RGL e-Book Cover©
RGL e-Book Cover©
THE door of No. 1, Tyburn Square, was painted black, with bell, letter-box, and massive knocker enamelled in vivid scarlet. In a few weeks' time this portal had passed from the limbo of conventional thresholds into the picturesque popularity of evening newspaper records. This spells fame in an age when genius means an infinite capacity for making money.
In less than two months all that was best and brightest in society had passed beyond the flare of lampblack and vermilion. Beyond was a hall, paved and lined with white marble, filled with lemon-trees. Beyond this again was a large room, the walls unpapered, the white boards absolutely bare, and containing no furniture beyond a couple of saddlebag armchairs. The big bay window at the far end was fitted with cathedral glass.
In this primitive fashion Paul Beggarstaff received his clients. At all times and seasons a good fire burned upon the hearth. Ladies came here to have their fortunes expounded, their lines of life vigorously told, and to get advice upon everything, from the selection of a servant to the backing of a horse.
And yet, two months ago, nobody had heard of Paul Beggarstaff. He did not come in clouds of mystery, there was no flavour of the East about him, his very name had an Anglo-Saxon suggestiveness. He merely claimed certain occult powers, and seldom did he promise in vain.
Beggarstaff was a young man, with pale, scholarly features, an aquiline nose supporting gold-threaded pince-nez, and a drooping blonde moustache. There were no magic circles, no black cats, no anything. The very novelty of the thing was one of its great attractions. Surely nobody but a very strong man could afford to dispense with the properties.
Beggarstaff had made his reputation over that case of Lady Summerbright's. The affair is woven into the diaphanous fabric of history by this time. Her ladyship, the loveliest and silliest woman in London, had lost her diamond necklace. Truth will tell you that the gaud has a bloody history of its own. Commercially, the stream of light would have ransomed quite a number of mediaeval kings.
Lord Summerbright, whose literary ability had been throttled by patrician ties, could suggest nothing better than a visit to Beggarstaff, whose original doorway had arrested his cynical attention. With the sublime creed that folly follows, her ladyship went.
She returned with a wonderful story. She was quite certain she had had the dubious delight of an interview with the devil, clad in frock-coat, mathematically pressed trousers, and glasses rimmed with gold. Also her ladyship was quite certain that the father of lies was a graduate of one of our universities.
"James," she declared, "the man is a marvel. He told me everything I had done on that fatal night. Things that happened in my bedroom!"
"Lucky—er—devil," Summerbright murmured.
"No; but really, James. He motioned me into a chair, he actually knew why I came, and then he began to tell me things. I never was so frightened in my life. And he says I dropped my necklace close here as I was getting out of my carriage, and that the same will be found down the drain which is opposite the door."
Summerbright smiled. When a man laughs at a woman in that irritating way she is generally inspired to new and dazzling heights of folly.
"I am going to have that drain searched at once," said her ladyship. And she did.
The necklace was found as Beggarstaff predicted. Within a week the name of Paul Beggarstaff was known from one end of England to another. This was notoriety. But when the Purple Pill King and the greatest Soap Emperor worked the incidents into full-page advertisements, fame followed.
Hundreds of fashionable clients flocked to Tyburn Square. The Sage's prices were trebled, but this only served to increase the crush. Nor could it be denied that Beggarstaff was wonderfully successful with his patients, as he chose to call them. To put the matter tersely, Beggarstaff had become an institution.
It was Saturday afternoon, a day when occult science slacked her bow, and Beggarstaff sat alone. In a Sage his occupation was a prosaic one, and not even the most latitudinarian of critics can exactly regard the Sporting Times as literature. The rapid pulse of the electric bell thrilled, and Beggarstaff put the pink sheets aside. A minute later, and a tall figure entered. "I beg your pardon," said the intruder, "but I presume you—"
"Paul Beggarstaff, at your service. You wish to consult me, Sir Peter?"
Sir Peter Mallory looked slightly uncomfortable. He was a handsome young man, with a bronzed face and an eye suggestive of higher things than sighting a choke-bore with a dusky flight of partridge drumming into the September haze. Mallory was a sportsman by environment, an enthusiast and dreamer by instinct.
"If you were a woman," said Beggarstaff, "you could feel more easy. Sit down."
"Woman," Mallory murmured, as he sank into the chair, "can do things sublimely. Honestly, I came here against my better convictions."
"Of course, that's why you do come. Just at present you are out of sorts with common honesty. Believing me to be a thorough-paced humbug you come to me as an antidote. Strychnine is a valuable medicine, and Longman is behaving very badly."
"What do you know about Longman?"
"I know he has disappointed you, and yet his pseudo-Socialism is no more meretricious than yours. He has been robbing you in the name of political humanity."
"Over two thousand pounds," Mallory muttered. "I'm sick of politics. Those fellows are all alike. But I didn't come to talk of that to you."
Beggarstaff smiled slightly.
"No," he said. "You came to discuss a girl. The girl puzzles you."
"How in the name of fortune do you come to know that?"
Beggarstaff gave a lofty wave of his hand. The gesture seemed to imply the triviality of the problem to a mind of wide grasp.
"Suffice it that I do know," the Sage remarked. "The question is: Are you in earnest? Because, if you are not, the matter is likely to lead you into serious trouble. What are your intentions in the matter of the Yellow Girl?"
"Beggarstaff, you are in league with Satan?"
"There are worse syndicates," the Sage said drily. "All the same, you are mistaken. I have no connexion whatever with the firm you mention. Are you serious?"
"I was never more earnest in my life."
"Because you are a clever man, and consequently dilettante. And you were not always serious. Don't be angry. Do you remember Phillpotts, of Jesus? He was an elderly man, and he had a daughter. Wasn't her name Jessie? Then there was the 'Pearl of Price.' She married a butcher at Newmarket subsequently. Then what of 'She of the Dainty Feet'? She in the fulness of time got mixed up—"
"For Heaven's sake, stop!" Mallory cried. "Good God! if I were a man of right mind I should cut my throat after an hour with you! How—how do you—"
The speaker paused, absolutely at a loss to proceed. For the first time in his life he was frightened; a knowledge of nerves had suddenly been thrust upon him.
"The thing is ridiculously easy," Beggarstaff said. "You will perhaps wonder at my asking if you have recovered the Mallory diamonds yet."
"You know they are lost also? Those Scotland Yard people—"
"Have not uttered a word. You lent the family jewels to your sister to attend a Drawing-Room, and the stones disappeared under the most mysterious circumstances. Scotland Yard suggested an absolute secrecy, but you see I know all about it."
"I never felt more hopelessly at sea, never in my life—"
"And yet you are an exceptionally clever fellow, Peter."
Mallory started at the change of voice. With one sweep of his hand Beggarstaff seemed to have entirely altered his features. And yet he had merely removed his glasses, and given the long, saffron moustaches an upward curl.
"As I live," Mallory cried, "it's Paul Clibburn, of Jesus!"
"The same, at your service, Peter. You wonder to find me in this guise."
"Wonder! The feeblest way of putting it. Second Wrangler! A first-class classic! Greek and English verse prizeman. The prettiest bat for a late cut I ever saw. And perhaps the finest comedian ever seen on the banks of the Cam. And to be doing this kind of thing!"
Beggarstaff touched the bell and gave the servant instructions that he was in to nobody. Then he carefully locked the door and produced the cigarettes.
"I gather from your manner that you are slightly disgusted, Peter," he said.
"Well, who wouldn't be? You are masquerading in this cheap- Jack style; you, a man that might have been Lord Chancellor had you liked."
A film of regret dimmed Beggarstaff's eyes. His voice was dominated by it also.
"Unfortunately, all those things require money," said he. "And when I came down from Cambridge not only was I penniless, but I had succeeded in dissipating every penny my poor old father had. He would pay my debts, you see. When he died, two years later, my mother and two sisters were totally unprovided for. But for the thoughtless blackguard who sits before you, they could have had every comfort.
"Mallory, to lead Cambridge by the nose and London by the ear are two cruelly different things. Honestly, I tried my hand at a dozen things: at every one of them I was a ghastly failure. I couldn't afford to wait. There comes the time when cynicism and ungodliness get you down and strangle you. I could play the liar, and humbug, and knave, perched up on cee-springs, building churches and the like. That is why I decided to become a successful humbug also."
"But you had to get a start, Paul."
"Well, didn't that Lady Summerbright business give me a magnificent one?"
"Still, I never believed that there was anything in that thought-reading—"
"Absolute humbug," Beggarstaff interrupted. "To be perfectly candid with you, the thing was arranged between Summerbright and myself. You will remember that we were the greatest of friends at Cambridge. Summerbright placed the jewels in the drain, and then suggested that his wife should come to me, first posting me up in the local colour. After that the rest followed like a flock of sheep. They come to me with the most sacred of family secrets. I hold the honour of a hundred families in the hollow of my hand. Peter, there is absolutely no limit to human credulity and weakness. Did I but choose, I could become the greatest blackmailer of this or any other age. But there is no need. The money comes in like a flood; and my own flesh and blood reap the benefit."
"Still, I have heard people speak very highly of you."
"Because I am cleverer than they. I never advise unless I know. I put people off; and, in the meantime, I coach up for them. Some of my adventures are worthy of a place in the Arabian Nights, I could tell you—"
"Crimes! Are you the latest revision of Sherlock—"
"Pshaw! I am not a detective. One stumbles upon crime sometimes; but I make it a rule to avoid that class of thing if possible. Crime is so vulgar and conventional. And I am getting to love the solution of the social mystery for its own sake. For instance, this Yellow Girl problem promises to be most fascinating."
Mallory flushed slightly.
"I may as well confess the occasion of my visit here," he said. "Indeed, seeing how much you know already, it would be folly to do otherwise. But how do you get your information?"
"You need not go any further," said Beggarstaff, "because I am not going to tell you. In my business—the business of life—one thing is woven into another. My few facts came to me quite accidentally, and your face shows the state of your mind. Now tell me all about the Yellow Girl and where you met her."
"But still to betray the secrets—of the—of the—"
"New Bohemian Club. There, you see. I know the name. Also, I may remark that their place of meeting is somewhere near Battersea Park. You are a member!"
Mallory commenced to speak with greater freedom.
"I am a member," he said. "There are two hundred and fifty of us altogether. Our symposiums take place every Wednesday night, eight till two."
Beggarstaff nodded and passed the cigarettes.
"So I understand," he said. "You are a very exclusive coterie."
"In a way, very exclusive. Some of the very best people come there constantly. We dance and sing, and play cards and the like, the supper being prepared beforehand, so that there are no waiters, and our own members provide the orchestra. We are free, I must confess—very free indeed. Conventionality is left in the cloakroom. Each member has an ivory ticket; and when he or she cannot attend; this ticket may be passed on to a friend who can be trusted. So well is the secret kept that none of the society papers have got hold of it yet."
"I could go if I liked," said Beggarstaff. "Proceed."
"There is very little more to tell," said Mallory. "With some of the best and brightest society people, with a choice selection of artists, authors, and the like, I need hardly say that our functions are enjoyable in the extreme. There are no sets and cliques whatever; everybody speaks to everybody else; in fact, we are quite a happy family."
"In fact, the Yellow Girl is the only mystery you have."
"Precisely. She never misses a night. She comes at eight and goes at one, regularly."
"By goes I suppose you mean disappears," Beggarstaff suggested drily.
"I have certainly tried to trace her," Mallory admitted with a splash of red on his cheeks, "but the Yellow Girl, or Zilla, as she prefers to be called, simply melts away. The laws of our coterie preclude any personal questions, so that Zilla may be an empress for all we know. That she is wonderfully popular is certain."
"So I have heard," Beggarstaff said thoughtfully. "And she invariably dresses in yellow silk and black lace, with shoes to match. There is quite a flavour of Dumas about the thing. I presume the lady is beautiful."
Mallory caught his breath, his eyes dilated.
"The cant phrase is utterly inadequate," he remarked fervently. "Zilla is fascination itself. She is the essence of the ages, the crystallisation of centuries of prettiness. Sometimes she suggests Cleopatra, then in a flash she is Clytemnestra, then she is Ellen Terry. Dark as night, a kind of dream with lovely liquid eyes floating in it. Then the fascination of her manner and the brilliant airiness of her conversation baffle description. One minute she is tender and confidential, the next she eludes you in the strangest fashion. And yet she had never seen plovers' eggs till last Wednesday."
Mallory's last remark savoured of worldly philosophy. The incident of the plovers' eggs suggested the wildest possibilities. Beggarstaff smiled. Already he had formed the still gauzy threads of a still more gossamer theory of his own.
"Really," he said, "a much more classic point than would at first appear. Do you know that those plovers' eggs form the turning-point of the tragedy, Peter?"
"Is it necessarily a tragedy?" Mallory asked.
"I fear so, unless comedy crosses it. Now, as to your intentions?"
"My fixed resolution is to make Zilla my wife."
"Quite so. I see your mind is absolutely made up on the point. And Zilla?"
"Loves me! In one of her indiscreet moments she confessed as much."
Beggarstaff made no reply for a few minutes. He seemed to dream in the smoke of his cigarette.
"Women are only women," he said presently. "But you will never marry Zilla; that is, if my theory be the correct one. You might as well go to the King, and demand the hand of a princess. The great Chinese Wall is as a box of bricks compared to the obstacles lying before you."
"Any fool can get over a wall with a ladder," Mallory said impatiently. "And I don't want you to try the sage business on me."
The seal of earnestness wrinkled Beggarstaff's forehead. His eyes were grave.
"I'm not," he said. "I am terribly in earnest! Most men would let you go to the devil in your own way, but I prefer to accompany you part of the journey. I am going to carry the ladder in fact. In other words, I am going to solve the mystery of the Yellow Girl for you, and leave the rest to Providence."
"That's exactly what I want you to do."
"Then we are agreed. You will attend Wednesday's symposium, of course?"
"I have not missed one for the past six months."
"Good. I am going to accompany you upon this occasion. Mind, I am to have a free hand in this matter, and, not being under the glamour of the siren, I am to treat her as I please. My mission is to find out who she is and where she comes from. You will procure me a ticket?"
"With pleasure, Paul; and you shall be my best-man."
Beggarstaff smiled in a significant manner. He shuddered from the head downwards.
"In a shirt of mail, then," he muttered. "This is an adventure after my own heart, mysterious, full of danger, rococo, almost fantastic. Mind, I merely surmise. A princess of the gutter, a beggar-maid in Belgravia. Which?"
Mallory rose. He was too deadly in earnest to jest.
"It is arranged for Wednesday, then?" he asked.
"I shall not fail you," Beggarstaff responded. "À la bonne heure!"
DESPITE Beggarstaff's frankness, Mallory's belief in the occultism of his friend was as yet concrete. And Mallory was still by way of being a rhapsodist. Even close commercial contact with the professional type of politician had not killed all the poetry that lay within him.
This he touched upon on the way to the New Bohemian. Beggarstaff laughed.
"Your mind is harping upon my startling knowledge concerning the loss of your jewels," said the latter. "You cannot understand whence came my information. What could be easier? Your sister told me. She came and asked me to recover them. And upon my word I almost fancy I am going to do so."
More Beggarstaff would not say. Even to a friend he could not wipe all the colour out of his reputation. Presently the cab stopped.
"We have got to get out here," Mallory explained. "It is one of our rules that no cab shall approach within three hundred yards of the hall. The reason is obvious. If the night is wet, why, there is an end of it."
Mallory led the way down a narrow but none the less respectable street, and turned finally into a paved yard. A flight of stone steps terminated in what appeared to be a large stable-loft. Once inside a vestibule, this prosaic suggestion vanished. The grouping of the palms and the arrangement of the drapery might have been Liberty's own handiwork, plus a daring eccentricity and head-strongness suggestive of the best Parisian instinct.
On either side were closed doors, obviously leading to dressing-rooms. The draperies, half-hanging, disclosed the dancing saloon, and beyond this, in a corridor, a glimpse of supper was afforded. Some threescore people were already dancing to excellent music provided by a party of the guests themselves.
Most of the people there were celebrities in their way—society leaders, a literary lion or two, some artists of repute.
Mallory nodded carelessly to one or another, for the majority were known to him, as indeed they were by sight to Beggarstaff also.
Gaiety rippled along the room like the song of a summer brook.
"A sight perfectly unique," Beggarstaff murmured—; "nearly a hundred of the Celtic race together, and all actually enjoying themselves!"
A dazzling vision in diaphanous green, translucent as sea- foam, and fresh as Aphrodite smiling to the morn, came forward.
Beggarstaff knew the lady well. She was quite the latest success in the way of duchesses.
"Sage of Tyburn," she said imperiously, "you are going to waltz with me."
It came to Beggarstaff as it does to men past thirty sometimes, that life is fitfully worth the living. He allowed the flood- tide to carry him away. It was past eleven before he suddenly returned to a knowledge of himself—and the Yellow Girl.
There she was—close beside him. Dancing had ceased for the time, and would not be resumed till after supper. Beggarstaff gasped.
He could not mistake Mallory's description. It struck him now as being singularly apt. The afflatus of love had stood Peter in good stead over that prose poem. Those eyes were the closely guarded heritage of centuries. The face was Cleopatra's. Then— Well, Beggarstaff could not be quite sure. And yet the vision could have been moulded in no crucible forged later than the sere Victorian.
Three or four men stood round her. Her lips were gay with laughter, her conversation sparkled with happy felicities. Beggarstaff had never before met any woman with so perfect a mental equipment outside America. And yet the Yellow Girl was no American. Might as well mistake Kenilworth for a Fifth Avenue pork-palace.
At a sign from Mallory, Beggarstaff came forward. Evidently Peter had been speaking of him, for Zilla held out her hand with a smile and challenge in her eyes.
"They tell me you are a marvellous man," she cried.
"Then this meeting should go down to history," Beggarstaff suggested.
Some magnetic attraction about the pair seemed to bring others around them. And Zilla was in one of her brightest and most audacious moods. Here was a chance for the Sage to distinguish himself. Why should he not solve the enigma, explain who the Yellow Girl was, expound the raison d'être for the curious?
An impatient rustling of silks and laces followed this suggestion from the duchess. The cry was taken up by those standing around. Again Zilla flashed the challenge of those fathomless eyes full upon Beggarstaff.
"Come," she cried. "Come, sir, who am I?"
"That most mysterious of created things, a woman," said Beggarstaff.
"But what woman? Whence came I? Am I a sprite born of the gaslight, a miasma? Or am I but the triumph of the age of new women and machinery? Sir, you can no more tell, than—than a Cambridge professor."
"I can, and I will," Beggarstaff responded, "on one condition."
"Name it, and it is yours."
"That you take off your gloves, and show me one of your hands—the left one."
For the first time the dusky eyes fell. A creamy whiteness crept over Zilla's face.
"I have promised," she said, "and I must perform. Stand back, all of you. This does not concern anyone but the Sage and myself. Only, if he prove my master, I will let you know."
The flashing circle widened as Zilla proceeded to remove her glove. Then, with a sudden rush of passion in her face, she gave her palm to Beggarstaff. The hand was small, but shapely, yet the fingers were hard and horny, the forefinger scored to the bone. Beggarstaff bent over it to conceal the triumph on his lips.
"I suppose this is why you never sup," he whispered.
"Ah, I do sup. But you understand it is one of my whims never to remove my gloves. Dear Sage, Dear Master, do not press me any further.
"I do not intend to press you at all. What I have discovered will never be made known to these people here. Only you challenged me, and I had, perforce, to look to my reputation. But if I happened to meet— There! I will not torture you more. Why should I spoil your evening by relating what you already know? There are conditions, though."
Zilla's lips curved between tears and scorn.
"There are always conditions where a man and a beautiful woman are concerned," she said, "and especially, when the latter is at the mercy of the former. Go on."
"You are utterly mistaken. The Ego finds no place in the problem. You are ruining the life of my friend Mallory. The intrigue must cease."
"Intrigue! How dare you! From my soul I love the man."
"And yet to marry him is out of the question. But the wise man always temporises with the psychological woman, and I give you a fortnight: Smile, you lovely fool, smile, or God knows what people will think!"
Zilla burst into the most, musical of laughs. With a sweeping bow, she took up her glove, and replaced it on her hand.
"Good people," she cried. "I was mistaken. The seer knows everything. Let any one who wishes to feel humble throw down the same challenge."
The women gathered round Zilla, plying her with questions. With an eagerness he could ill conceal, Mallory drew Beggarstaff aside.
"You have fathomed the mystery?" he gasped.
"I have fathomed nothing," Beggarstaff responded. "And for the present I say nothing."
And Beggarstaff spoke the truth. He had put the nude surmise to the test, and found it clothed. But it was surmise, all the same.
When the drawing was complete, Mallory should see it, but not before. Already many of the guests, were passing under the green silk portière into the supper-room. Zilla flashed a backward glance at Beggarstaff. A sinuous streak of amber danced before him, a trail of indescribable perfume seemed like a track upon the air. In her moments of seductive devilry Zilla was irresistible.
"Carpe diem!" Beggarstaff muttered. "But I must not forget my mission, all the same."
He followed. Zilla had already taken a seat at a round table, and with a wave of her fan drew Mallory and the Sage on either side of her. The duchess was also there, with a famous comedian in her train. Diamonds flashed and glittered round the board; the flowers were a striking admixture of blood-red and white. Supper was of the plainest and the daintiest. There was only one wine—champagne.
Absolute freedom reigned. Zilla seemed to lead them all where she pleased. To Beggarstaff she was a new and delightful study. He rose at length from the table with a keen regret. Still, there was work to be done. As Zilla stood near him he placed his foot on the point of the dainty satin shoe, and twisted the same until the silken seams gaped in a tear.
"Clumsy!" Zilla cried. "See what you have done!"
She held up her little foot, which Beggarstaff examined gravely.
"It is so small," he pleaded. "But I will see what can be done."
As if it were the most natural thing in the world, he withdrew the shoe from Zilla's foot, and placed it on the table.
"That plate is all over jelly!" Zilla protested.
Beggarstaff took no heed. From the neck of a bottle of potass water he drew the wire, and straightened it between his fingers. Then he dexterously threaded it through the seam, and twisted the ends off neatly.
"There," he said, "now you can go and dance again. Not with me—with Mallory. I am going to stay here and smoke a cigarette."
But Beggarstaff did not remain there long. He saw Zilla presently slide out of the ballroom, flashing away when nobody heeded her departure. Into an empty bonbon box Beggarstaff poured the contents of a basin of sifted sugar. With this in his hand he threaded his way to the vestibule. Then he proceeded to dust the steps leading down to the courtyard with the sparkling powder. There was a dim corner of the vestibule where one might stand unseen.
Beggarstaff had not long to wait. Presently out of the dressing-room came the figure of a woman, a lady's maid perhaps. She wore a veil, and carried a letter in her hand. Nobody could have taken the demure figure for that of Zilla. But Beggarstaff accepted no risks. He knew Zilla to be as elusive as a sunbeam, for was not secrecy everything to her? No sooner bad the maid disappeared than Beggarstaff examined the steps.
He caught up his hat and overcoat, struggling into the latter as he plunged for the night. On the sugar he had seen the print of the damaged satin slipper plainly. Once in the street he could see Zilla flitting along a hundred yards ahead. At a certain point she entered a cab, and the spy did the same with obvious intentions.
On and on they went back to civilisation, then through the uneasy, fitful slumber of the City, along towards the unknown East. Whitechapel came at length, and finally a street given over to the Chosen People.
There Zilla dismissed her cabman, and Beggarstaff did the same, at the outlay of a sovereign. Zilla appeared to be quite unconscious that she was being followed. By the fitful light of the gas Beggarstaff could see something in her hand, which he rightfully judged to be a latchkey. Before a little shop the girl paused.
At the same moment a hand, followed by an arm, shot out of the darkness and fastened with a snaky sinuousness around Beggarstaff's neck. He did not struggle. To do so would have merely rendered the garotte an accomplished feat. Despite his danger, Beggarstaff distinctly heard Zilla's key rattle in the lock.
"Spy!" hissed a voice in Beggarstaff's ear. "I know who you are following. If I gave the call, the rest of them would come and murder you. The girl's done you no harm."
The prisoner made no reply. He had estimated the strength of his opponent to an ounce. Once free, he had no fear of the other. With the point of his elbow he caught the ruffian under the ribs, knocking the breath out of his body.
Then Beggarstaff wrenched himself away. The wiry little antagonist gave a hoarse cry. Like a flash of light, Beggarstaff's fist crushed on the hooked nose of the other. A heap of black garments wriggled worm-like on the asphalt. The sound of hastening feet could be heard coming in that direction.
Beggarstaff darted away like an arrow from a bow. It was a time when discretion was the better part of valour. A "level time" man like himself had no difficulty in eluding pursuit. Once in the Whitechapel Road, Beggarstaff slackened. He lighted a cigarette, and proceeded to make his way home leisurely on foot.
"This is going to be a remarkable adventure," he said—, "a pearl of coincidences. I shall have no difficulty in remembering the name of the street and the house—Calcraft Lane, Whitechapel, chez Israel. What a romance!"
"AND you call yourself a friend!" Mallory said reproachfully. "You promise to do certain things for me, and, instead, you keep out of my way for three days. But there! I know that Zilla would elude even your vigilance."
Beggarstaff smiled as he lay back in the chair. He had had a hard day's work, and had subsequently dined intelligently. There is no armour like a good dinner.
"I only combat three of your statements," he said. "I am a friend, I am going to perform all I promised, and Zilla did not elude my vigilance. Her name and address are as well known to me as if they were published in Kelly's."
"Wonderful man! Tell me how you managed it."
"I shall do nothing of the kind, Peter. A princess told me I was a wonderful man this morning because I solved a domestic problem for her. Really, the thing looked supernatural, and so it would have been had not the husband been to me on a side-issue of the same puzzle. Once for all, Peter, are you absolutely resolved to go through with this thing?"
"Nothing short of premature dissolution shall dissuade me."
"Even if the lady turns out to be a fascinating heroine with a ticket-of-leave in lieu of a pedigree?"
"If you were not Beggarstaff, what an ass you would make! I am resolved."
Beggarstaff smiled. He had expected no other reply.
"Very well," he said. "Presently we will make a journey into a far-off country. I am going to show you a kingdom within a kingdom; and I warn you that you will require all your courage. Now come with me."
So saying, Beggarstaff led the way up to his bedroom. From the wardrobe he took down two suits of clothes, bell-bottomed black trousers, double-breasted coats, and cloth caps with ear-flaps.
"Put yours on," he said. "Never mind about your shirt— the cleaner that is the better. And when you come to tie that queer cravat around the neck, minus a collar, you will be perfect. The collar as a civilising force is not fully appreciated."
Mallory examined himself dubiously in the glass.
"By Jove!" he exclaimed. "I do look a Yahoo! I'd no idea of the difference. But won't what the late Laureate called 'the merits of a spotless shirt' make—"
"No difference at all. Clean linen, when a gentleman of Alsatia is taking his pleasure, is quite indispensable of late. Now turn your collar up and we'll start, There's no reason why we shouldn't have a cab as far as Liverpool Street."
Once the latter point was reached the cab was dismissed, and collars turned down again. Mallory felt like a man plunged into another sphere. Mars might be as this. They dived deeper into the surge of struggling humanity. The narrow streets were thronged with people. Every shop glittered with points of flame. Mallory noted a new type in the features of those who jostled him, a prominence of nose, a dilation of the nostril.
"Jews every one," said Beggarstaff, "We are in the Ghetto. The Jew is the most marvellous thing in Nature. Other animals assimilate; even a change of climate often produces a change of creed; but look at these people after the lapse of nigh on two thousand years! And here we are in Calcraft Lane at last."
"Do you mean that we have reached our destination?"
"Yes; don't show yourself too openly. Now look into that window. I was here myself last night, and something there attracted my immediate attention. Inadvertently I might mention that this establishment belongs to one Benjamin Israel."
Mallory peered in behind the dusty panes. The window was filled with tawdry finery. Cheap silk dresses, gowns of superior make and finish, filtered down to the depths, the flag of femininity flaunted from West to East. Feathers there were in any quantity, and by them a case of genuine diamond rings.
"I see nothing to attract me here," said Mallory.
"Look again. Above that blue silk with the claret stain on it. A pair of yellow satin slippers. The sole of one is seamed by a wire. They are marked tenpence. And yet I warrant that Pinet did not part with them under forty francs."
"Zilla's!" Mallory gasped. "The pair she wore last Wednesday! I'd like to buy them!"
"Go in and do so. There is only one customer in the shop. Do nothing and say nothing till she has gone, because a great surprise awaits you. And if you are asked any questions, be discreetly silent as to your friend outside. I will wait for you."
With a fast-beating heart Mallory entered. A coster-girl was haggling over a heap of feathers with another girl behind the counter. The latter was clad in some homespun, without the semblance of an ornament. From the shadow Mallory watched her.
"Two shillings," said the purchaser; "not one penny more."
"My dear," came the shrill response, "you must be joking. A real ostrich feather for two bob! Do you want to ruin me! In the name of the Fathers, that feather cost two-and-three, I swear. From the bonnet of a princess, Rachel. Oh, I bought it myself from a house in Grosvenor Crescent. Rachel, half-a-crown."
The dark face was eager. The crystal essence of business shone in her eyes. A matter of life and death seemed to hang on that threepence. The purchaser sullenly assented.
"Well, I suppose I must," she said. "But you're a hard hand at a bargain, and you've got a rare wheedling tongue of your own. And you so rich, too."
"My dear, we are poor, so poor. That is all a joke of the neighbours. Stop! There is nothing more that I could show you! A ring, dear, a brooch, with a diamond—"
"Give me my change, and let me be off. You'd coax the heart out of me. Oh, you're a cunning one, you are! Ask any one down the Lane, and see."
The speaker grabbed up the coppers and flounced out of the shop. Then the assistant turned her attention to Mallory. He still stood in the shadow. The girl smiled, the coquettish siren smile, yet shrewd withal, that draws money everywhere.
Twice did the girl repeat her question ere Mallory replied. Then he strode forward, and caught the girl's hand with painful force in his.
"Zilla," he whispered— "Zilla, in the name of Heaven, what does this mean!"
A little cry broke from Zilla's lips. The beautiful face was white with terror. She trembled like a bird fresh to the hand of the fowler.
"Why—why did you come here?" she asked hoarsely.
"I was bound to come. You might have known that I would find you out sooner or later. Now I am here, you must tell me what this means."
Very slowly Zilla was recovering herself. Her bosom ceased to palpitate; the hot, red blood crept to her face again.
Yes; she was glad this man had found her out. There could be no playing with fire any more. She, the dainty and fastidious, took a pure joy in the appalling hideousness of her attire. He must be illuminated.
"What does it matter now?" she asked recklessly.
"It matters just the same, Zilla. I shall always love you."
"Wonderful—most wonderful! Do you know what I would do now if I had a revolver?"
"God knows!"
"Shoot you, and myself afterwards. I would indeed! It would be lovely for us to die together."
A flaming light seemed to burn luridly in Zilla's eyes.
"I tell you it is impossible," she cried passionately. "I am a Jewess. Oh, if you could but faintly grasp what that means! Do you know that I can trace my descent back to the Fathers! If you saw my grandfather you would understand what a patriarch means. He would kill me before I wedded a Gentile; he would forfeit all his money first; and he loves that better than his soul."
"But this is a free country, Zilla—"
"I am not of your country, neither am I free. Even now we stand together in deadly peril. Do you suppose that I enjoy this life? Would I stay here if I could cut away the environment? But for the fleeting glimpses of the moon I should go mad. And now the moon has gone. You must never see me again after to-night."
Mallory passed behind the counter recklessly. He caught Zilla to his side, and covered her face with kisses. The girl floated along the tide like human flotsam carried on the crest of the storm. Her soul seemed to be fused in a smile.
"Oh, you fool!" she murmured. "You dear, dear, handsome fool!"
A cry of rage behind them rang to the greasy rafters. Mallory faced round upon what seemed to be the archetype of the ages. A man so old was he that the striking features were a mere mass of wrinkles criss-crossed in thousands of minute lines, and yet the skin was clear as ivory. Despite his years, the patriarch stood erect; the hot blood had tinged his bald scalp; His long beard seemed to be tossed by an angry wind.
"So this is what comes of your masquerading," he cried. "This is the end of your phantasm—a low intrigue with a Christian, a man of the people—"
"You are utterly mistaken," Mallory exclaimed. "I am a gentleman of title; my position can be easily defined. I could make your grandchild my wife if—"
The old man smiled with withering scorn.
"Truly, this is generosity," he said. "You marry my son's child—you! Rather would I take her by the throat and slay her! And when your forbears were tilling the soil, mine were masters of the universe. You shall never see the girl again, of that you may be certain. Go, I tell you; go before worse befalls you."
Ben Israel strode for the door, raising his voice as he went. Zilla stepped before Mallory. In passionate agitation she pointed to the street.
"Oh, be warned, be warned in time!" she cried. "If you care for me, if you have the least feeling, leave me. You are full young to die."
Mallory hesitated. He glanced at the old man, whose dilating nostrils showed the extent of the storm pent up within.
"I will go," he said, "but I shall see you again. If you think that in a free country like this you are going to fetter—"
He said no more, for Zilla flew at him like a tiger whose young is in danger. The force of the impact carried Mallory into the street, so that he stumbled and fell in the gutter. Then the door of the shop was banged to, the key rattled in the lock, and the gas went out suddenly. Mallory stood there dazed, nor did he notice for a moment the hand of Beggarstaff on his shoulder.
MALLORY swayed under the stress of his emotions. He was drunk with the turmoil of passion that fumed within. All these combined to promote cerebral intoxication. Naturally, wounded pride fought uppermost. Was he, Mallory of Mallory, to be flouted like this by a Hebrew old-clothes man! That the other's pride was as Aaron's rod compared with his the baronet did not realise.
"Are you absolutely mad?" Beggarstaff demanded sternly.
Mallory's arrested hand dropped to his side. Then he became conscious of a jagged flint in his fist. How it had got there was vague, its destination obvious. But Israel's window no longer stood in peril.
"If you had heard Moses declaiming!" Mallory protested.
"Peter, I heard every word. And I saw the patriarch. When you come to look at it in your calmer moments, you will realise his possession of the only point of view. And perhaps the absence of collar turned the scale. Your present appearance is not calculated to appeal to the better side of a Father in Israel."
"It can't possibly end here!" Mallory declared.
"Neither is it going to," Beggarstaff smiled significantly. "My glimpse of the old gentleman just now has merely precipitated matters. Would you be surprised to hear that Ben Israel is a patient of mine?"
"After what has happened I am surprised at nothing," said Mallory.
"Ah, in that case, you could be in no better mood for my purpose, The climax is at hand, the crux of the mystery in our grasp. You are still of the same mind?"
"I would commit crime to possess Zilla."
"Good! Then come on!"
And Beggarstaff coolly rang the bell by the door on the side of the shop. Mallory watched with admiration. A slatternly girl answered the summons. Beggarstaff placed a card in her hands.
"Take this to your master, and say I must see him at once."
The grimy one reappeared presently, and beckoned Beggarstaff to follow her.
He and Mallory passed up a grimy staircase, and from thence through baize doors into a softly-illuminated drawing-room.
There was no space in Mallory for astonishment, or he might have expressed surprise. The shaded lamps, the ferns, the pictures; nothing would have been out of place in Belgravia.
"Perfect!" Beggarstaff muttered. "Haroun al Raschid was a fool to me."
At the same moment Ben Israel entered. He bowed with a benign grace. He had lost all traces of his recent leonine passion. His manner was too distinctly old-world to betray any surprise at the guise of his visitors. Then his lips grew white as he recognised Mallory. Beggarstaff hastened to interfere.
"I was bound to bring my friend," he said. "Circumstances compel it. Rest assured he will not intrude here again."
"I am not afraid," Israel said significantly. "But your presence, sir—"
"Is intentional. You have a secluded paradise here."
"A whim of my granddaughter's. Weak mortal that I am, I deny her nothing; and yet if you only knew how she repaid me!"
"We will come to that presently," said Beggarstaff. "Call your granddaughter."
Beggarstaff spoke in tones of terse command. It was evident that Israel regarded his every word as pregnant with wisdom. The superstition which bade him consult the Sage still held him to the spell.
Zilla came up, hard, brilliant, her cheeks in red rebellion. She looked at Mallory, saying nothing. But she was as a polished diamond to Beggarstaff.
"I guessed I had to thank you for this," she said.
"I am afraid you will have to thank me for a great deal more," said Beggarstaff in his most caustic manner. "My story is not long, but it is none the less interesting for that. I must say that some time ago Ben Israel came to consult me on a professional matter. During that past year from time to time he has been missing jewels from a safe. I could not divine the thief then, but I undertook to do so within a certain time, and I have done so."
"You found me out here, and after that you could do anything," Ben Israel said, with a note of admiration in his voice. "I was in despair at my loss, for the key of the safe never left me. Tell me."
"I will tell you in a word. The thief stands there—"
He indicated Zilla with a gesture. The girl smiled. With some difficulty Mallory restrained his feelings.
"It would be better to own this," Beggarstaff proceeded, "because I know where the gems have been disposed of."
Zilla stood calmly forward. Her face was stern and set. Beyond the lurid red on her cheeks she had her team of Furies well in hand.
"I am not going to deny it," she said. "Why should I? What do I owe my grandfather? My mother had money of her own, but I have never had a maravedi of it."
"Two hundred a year on your education for five years," Israel snarled. "A fortune!"
"And not one penny since. Why, I have made more than that in the shop. Did you suppose that with my intellect and beauty I was going to live and die here? And that old man is worth thousands and thousands—the richest Hebrew in the Ghetto. Half the jewels of half the families in Mayfair are stored here.
"I had tasted of better things, I had picked up the ways and manners of the great world, I have played my part in it. You gentlemen can testify to my powers. I did rob him—I robbed him when he slept. And as to the select gathering we know of I bought my ticket from a member who came here once to pledge some cider-cups. Yes; we have seen titled people here.
"My education, my intellect, my vast and general reading, are all my own. As to dress. Worth and Jouvin, and Redfern are responsible. I robbed my grandfather to pay for it, and I would do it again."
Zilla paused for breath, and then she proceeded rapidly.
"I lived, I had to live—my soul was perishing here. But for those changes, I should have killed him and destroyed myself afterwards. Is it so strange that I should be what I am? Look at my purity of race; remember that no girl could possibly have been better educated than I; wit, beauty, and ambition were mine. I am the Phoenix risen from the garbage of this place. And I am not ashamed."
Ben Israel burst out furiously. The recollection of his losses aroused all the gall in his nature. The listeners could not follow the storm for want of a knowledge of the language. It was a tempest of words, a devastation of lightning glances, all the wild oratory that comes from majestic wrath.
Then the Hebrew paused, spent and trembling with the anticyclone.
"What does he mean?" Mallory asked.
"Simply that he disowns me. He curses me," said Zilla. "A Christian cannot understand. And I could have robbed him more had I chosen. Look here."
She drew aside a panelled slide from a sideboard, and disclosed a safe.
"A fortune is there," she said, "and I have the key of that."
With a cry, Israel darted forward, trembling like a mother who sees a nursling of hers in danger. Beggarstaff took up a wax candle from a table, and lighted it, as Israel threw back the ponderous iron door. He beckoned Mallory to his side. There were scores of velvet cases in the safe. Then it was Mallory's turn to cry out. Darting his hand forward, he withdrew a green case with a crest and monogram stamped in gold thereon.
"Where did you get this?" he demanded sternly.
"And what right have you to ask?" came the ready response.
"A fair one, I take it," Beggarstaff said drily. "I may as well tell you, Israel, that my friend's proper designation is Sir Peter Mallory."
Israel looked from one to the other. A senile cunning had crept into his face. The dignity of the patriarch remained as an outraged memory. The features became so old and worn and pitiful that Mallory was touched.
"You old rascal!" he exclaimed. "These diamonds are my own property. They were stolen from my town house some time ago. How did you get them?"
"I think mine is the fitter state of mind to give the solution," said Beggarstaff. "Our friend here deals in stolen goods of the highest class. When he came to see me I surmised something of the kind at the time. No man could have been in so abject a state of terror as he was over a mere loss. For my own sake I made inquiries here. I found Israel dubbed a millionaire and a miser. That he has confederates I had physical proofs a while ago. But until to-night I was not absolutely certain of my man. I came here to denounce yonder young lady, because after the New Bohemian adventure, I could give a pretty good guess who stole the jewels. The fact is, I surmised Israel had a monomania for jewels, and would retain the stones. I was right. I could not be certain yours were here, Mallory, but I played up to it on the off chance. Did I not tell you that this was going to prove a most remarkable adventure?"
Zilla came forward hastily.
"On my word I am innocent of this knowledge!" she said.
Obviously she spoke the truth. It was impossible to look in her face and doubt. Israel crouched miserably in a chair, waiting for his sentence.
"Zilla," said Mallory, "I am of the same mind still."
"But the religious element," suggested Beggarstaff.
Zilla smiled through a mist of tears.
"Woman has but one religion," she said; "and there is the man who taught me. So long as I have him, the rest is nothing."
Beggarstaff turned sternly to Ben Israel.
"You hear that," he said. "You can dispose of your ill-gotten property as you please, but you are going to consent with a good grace. And you are going to lay your hand on the head of your son's child and pray for her happiness."
"Give me till to-morrow," Israel pleaded. "My curses I recall willingly. Am I to be outdone in clemency by a mere Christian? But as to the rest, I am an old, old man, and you do not know what you ask."
IT was well into the marrow of the morning, and a cab stood at Mallory's door. Out of it stepped Zilla, sweet and chastened, a dream in black lace. Mallory congratulated himself on the fact of his sister's presence.
"Zilla," he exclaimed—. "Zilla as I always see her—"
"And always will, Peter. My grandfather died in the night; they found him dead in his bed this morning. And I have come to you."