miracle Gold: A Novel (Vol. 1 of 3)
She was one of the last passengers to leave the train and the shallow fringe of alighting passengers had thinned and almost cleared away. She felt completely overwhelmed, as if she should die. She caught with one hand the side of the open carriage door for support, and kept the other hand before her face. She ceased to sob, or cry or weep. The collector and two guards were standing round her, waiting until she should recover herself. Presently a fourth man came up slowly from the further end of the train and stood among the three men.
"What is the matter?" he asked softly of one of the guards. "Has anything happened to the lady? Is she ill?"
A shiver went through Edith. There was something familiar in the voice, but unfamiliar in the tone.
"Lost her ticket and hasn't got any money. We have sent for the Inspector," answered the collector.
"Pooh, money," said the new-comer contemptuously. "I have money. Where has the lady come from? How much is the fare?"
"Come from Millway," answered the collector.
"Millway! So have I. What class? First?"
"No; Third. Five and twopence."
"Here you are." The new-comer held out his hand to the collector with money in it.
"This gentleman offers to pay, miss," said the collector turning to Edith. "Am I to take the money?"
The girl swayed to and fro, and did not answer. It was plain she heard what had been said. Her movement was an acknowledgment she had heard. She did not answer because she did not know what to say. Two powerful emotions were conflicting in her. The feeling of weakness was passing away. She was trying to choose between gaol (for so the matter seemed to her) and deliverance at his hands.
"Of course, the lady will allow me to arrange this little matter for her. She can pay me back at any time. I will give her my name and address: Oscar Leigh, Forbes's bakery, Chetwynd Street."
"Am I to take the money, miss? We are losing time. The train is going to back out. Here's the Inspector. Am I to take the five and twopence from this gentleman?"
"Yes," she whispered. She loosed her hold upon the carriage door, but did not take down her hand from her face.
The collector wrote out and thrust a ticket into her disengaged hand. The touch of the hand recalled the dim memory of what had happened earlier that day. Her fingers closed firmly, instinctively, on the paper.
"Now, miss, it's all right. Please stand away. The train is backing out."
She dropped her hand from her face, moved a pace from the edge of the platform and looked round. She knew she should see him with her eyes, she had heard him with her ears. She shrank from the sight of him, she shrank still more from the acknowledgment she should have to make.
Leigh was standing in front of her, leaning on his stick and gazing intently at her. With a cry of astonishment he let his stick fall and threw up his arms. "Miss Grace! Miss Grace, as I am alive! Miss Grace here! Miss Grace here now!"
He dropped his arms. His cry and manner bereft her of the power of speech. She felt abashed and confounded. She seemed to have treated badly this man who had just delivered her from a serious and humiliating difficulty.
"Pray excuse me," he said, bowing low and raising his hat as he picked up his stick. "The sight of you astonished me out of myself. I thought you were miles and miles away. I thought you were at Eltham House. To what great misfortune does my poor mother owe your absence? You are not-please say you are not ill?"
"I am not ill." It was very awkward that he should speak of his mother's loss, of her abandoning his mother. She had felt a liking in their short acquaintance for the poor helpless old woman. She had come away without saying a word to Mrs. Leigh. True, she had left a note, and as she was quitting the place that morning the note had not been where she had placed it. Perhaps it had merely been blown down or knocked away by the wind or by herself, or by him in the dark. She was conscience-stricken at having deserted Mrs. Leigh, she was bewildered at the inconsistency of his words now, and his visit to that room from which he believed she had fled last night. She had, too, overheard him say to his mother that he would put something right in Eltham for her this day. She had gathered he had had no intention of leaving Eltham until about noon, and it was not nine o'clock yet! He surely did not know she was in that dark room when he made the soliloquy. To suppose he thought she was there would be madness. He knew at that time she had left the house with the intention of not returning and he believed she had not returned. How then could he imagine she was still at Eltham? Why had he left Millway so early? Ah, yes, of course, as far as that went, Mrs. Brown must have discovered her flight on missing the key of the gate from its hook in the little hall of the gate-house. She must have given information and he must have come up by this train, but why? Ah, the whole thing was horribly confused, and dull, and dim, and she heard a buzzing in her ears.
All this went through her mind as quickly as wind through a tree, and like wind through a tree touching and moving the many boughs and branches of thought in her mind simultaneously.
Leigh, upon hearing her say "I am not ill," drew back with a gesture of astonishment and protest, and said, "You were not ill, and yet you fled from us, Miss Grace! Then we must have been so unfortunate as to displease Miss Grace unwittingly. But you are tired, child, and I am inconsiderate to keep you waiting. You are going where?" His voice became suave and gracious. His manner showed to advantage contrasted with his half sly and wholly persistent manner of yesterday.
"I was going home to Grimsby Street."
"Then this is our way. You have no baggage, I presume?"
"No, I left it behind me. I also left a note-"
"Hah! Here we are. Now Miss Grace, you must be far too tired and put out by your early journey and this most unpleasant experience on the platform to be allowed by me to speak a word of explanation. Pray step in. I shall call to enquire how you are later in the day."
He hurried her into a four-wheeler and gave the driver his fare and the address before she had time to hesitate or protest. Then he turned briskly away, and leaving the terminus, clambered to the top of an omnibus going east.
When he arrived at the Bank he descended. He looked sharply around, and after scrutinizing the faces of all those standing or moving slowly near him, walked rapidly a few hundred yards back over the way the omnibus had come, along clattering and roaring Cheapside. Then he pulled up suddenly, and cast quick, furtive glances at the men on either side, particularly those who were standing, and those moving slowly.
It was certain Oscar Leigh was trying to find out if he was watched.
"Hah!" cried he under his breath. "No one. All right." He then turned into one of the narrow streets leading south out of the main thoroughfare and walked rapidly. Here were large, slow-moving vans and carts and drays in the roadway and a thin stream of men, with now and then a woman of homely aspect and dingy garments, hurrying by. As one walked it was quite possible to take note of every person and no one escaped the dark flashing eyes of Leigh. In the eyes of City men when they walk about through the mazes of their own narrow domain there is always an introspective look. They are not concerned with the sticks and stones or the people they encounter. They know every stick and stone by rote and they are not abroad to meet people in the street, but to call upon people in warehouses, shops, or offices. Their eyes are turned inward, for their minds are busy. As they step swiftly forward they are devising, inventing, calculating, plotting, planning. They are on their way from one place to another and all the things they pass by are to them indifferent. They have the air of sleep-walkers who have only their bournes in their minds and are heedless of all things encountered by the way.
Oscar Leigh was the very opposite to the denizens of the City. His whole attention was given to his environment. He kept on the left-hand pavement and close to the houses so that he could see all before him without turning his head. Thus he obviated any marked appearance of watchfulness.
When he came to a cross street he stood still, looked back and mopped his forehead with his handkerchief. He waited a minute and then, muttering again a satisfied "Hah! No one," struck into the cross street by the left and proceeded very slowly. This was a still narrower artery than the former one. When he reached the end of it he paused once more, and stood regarding the ground he had just covered. It was plain that by this time all anxiety had been removed from his mind.
He faced about, threading his way through alleys of great secrecy and gloom and silence, and moved in a south-easterly direction until he emerged at the head of London Bridge.
He crossed the river on foot, and keeping to the right through mean streets out of Borough High Street found himself in London Road, where from noon to midnight, all the year round, a market for the poor is held on the pavement and in the kennel.
He crossed this street and entered another, Tunbridge Street, the dirtiest and dingiest one he had yet traversed. It seemed given up wholly to vehicles out of work. Here were a couple of dozen large, unhandsome, stores, warehouses and small factories, and half-a-dozen of very poor houses, let in tenements. An ill-smelling, close, foul, low-lying, little-used street.
The ground floor of one of the houses was devoted to commerce. The floor, as far in as one could see, was littered with all kinds of odds and ends of metal machines and utensils and implements. On a washed-out blue fascia-board, in washed-out white letters, over the door, were the words "John Timmons," in large letters, and beneath in small letters, once black and now a streaky grey, "marine store dealer." Into the misty twilight of this house of bankrupt and forgeless Vulcan Leigh disappeared. Any one passing down Tunbridge Street a quarter of a minute after he stepped across the threshold would not have been able to detect any living being in the business establishment of Mr. John Timmons, marine-store dealer.
But if a listener had been at the back of the store, behind the boiler of a donkey-engine, or leant over the head of the dark cellar in the left corner, he would have heard the following dialogue carried on by careful whispers in the darkness below:
"Yes. I have come back sooner than I expected. I went to Birmingham yesterday morning to consult a very clever mechanist there about the new movement for the figures of time in my clock-Hah!"
"You told me you were going away, but I thought it was to Edinburgh."
"Hah!" said the former speaker, "I changed my mind about Edinburgh and went to Birmingham instead. I thought when I was speaking to you last that Edinburgh would be best, but I got the name of the best man in Birmingham and went to him instead. My friend in Birmingham not only put me right about the new movement, but when I told him I thought I was on the point of perfecting my discovery of the combination in metals he told me he would be able to find a market for me if I was sure the new compound was equal to representation. Of course, I told him the supply would be limited until I could arrange for a proper laboratory and for help. I explained that no patent could protect all the processes of manufacture and that for the present the method must be a profound secret. I also told him I proposed calling my invention Miracle Gold."
"No doubt about no patent being sufficient to protect. You were right enough there. Ho-ho-ho-ho."
"It was best to say that. Anyway, he is ready to take any quantity, if the thing is equal to representation."
"There's no doubt it will be. Ho-ho-ho-ho."
"I told him my great difficulty at present, was the colour-that it was very white-too like Australian gold-too much silver."
"Ho-ho-ho-ho, that was clever, very clever. You are the cleverest man I ever met, Mr. – ."
"Hah-stop. Isn't it best not to mention names here?"
"Well, it's always best to be on the safe side and even walls can't tell what they don't hear, can they?"
"I told him also that for the present the quantity would be small of the miracle gold, but that I hoped soon to increase the supply as soon as I got fully to work."
"That's true."
"He says he will take all I can make, no matter how much, if it is equal to representation-"
"Ho-ho-ho-ho! Equal to representation! That's splendid. I can't help laughing at that."
"No. It was clever of me. But the affair is hardly a laughing matter. May I beg of you not to laugh in that way again? I dare say the most uncomfortable place after a prison into which anyone goes is a grave, and this place looks and smells like a grave. Besides, there is fearful danger in this affair, fearful danger. Pray don't laugh."
"But you will go on with the thing now?"
"Yes, I will go on with it. But, observe, I cannot increase my risk by a grain weight. I am already risking too much. I deal, mind you, with nothing but the alloy."
"I don't want you to deal with anything else. You know nothing of the matter beyond the alloy. What did the Birmingham gentleman say the stuff would be worth?"
"In the pure metal state?"
"Of course. After you are done with it?"
"Hah! He will not say until he has a specimen. When can you have some ready?"
"Now. This minute. Will you take it away with you?"
"No, not now. What are you doing tonight?"
"Nothing particular."
"Can you come to my place between twelve and half past?"
"Certainly."
"Without fail?"
"I'll be there to the minute you say."
"Very well. Let it be twelve exactly. I have a most excellent reason of my own for punctuality. Bring some of the alloy with you. Knock at the door once, one knock, the door in Chetwynd Street, mind. I'll open the door for you myself. Mind, not a word to a soul, and above all don't go into the Hanover hard by. I have reasons for this-most important reasons."
"Do not fear. I shall be there punctually at twelve. I never go into public houses. I can't afford it. They are places for only talking and drinking and I can't afford either. Are you going?"
"Yes. I must run away now. The National Gallery folk are in a fog about a Zuccaro. They are not certain whether it is genuine or not. There is a break in the pedigree and they will do nothing until I have seen the picture and pronounced upon it. Good-bye. Twelve sharp."
"Good-bye. I'll not keep you waiting for me to-night."
Oscar Leigh came quickly out into Tunbridge Street and thence into London Road, and got on the top of an omnibus going north. He changed to the top of one going west when he reached Ludgate Circus.
If you have sharp eyes, and want to see with them that you are not followed, the top of an omnibus is an excellent way of getting about through London.
Leigh alighted from the second omnibus at Charing Cross, and walked from that straight to the Hanover in Chetwynd Street. The nation was not that day made richer by his opinion of the genuineness of the alleged Zuccaro, nor had he up to this moment conceived the advisability of inventing the mummified Egyptian prince, much less of buying his highness, with a view to painting the dial of his clock with the asphalatum from the coffin.
He had spent the time between his arrival at Victoria and his brandy and soda with Williams at the Hanover in going to and coming back from Tunbridge Street, and in his visit to John Timmons, marine-store dealer.
CHAPTER XI
STRANGER THAN MIRACLE GOLD
Grimsby Street, where Mrs. Grace, Edith's grandmother, had lodgings, to which Edith Grace had been driven that morning from Victoria, is one of the humble, dull, dingy, thoroughfares formed of small private houses in Chelsea. The ground here is very low and very flat. The houses have all half-sunken basements, bow windows on the first floor and two floors above. They are all painted of the same light, washed-out drab. They all have light drab Venetian blinds. All have tiny areas paved with light drab flags; all three steps rising six or eight inches each from the front gate to the front door. All have six steps descending from the flagged passage to the dark drab, blistered low house-door under the steps. The aspect of dull, respectable mediocrity of the whole monotonous street is heart-breaking. The sun, even of this cloudless June day, did not brighten it. The sun cannot make washed-out drab look pleasant. From end to end is not a tree or shrub or creeper, not even a single red brick to break the depressing uniformity; the chimney-pots are painted drab too. The area-railings are all black. All the doors are the colour of unpolished oak. The knockers flat and shapeless and bulged with blistered paint.
Mrs. Grace lived at Number 28, half-way down the street. She rented the first floor unfurnished. She had lost some money in the disaster which swallowed up her granddaughter's little all. The utmost economy now became necessary for the old woman, and she had resolved to give up the tiny room until now Edith's.
Mrs. Grace was a tall, well-made woman, of seventy years, very upright and youthful in manner for one of her years. She was of quick nature, and looked upon all matters from an extremely optimist or pessimist point of view. This disposition had little or no effect upon her spirits. It afforded her as much satisfaction to consider the direst, as the pleasantest, results. She was uniformly good-natured, and always saw the hand of beneficent Providence in calamity.
That Thursday morning when Edith alighted from the cab, Mrs. Grace was sitting in her front room window looking out at the placid, drab street. With an exclamation of surprise and dismay she ran down stairs, let the girl in, embraced and kissed her vehemently, crying, "My darling! my darling child! What has happened? Is there no such place at all as Eltham House, or has it been burned down?"
Edith burst into tears. She was not given to weeping, but the relief at finding herself at home, after the anxiety and adventures through which she had gone, broke her down, and, with her arm round the old woman's waist, she led Mrs. Grace upstairs to the sitting-room.
"Sit down, dear. Sit down and have your cry out. Take off your hat and rest yourself. Have you had your breakfast? Did you find Mrs. Leigh dead? or has there been a railway accident? Have your cry out. I am sorry I ever let you away from my sight. You are not hurt, are you? Where is your luggage? I declare that cabman has driven off with it. I must get someone to run after him. Did you take his number?"
"No, mother." Edith called her grandmother simply mother. It was shorter than grandmother, and more respectful than granny. "I have no luggage with me. I left it at Eltham House. No accident has happened. Simply I did not like the place. I could not stop there. I felt strange and lonely and afraid, and I came back. I ran away."
"And quite right too, dear. I am very, very sorry I ever let you go away from me. I am sure I do not know how I have got on since you left me. I thought of telegraphing you to come back. But it's all right now that you are here again, and I shall take good care you do not go off from me any more until some fairy prince comes for my child. We shall be able to live some way together, dear. With a little economy we need not be separated. Your room is just as you left it; nothing stirred. I hadn't the courage to go into it. Go into your own room, pet, and take off your things." She took Edith by the hand and led her to the little room which had been hers so long, and which seemed so secure after that large chamber in which she had spent so many minutes of anxiety and fear at Eltham House.
Then, in few words, she told all to the old woman, omitting the visit of Leigh to the room when he believed her to be gone. She explained her flight by saying this Mr. Leigh had wearied her with attentions. She said nothing about his having asked her to let him kiss her patriarchally. She wound up by declaring she could not endure him and his objectionable devotion, and that she had come away by the first train, having left a note to say the place did not suit her, and that her luggage was to be sent after her. Then she told of the loss of her ticket and Mr. Leigh's opportune appearance, and last of all, of his promise or threat of calling.
The story, as it met the ears of Mrs. Grace, did not show Leigh in a very offensive light. No doubt he had been at Eltham House when Edith arrived, and that gave the girl an unpleasant shock, for which she was not prepared, and which coloured all her subsequent thoughts of him. She had been a little put out, or offended, or frightened. She had gone to her room, locked the door and slipped away back to London next morning. That was all, and the old woman made much of getting the girl home again, and dwelt little on the reason of her flight. She put down the cause of flight to an over-sensitive young girl confronted for the first time with vulgar admiration and the cold world beyond home.
Edith confessed to have eaten no breakfast, and slept nothing during the night, so Mrs. Grace insisted upon her taking food, and lying down awhile in her room. Then she came away, shutting the door softly behind her, and sat in the window-place of the sitting-room to think over the affair.
Thought with Mrs. Grace was never logical or consequential, and at the present moment the delight of regaining Edith coloured her ideas with pleasant hues. It had been sorely against her grain she allowed the girl to go from her at all. Nothing but her granddaughter's emphatic wish would have brought her to consent to it. Before they lost their money they had had enough for modest luxury in these cheap lodgings. All Edith's money had been engulfed, and some of her own. There was still enough for the existence of two. Edith was not fit for the world, and this experience afforded convincing evidence that no other experiment of the kind should be tried.
When the little man, Leigh had come to arrange about Edith, she looked on him with scant favour. He was about to take the child from her. He had told Edith he would call later to-day to ask how she had got on. She should receive him with pleasure. No doubt he had persecuted Edith a little, and the girl had been put out and frightened. But was not this very persecution the means of driving Edith back to her home? And were not his attentions not only a proof, if proofs were needed, of the girl's beauty, but also of the unadvisability of letting her stray from her side? That argument would be conclusive with Edith when they talked the matter over quietly. If a man of this man's appearance had, under the potent spell of her beauty, so far forgotten himself as to offer her marked attentions, how much more persistent and emphatic would be the homage drawn towards her from other men. Her good looks had turned the head of this Leigh until he forgot his deformities. Could she expect other men, men of fair proportions, would be more insensible or less persistent?
Mrs. Grace did not believe Edith had any insuperable objection to marriage, or the notion of a suitor. But she knew the girl's pride of family would prevent her ever attorning to the attentions of an admirer who was not a gentleman. The Graces of Gracedieu, in Derbyshire, had come over with the Norman William, and although her own husband had been only the poor cadet of that house, and her son, Edith's father, a lawyer, who died young, leaving little for his widow and orphan, Edith was as proud of her lineage as though through her veins ran "all the blood of all the Howards." Indeed Edith had somewhat strained and fantastic theories of family and breeding and blood. She had always impressed upon Edith that she was a lady by birth and breeding. Edith was disposed to assume that she was a duchess by descent. There was no haughtiness or arrogance in her grand-daughter; the girl was extremely simple, and gentle, and good-natured; but she kept aloof from the people round her, not out of disdain, but because of the feeling that she was not of them, that they would not understand her or she them, and that they by her presence would only be made unhappy in reflecting on their own humble origin.
When Edith first declared her resolution of earning her own bread, and going out as a governess or companion, Mrs. Grace had made sure this pride of family or birth would successfully bar the way to any bargain, and when the bargain was struck with Mr. Leigh, she felt confident the arrangement would not last long. The end had come sooner than she had dared to hope, and she was delighted. She was thankful to Leigh for being the cause of Edith's failure to rest from home.
