Helen Ford

“Ah, good afternoon, Mr. Ford,” he said, with affability, cordially grasping the inventor’s hand. “Still at your work, I see. I could not resist the impulse to call and inquire after your progress. It seems such a welcome relief to come from the close, dusty court-room to this little retreat of yours. And how are you getting on, my dear friend?”

“I am advancing as rapidly as I anticipated,” said Mr. Ford, pausing in the midst of an intricate calculation. “I feel that I have every reason to be encouraged.”

“I am delighted to hear it,” exclaimed the lawyer, with friendly enthusiasm. “Then you really think that before many years we shall be able to skim from country to country on the wings of the wind, so to speak.”

“I have not a doubt of it,” answered the inventor, in a tone of quiet confidence. “We already know how great a degree of speed has been attained by our steamers and locomotives, in the face of far greater obstacles than are to be encountered in the case of aërial navigation. The great impediment to the speed of the locomotive is, as you are doubtless aware, the friction that necessarily results from its constant contact with the earth.”

Mr. Sharp nodded assent.

“While the speed of the ocean-steamer is in like manner very materially lessened by the resistance of the water.”

Mr. Sharp had often been struck by this very thought. Indeed, he had expended considerable time and thought in the leisure stolen from his professional cares in attempting to devise means for remedying to some extent these causes of loss. For, as he had before assured Mr. Ford, though a lawyer by profession, his tastes lay in quite a different direction.

“Now in traversing the air,” continued Mr. Ford, “we have the advantage of not being obliged to contend either with the friction generated by constant contact with the earth, or with the resistance of a foreign element like water. All that needs to be overcome is the resistance of the air, which is no greater than in the other cases, while the other obstacles are removed.”

“Very true,” said Mr. Sharp, with an air of profound conviction.

“All that is needed to establish aërial navigation on a firm basis is to find some means of steadying and regulating the motion, which no doubt would be incredibly rapid. It is intended that the machine shall partake of the nature of a balloon, as buoyancy will of course be requisite.”

“My dear sir,” said Mr. Sharp, warmly grasping the hand of the inventor, “nothing could be more clear and lucid than your explanation. The same course of reasoning, if you will permit me to say so, has more than once suggested itself to me, but, if I may be allowed the expression, it is an idiosyncrasy of mine to possess more theoretical than practical ability. Therefore even if my many engagements would suffer it, I doubt whether I should become a successful inventor. You, my dear sir, who so happily combine both, are admirably adapted to that high vocation.”

“I ought to succeed,” said Mr. Ford, with a little sigh, “if the labor and thought of many years employed in one direction can achieve success.”

“I hope,” said the visitor, as if the question had just occurred to him, “that you have made free use of the money it was my privilege to offer you recently.”

Mr. Ford replied gratefully, that he had expended about one half of it. He hoped to be able to repay it some day.

“Of course,” argued the lawyer to himself, “he could not pay it now. That is what I wanted to know.”

“I ought perhaps to mention,” he said, carelessly, “that having a large claim unexpectedly presented for payment yesterday, I raised money upon your note, expressly stipulating that you should not be called upon for it, as I should be able to redeem it in a day or two.”

“You are very kind,” said Mr. Ford. “Perhaps I had better return you the money yet remaining in my hands.”

“By no means, my dear sir,” exclaimed Mr. Sharp, almost indignantly; “shall I recall the humble offering which I have laid upon the altar of science? Nay, I am resolved that my name shall be humbly connected with yours, when the world has learned to recognize your genius, and numbers you among its benefactors.”

How was it possible to suspect a friendship so disinterested?

CHAPTER XXIII.

THE BLOW FALLS

The next morning found Mr. Sharp closeted with a brother practitioner equally unprincipled with himself. There was this difference between them, however, that while Mr. Sharp concealed his real character beneath a specious show of affability and suavity, his companion, whom, by way of distinction, we will call Blunt, was rough in his manners, and had not art enough to compass the consummate duplicity of the other. Indeed, so accustomed was Mr. Sharp to its use, that he did not lay it aside even where he knew it to be useless.

“My dear friend Blunt,” he exclaimed, with charming cordiality, “I am delighted to see you looking so well.”

“Humph?” was the somewhat dubious rejoinder.

“I should have called upon you instead of sending for you to my office, but I have really been so harassed by business that I could not get a single spare moment.”

“And you presumed that I was not overburdened in that way, eh?”

“My dear Blunt,” said Sharp, with wounded feeling, “how can you imagine such a thing?”

“I only judged from what you said. You hadn’t time to call upon me, but judged that I had plenty of time to spend in calling upon you.”

“My dear Blunt,” said Sharp, impressively, “if the extent of a man’s business were always commensurate with his merits–”

“We should neither of us stand a very good chance.”

“That was not exactly what I intended to say,” said Sharp, blowing his nose, “your modesty, my dear Blunt–”

“Modesty! I am sure you’re joking now, Sharp, and although my time is not particularly valuable, I don’t care to stand here discussing personal qualities; so if you had any object in sending for me, out with it.”

“You are somewhat abrupt in your speech, my dear friend; an evidence of your sincerity, for which no one has a greater respect than myself.”

“I have heard,” muttered Blunt, “that people are apt to set a high value on qualities which they lack.”

“However,” pursued Sharp, evading a reply to his last remark, “I have a little professional business to offer you, if your engagement will permit.”

“No fear on that score,” said Blunt, dryly; “but this business—why don’t you do it yourself? You needn’t tell me it’s on account of a pressure of the other engagements, for I know better.”

“That is not the reason, as with your usual penetration you have discovered, my dear Blunt. Do not for a moment think I would attempt to deceive you. With others it might do; but with you I know there would be no chance of succeeding.”

Mr. Sharp nodded with pleasant affability to his visitor, and resumed: “The fact is, it is a matter in which I do not wish to appear. One of my clients (Mr. Sharp brought out these words with an emphasis calculated to convey the idea that it was one of a very large number), for a reason which I need not mention, employed me some weeks since to lend a sum of money to a certain individual. This was only to establish a power over him which, some time, it might be convenient to use. That time has come; it is his desire that the note should be presented with a demand for immediate payment; in default of which a particular article in possession of the borrower should be seized in execution. This, as you may readily imagine, would have a tendency to harrow up my feelings, and–”

“Therefore you intrust the business to me, who have no feelings to be harrowed up.”

“My dear Blunt, I desire you to undertake this, because of your superior strength of mind. I am well aware of my own deficiency in that respect.”

“Well, well, have it as you will. I won’t trouble you to assign reasons for throwing business into my hands. I sha’n’t let any scruples stand between me and my own interest. Where’s the note!”

“One thing more,” said Sharp, slowly unclasping the wallet which contained the note. “This man—Robert Ford—thinks I lent him the money on my own responsibility, and naturally regards me as a firm friend. I called on him yesterday, and hinted that I had been forced to raise money to meet a pressing engagement, and had given up this note as collateral, on condition that it should not be presented. Very probably he may mention this. I don’t wish him to suspect that there is any understanding between us, as it will destroy what little influence I may have over him. You will be kind enough, therefore, to say nothing to undeceive him on that point, and if you could make it convenient to abuse me a little, just to show that there is no collusion between us, I should regard it as a particular favor.”

“Abuse you! I will do it with the greatest pleasure in the world.”

“I knew it, my dear Blunt; it was what I expected of your friendship. But I must give you his direction. Have you all necessary instructions?”

“You have not told me what I am to seize on execution?”

“Very true, an important omission. You must know that this Ford, an estimable man, by the way, has taken a fancy to invent a flying machine, and to that end has collected an odd jumble of machinery. This is what I wish you to seize. Here is the address.”

“And where am I to bring it?”

“You may as well bring it here.”

“How unfortunate that you cannot complete the invention,” said Blunt, dryly. “If it is just as convenient I shouldn’t mind receiving the pay in advance; not,” he continued, with a pointed imitation of his companion’s manner,—“not that I doubt in the least your high-souled integrity, my dear Sharp, but simply because, just at present, singularly enough, I happen to be out of cash.”

“I shall be most happy to discharge your claim forthwith,” said Sharp, rather ostentatiously displaying a roll of bills, and placing a five in the hands of his agent.

Blunt examined the bill with some minuteness, a sudden suspicion having entered his mind as to its genuineness. Satisfied on this point, he slipped it into his vest pocket, saying, “All right, you shall hear from me in the course of the day.”

An hour afterwards a loud authoritative knock aroused Robert Ford, who, it is needless to say, was employed after his usual fashion.

“Come in!”

The invitation was quickly accepted by a shock-headed man, stout and burly, who without ceremony drew out a note, and said, abruptly, “You are Robert Ford, I presume?”

“That is my name, sir,” said the inventor, in some surprise.

“Very well. Here is a note with your signature, payable on demand. I presume it will be perfectly convenient for you to pay it now.”

Mr. Ford took the note with an absent air, and said, glancing at the man before him, “Excuse me, but I do not recollect having seen you before.”

“Very probably,” said Blunt, with sang froid. “We never had the pleasure of meeting before.”

“Then,” said the inventor, “how comes it that you have a demand against me?”

“If you will take the trouble to examine the note, you will find that it comes through a third person, Richard Sharp. You probably remember him.”

“Yes, I know him.”

Mr. Ford glanced at the paper in his hand.

“I think there must be some mistake,” he said. “The sum should be two hundred dollars, not three.”

“There is no mistake,” said Blunt, positively. “It is just as he gave it to me.”

“Mr. Sharp mentioned yesterday,” said Mr. Ford, with a sudden effort at recollection, “that he had parted with this note to some one, but on condition that it should not be presented. You had better see him about it.”

“I have nothing further to do with him,” replied Blunt, “I believe he did mention something of the kind; but of course he cannot expect me to keep this note when I want the money.”

“Then, sir,” said Mr. Ford, “if, as you admit, Mr. Sharp made this condition, it is incumbent on you, as a man of honor, to keep it. I am sure it is very far from Mr. Sharp’s intention to trouble me for the payment of a sum which he loaned without the expectation of immediate repayment. I should wrong his disinterested generosity by harboring such a suspicion.”

“His disinterested generosity!” repeated Blunt, with a loud laugh.

“Sir,” said the inventor, with calm dignity, “I must request you to forbear insinuating by word or manner anything derogatory to a man who has proved himself my benefactor, and, solely impelled by his interest in science, has offered me the aid of his purse, without even an application on my part.”

“Very well,” said Blunt, “although it’s rather amusing to me to hear Sharp spoken of as interested in science, I won’t quarrel with your opinion of him, especially as his character isn’t in question just now. The main point is, can you pay this note?”

“I cannot.”

“Then I shall be under the disagreeable necessity of calling two of my friends in waiting.”

Two Irishmen, who appeared to have been waiting outside, entered at Blunt’s call.

“Take that machinery,” said Blunt, in a tone of command, “and carry it down stairs.”

“Stay!” said Mr. Ford, in alarm; “what do you intend to do?”

“I am only acting in self-defence,” said Blunt, doggedly. “You cannot pay your money. If I can’t get my pay in one way, I must in another; therefore, I take this machinery of yours in execution.”

The thought of this calamity nearly overcame Mr. Ford. He did not pause to consider whether the seizure was legal or illegal, but, in an agitated voice, urged, “Take everything else, but spare me this. It is to me of inestimable value,—greater than you can possibly imagine.”

“That’s the very reason I take it,” said Blunt. “All the rest of your trumpery,” glancing contemptuously at the plain furniture, “wouldn’t be worth carrying away.”

“At least,” implored the inventor, “wait till to-morrow, till I can see Mr. Sharp.”

“And where would you be?” sneered Blunt. “Don’t think to catch me with such chaff; I’m too old a bird. I will take it while it is here.”

“But,” urged Mr. Ford, “it can be of little value to you. You cannot sell it for one quarter of the debt.”

“Perhaps not. But that isn’t what I take it for.”

“What then?”

“As a pledge for its final payment. I care nothing for the trumpery, while you, I know, do. When you come forward and pay the note, you shall have it back again.”

“Do you promise that?” asked the inventor, more cheerfully.

“I will agree to wait a reasonable time.”

Little ceremony was used in the removal of the complicated machinery. Within ten minutes, all that had so fully occupied the thoughts of Mr. Ford, and furnished the pleasure and the occupation of his quiet life, was swept away, and he was left alone. That the labor was to no purpose, and the hopes which he cherished vain, imported little. To him, at least, they were realities, and upon them he had built a dazzling superstructure, which now suddenly crumbled into pieces at his feet.

Lewis Rand’s triumph was thus far complete.

CHAPTER XXIV.

HELEN’S GOOD FORTUNE

Mr. Bowers, the manager, sat at his desk in the little office adjoining the stage, running his eye over a manuscript play presented for examination by an ambitious young man in spectacles.

“Bah!” said the manager, tossing aside the play after a very brief examination, “what can the man be thinking of? Two murders in the first act, and a suicide in the first scene of the second! Such an accumulation of horrors will never do. Here, Jeffries.”

The messenger made his appearance, and stood awaiting orders.

“Here,” said Mr. Bowers, tossing the play towards him, “just do this thing up, and when the author calls this afternoon, tell him from me that it is a very brilliant production, and so on, but, like Addison’s Cato, for example, not adapted for dramatic representation. That will sugar the pill.”

“Is it the tall young man, with a thin face?”

“Yes; his name is Ichabod Smith; but he writes under the nom de plume of Lionel Percy.”

“Yes, sir; I have seen his name in the story papers. He has just written one called ‘The Goblin Lover; or, The Haunted Tower.’”

“Any further orders, sir?” inquired Jeffries, deferentially.

“Has Miss Ford come?”

“No, sir; I think not.”

“Notice when she does, and request her to call at the office a moment.”

“Yes, sir.”

“It is no more than fair that I should increase her salary,” soliloquized Mr. Bowers. “She has really proved quite a card, and richly deserves double what I have hitherto paid. Besides,” he mused, for the manager was by no means neglectful of his own interests, “I should not be surprised if another establishment should try to entice her away by a larger offer. I must bind her till the end of the season.”

At this moment Helen was announced by Jeffries.

She entered, not without a little feeling of embarrassment. She had not often been brought into communication with Mr. Bowers, since her engagement, and now the only reason that occurred to her to account for this unexpected summons was, that she might in some way have given dissatisfaction, although the applause which greeted her nightly seemed hardly consistent with this idea.

Her apprehensions were at once dispelled by the unusually gracious manner in which she was received.

“I am glad to see you, Miss Ford,” said Mr. Bowers, affably; motioning her to a seat. “I have sent for you to say that your services are in the highest degree acceptable to me and to the public. The marks of approval which you receive nightly must be very gratifying to you as they are to me.”

Quite overpowered by this extraordinary condescension on the part of the manager, whom she had been accustomed to regard with a feeling of distant awe and respect, Helen answered that she was very glad that he was satisfied with her.

“To prove how highly I value your services,” continued Mr. Bowers, “I have decided to double your weekly salary, provided you will sign an engagement to remain with us till the end of the season.”

Helen, who had feared on being summoned to the manager’s presence, that it was to be told that her services were dispensed with, hardly knew how to express her gratitude for what was so far beyond her expectations.

“It is very generous in you, sir,” she said, “to increase my salary without my asking for it.”

“I always make it a point,” was the reply, “to recompense merit to the extent of my means.”

“And now,” he added, pushing towards her a contract already drawn up, “if you will sign this obligation to sing for me the remainder of the season on these terms, I shall have no further cause to trespass on your time.”

Helen wrote her name hastily, and withdrew from the manager’s presence, it being already time for rehearsal.

“A very pretty little girl, and not at all aware of her own value,” mused Mr. Bowers. “I am lucky to have secured her.”

Eager to communicate her increase of salary to her father and good Martha Grey, who had always shown so warm an interest in her welfare, Helen hastened home immediately after rehearsal.

Flushed with exercise, and with a bright smile playing over her face, she danced into Martha Grey’s little room.

“O Martha!” she ejaculated, sinking into a chair, “I am all out of breath running, I was so anxious to tell you of my good fortune. You are the very first that I wanted to tell it to.”

“What is it, Helen?” inquired Martha, looking up from her never-ceasing work with an expression of interest.

“What do you think it is? Guess now,” said Helen, smiling.

“I never was good at guessing, Helen. I think the shortest way will be to tell me at once.”

“I have had my salary raised to twelve dollars a week; just think of that, Martha: and all without my asking. I shall be able to buy ever so many nice things for papa, now, that I couldn’t afford before; and I mean to make you a present, besides, Martha; you’ve been so very kind to me.”

“Thank you for the kind thought, my dear child. I will take the will for the deed. But you mustn’t think yourself too rich. If you have any money to spare you had better be laying it up against a time of need. Remember the theatre will be closed for a time in the summer, and your salary will stop. You will want to lay up money to carry you through that time.”

“At any rate, Martha, if you won’t let me spend any money for you, I shall insist on coming in now and then and helping you with your work, so that you can gain time to walk out with me. I am afraid you work too hard. You are looking pale.”

“It is long since I had much color,” said Martha. “You have enough for us both.”

“Then you must go out and get some. But I mustn’t stop a minute longer; I must go up and tell papa;” and she bounded up stairs with a light heart, little suspecting what had taken place during her absence.

What was her surprise to find her father listlessly looking out of the window into the little court below, and otherwise quite unoccupied.

“What is the matter, papa?” inquired Helen, in apprehension; “and where,” for the first time noticing the absence of the work which usually engaged her father,—“where is your machine?”

“It is gone, my child,” said Mr. Ford, despondently.

“Gone! what do you mean, papa? You have not got discouraged, and sent it away?”

“Discouraged! No, Helen; on the contrary, I never felt nearer success than I did a few hours since. But all is changed now.”

“What has become of it, papa?” questioned Helen, in increasing alarm.

“It has been seized for debt, Helen.”

“For debt?”

“Yes; for the note which I gave Mr. Sharp. I had not the money to pay it, so they carried off my machine for security.”

“Is it possible he has been so cruel and unfeeling?” exclaimed Helen, indignantly.

“Do not blame him, my child. I am convinced that it is far from his intention to trouble or distress us. But he parted with the note a day or two since, as he himself told me, on the express condition that it should not be presented for payment, and this stipulation has been disregarded.”

“And how large was this note, papa?”

“For three hundred dollars.”

“Three hundred! I thought it was only two hundred that were lent you.”

“That was my own impression,” said Mr. Ford, with an air of perplexity. “But you know,” he continued, with a melancholy smile, “that I have no head for business. I have been so occupied in other ways. It is quite possible that I have made a mistake.”

“I am afraid,” said Helen, gravely, “that Mr. Sharp is not so much your friend as you imagine.”

“Not my friend, Helen? He offered to lend me this money voluntarily, without any expectation of immediate return. I am certain that when he hears of this affair, he will hasten to make it right.”

“Perhaps I do him wrong,” said Helen, thoughtfully, “and indeed I do not know what good it would do him to annoy us. But, papa, there is one thing I haven’t told you,—a piece of great good news. I have had my salary doubled at the theatre. I shall earn twelve dollars a week. Think of that, papa.”

“But are you not working too hard, Helen?”

“I, working hard! It is only a pleasure for me to sing. I am very lucky in being paid for what I would rather do than not. It is different with poor Martha. She doesn’t earn more than four dollars a week, and has to sit at her sewing from morning till night. I wish I could do something to help her. She looks so tired and pale all the time.”

“God has favored you, my child, in bestowing upon you so choice a gift. I hope you do not fail to thank him for this goodness.”

“Never, papa. I thank him every night.”

“How much money have you left, papa?” she inquired, after a pause.

“I don’t know exactly how much. I had better give it to you to help pay our daily expenses.”

“There are one hundred and twenty dollars,” said Helen, counting it. “Then we shall need one hundred and eighty to make up the balance of the sum mentioned in the note.”

“Surely, I cannot have expended that sum,” said Mr. Ford, with a perplexed look. “If I could see Mr. Sharp?”

“I will go and see him, papa.”

“Perhaps it will be best.”

In five minutes Helen was on her way to the lawyer’s office.

CHAPTER XXV.

MR. SHARP CHANGES HIS BASE

When Lewis Rand made choice of Richard Sharp, a briefless barrister, as his agent, in preference to a lawyer of greater reputation, he was influenced by what he considered satisfactory reasons. In the first place, Mr. Sharp’s easy morality and lack of principle were no unimportant qualifications for the business in which he was to be employed; that he had good qualities of a particular kind Lewis knew; and he judged that his lack of other clients would insure his devotion to his interests.