The Child Wife

In spite of this, Swinton recognised the occupants of the cab – both of them. The lady was his own wife; the gentleman his noble patron of Park Lane!

The cab passed him, without any attempt on his part to stay it. He only followed, silently, and at a quick pace.

It turned down the Haymarket, and drew up by the door of one of those quiet hotels, known only to those light travellers who journey without being encumbered with luggage.

The gentleman got out; the lady after; and both glided in through a door, that stood hospitably open to receive them.

The cabman, whose fare had been paid in advance, drove immediately away.

“Enough!” muttered Swinton, with a diabolical grin upon his countenance. “That will do. And now for a witness to make good my word in a court of – Ha! ha! ha! It will never come to that.”

Lest it should, he hastened to procure the witness. He was just in the neighbourhood to make such a thing easy. He knew Leicester Square, its every place and purlieu; and among others one where he could pitch upon a “pal.”

In less than fifteen minutes’ time, he found one; and in fifteen more, the two might have been seen standing at the corner of – Street, apparently discussing of some celestial phenomenon that absorbed the whole of their attention!

They had enough left to give to a lady and gentleman, who shortly after came out of the “quiet hotel” – the lady first, the gentleman at an interval behind her.

They did not discover themselves to the lady, who seemed to pass on without observing them.

But as the gentleman went skulking by, both turned their faces towards him.

He, too, looked as if he did not see them; but the start given, and the increased speed at which he hurried on out of sight, told that he had recognised at least one of them, with a distinctness that caused him to totter in his steps!

The abused husband made no movement to follow him. So far he was safe; and in the belief that he – or she at least – had escaped recognition, he walked leisurely along Piccadilly, congratulating himself on his bonne fortune!

He would have been less jubilant, could he have heard the muttered words of his protégé, after the latter had parted from his “pal.”

“I’ve got it right now,” said he. “Knighthood for Richard Swinton, or a divorce from his wife, with no end of damages! God bless the dear Fan, for playing so handsomely into my hand! God bless her?”

And with this infamy on his lips, the ci-devant guardsman flung himself into a hansom cab, and hastened home to Saint John’s Wood.

Chapter Seventy Two.

Wanted – A Master!

Having changed from soldier to author, Maynard was not idle in his new avocation.

Book after book came from his facile pen; each adding to the reputation achieved by his first essay in the field of literature:

A few of the younger spirits of the press – that few addicti curare verbis nullius magistri– at once boldly pronounced in their favour: calling them works of genius.

But the older hands, who constitute the members of the “Mutual Admiration Society” – those disappointed aspirants, who in all ages and countries assume the criticism of art and authorship – could see in Maynard’s writings only “sensation.”

Drawing their inspiration from envy, and an influence not less mean – from that magister, the leading journal, whose very nod was trembling to them – they endeavoured to give satisfaction to the despot of the press, by depreciating the efforts of the young author.

They adopted two different modes of procedure: Some of them said nothing. These were the wiser ones; since the silence of the critic is his most eloquent condemnation. They were wiser, too, in that their words were in no danger of contradiction. The others spoke, but sneeringly and with contempt. They found vent for their spleen by employing the terms “melodrama,” “blue-fire,” and a host of hackneyed phrases, that, like the modern slang “sensational,” may be conveniently applied to the most classic conceptions of the author.

How many of the best works of Byron, Shakespeare, and Scott, would escape the “sensation” category?

They could not deny that Maynard’s writings had attained a certain degree of popularity. This had been achieved without their aid. But it was only evidence of the corrupted taste of the age.

When was there an age, without this corrupted taste?

His writings would not live. Of that they were certain!

They have lived ever since; and sold too, to the making of some half-dozen fortunes – if not for himself, for those upon whom he somewhat unwarily bestowed them.

And they promise to abide upon the bookshelves a little longer; perhaps not with any grand glory – but certainly not with any great accumulation of dust.

And the day may come, when these same critics may be dead and the written thoughts of Mr Maynard be no longer deemed merely sensations.

He was not thinking of this while writing them. He was but pursuing a track, upon which the chances of life had thrown him.

Nor was it to him the most agreeable. After a youth spent in vigorous personal exertion – some of it in the pursuit of stirring adventure – the tranquil atmosphere of the studio was little to his taste. He endured it under the belief that it was only to be an episode.

Any new path, promising adventure, would have tempted him from his chair, and caused him to fling his pen into the fire.

None offered; and he kept on writing – writing – and thinking of Blanche Vernon.

And of her he thought unhappily; for he dared not write to her. That was a liberty denied him; not only from its danger, but his own delicate sense of honour.

It would have been denied him, too, from his not knowing her address. He had heard that Sir George Vernon had gone once more abroad – his daughter along with him. Whither, he had not heard; nor did he make much effort to ascertain. Enough for him that abroad or at home, he would be equally excluded from the society of that young creature, whose image was scarce ever absent from his thoughts.

There were times, when it was painfully present; and he sought abstraction by a vigorous exercise of his pen.

At such times he longed once more to take up the sword as a more potent consoler; but no opportunity seemed to offer.

One night he was reflecting upon this – thinking of some filibustering expedition into which he might fling himself – when a knock came to his door, as of some spirit invoked by his wishes.

“Come in!”

It was Roseveldt who answered the summons.

The Count had become a resident of London – an idler upon town – for want of congenial employment elsewhere.

Some fragment of his fortune still remaining, enabled him to live the life of a flaneur, while his title of nobility gave him the entrée of many a good door.

But, like Maynard, he too was pining for an active life, and disgusted to look daily upon his sword, rusting ingloriously in its sheath!

By the mode in which he made entry, something whispered Maynard, that the time had come when both were to be released from their irksome inaction. The Count was flurried, excited, tugging at his moustache, as if he intended tearing it away from his lip!

“What is it, my dear Roseveldt?”

“Don’t you smell gunpowder?”

“No.”

“There’s some being burnt by this time.”