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Charliewood sat down in obedience to a motion of his host's hand. He sat down with a sigh, for he knew that he had been summoned to Sir William Gouldesbrough's house to perform yet another duty which was certain to be distasteful and furtive.
Yes! there was no hope for it now. For the last few years the man about town had been under the dominion of a stronger will than his, of a more cunning, of a more ruthless brain. Little by little he had become entangled within the net that Gouldesbrough had spread for him. And the lure had been then and afterwards a lure of money – the one thing Charliewood worshipped in the world.
The history of the growth of his secret servitude to this famous man was a long one. Money had been lent to him, he had signed this or that paper, he had found his other large debts bought up by the scientist, and at the end of three years he had found himself willy nilly, body and soul, the servant of this man, who could ruin him in a single moment and cast him down out of his comfortable life for ever and a day.
No living soul knew or suspected that there was any such bond as this between the two men. Even Charliewood's enemies never guessed the truth – that he was a sort of jackal, a spy to do his master's bidding, to execute this or that secret commission, to go and come as he was ordered.
As yet all the services which Charliewood had rendered to Sir William, and for which, be it said, he was excellently paid, were those which, though they bordered upon the dishonourable and treacherous, never actually overstepped the borders.
Gouldesbrough employed Charliewood to find out this or that, to make acquaintance with one person or another, to lay the foundation, in fact, of an edifice which he himself would afterwards build upon information supplied by the clubman. There was no crime in any of these proceedings, no robbery or black-mail. And what happened after he had done his work Charliewood neither knew nor cared. Of one thing, however, he was certain, that whatever the scientist's motives might be – and he did not seek to probe them – they were not those of the ordinary criminal or indeed ever bordered upon the criminal at all. All that Charliewood knew, and realized with impotence and bitterness, was that he had allowed himself to become a mere tool and spy of this man's, a prober of secrets, a walker in tortuous by-paths.
"What did you wire to me for?" Charliewood said in a sulky voice. "What do you want me to do now?"
Sir William looked quickly at his guest, and there was a momentary gleam of ill-temper in his eyes, but he answered smoothly enough.
"My dear Charliewood, I wish you wouldn't take that tone. Surely we have been associated too long together for you to speak to me in that way now. It has suited your convenience to do certain things for me, and it has suited my convenience to make it worth your while to do them. There is the whole matter. Please let's be friendly, as we always have been."
Charliewood shrugged his shoulders.
"You know very well, Gouldesbrough," he said, "that I am in your hands and have got to do anything you ask me in reason. However, I don't want to insist on that aspect of the question if you don't. What did you wire to me for?"
"Well," Sir William said, passing a cigar-box over to the other, though he did not smoke himself, "there is a certain man that I am interested in. I don't know him personally, though I know something about him. I want to know him, and I want to know everything I can about him too."
"I suppose," Charliewood answered, "that there is no difficulty for you in getting to know anybody you want to?" He said it with a slight sneer.
"Oh, of course not," Sir William answered, "but still in this case I want you to get to know him first. You can easily do this if you wish, you are sure to have some mutual acquaintances. When you get to know him make yourself as pleasant as you can be to him – and nobody can do that more gracefully than yourself, my dear boy. Become his intimate friend, if possible, and let me know as much as you can about his habits and objects in life. I don't want you to spare any expense in this matter if it is necessary to spend money, and of course you will draw upon me for all you require in the matter."
Charliewood held up his cigar and looked steadily at the crust of white ash which was forming at the end.
"What's the man's name?" he asked without moving his eyes.
"His name," said Sir William lightly, "is Rathbone, a Mr. Guy Rathbone. He is a barrister and has chambers in the Temple. A youngish man, I understand, of about seven and twenty."
At the name Charliewood gave a momentary start. He allowed a slight smile to come upon his lips, and it was not a pleasant smile.
Gouldesbrough saw it, flushed a little and moved uneasily, feeling that although this man was his servant there were yet disadvantages in employing him, and that he also could sting when he liked.
Directly Sir William had mentioned the name of the person on whose actions and life, not to put too fine a point on it, he was ordering his henchman to become a spy, Charliewood knew the reason. He realized in an instant what was the nature of the interest Sir William Gouldesbrough took in Mr. Guy Rathbone, barrister-at-law.
The famous scientist, long, it was said in society, a man quite impervious to the attractions of the other sex and the passion of love, had but a few months ago become engaged.
Wealthy as he was, distinguished, handsome and attractive in his manner, there had not been wanting ladies who would have very gladly shared and appropriated all these advantages. Like any other unmarried man in his desirable position, the scientist had been somewhat pursued in many drawing-rooms. Of late, however, the pursuit had slackened. Match-making mothers and unappropriated daughters seemed to have realized that here was a citadel they could not storm. Six months ago, therefore, society had been all the more startled to hear of Sir William's engagement to Miss Marjorie Poole, the only daughter of old Lady Poole of Curzon Street.
Marjorie Poole was the daughter of a rather poor baronet who had died some years before, the title going to a cousin. Lady Poole was left with a house in Curzon Street and a sufficient income for her own life, but that was all. And among many of the women who hunt society for a husband for their daughters, as a fisherman whips a stream for trout, the dowager was one of the most conspicuous.
It was said that she had angled for Sir William with an alertness and unwearying pursuit which was at last crowned by success. More charitable people, and especially those who knew and liked Miss Poole, said that the girl would never have lent herself to any schemes of her mother's unless she had been genuinely fond of the man to whom she was engaged. There had been much talk and speculation over the engagement at first, a speculation which had in its turn died away, and which during the last few weeks had been again revived by certain incidents.
Eustace Charliewood, whose whole life and business it was to gather and retail society gossip, was very well aware of the reason which made people once more wag their heads and hint this or that about the Gouldesbrough engagement.
Mr. Guy Rathbone had appeared upon the scene, a young barrister of good family but of no particular fortune. Several times Mr. Rathbone had been seen skating with Miss Poole at Prince's. At this or that dance – Sir William Gouldesbrough did not go to dances – Rathbone had danced a good deal with Miss Poole. Many envious and linx-like eyes had watched them for some weeks, and men were beginning to say in the clubs that "young Rathbone is going to put the scientific Johnny's nose out of joint."
It was this knowledge which caused the little sneering smile to appear on Charliewood's face, and it gave him pleasure to detect the human weakness of jealousy in the inscrutable man who held him so tightly in his grip.
"Well, all right," Charliewood said at length. "I'll do what you want."
"That's a good fellow," Sir William answered, smiling genially, his whole face lighting up and becoming markedly attractive as it did so, "you've always been a good friend to me, Charliewood."
"My banking account is very low just at present," the other went on.
"Then I'll write you a cheque at once," Sir William answered, getting up from his chair and going to the writing-table in the corner of the room.
Charliewood's face cleared a little. Then he noticed his cigar had been burning all down one side. He dropped it into an ash-tray and put his hand in his coat pocket to find a cigarette.
He took out an ordinary silver case, when his eye fell upon the crest engraved upon the cover. He started and looked again, turning it so that the light fell full upon it.
The crest of the Charliewood family was a hand with a battle-axe and the motto, "Ne Morare," and in the usual custom it was engraved upon Charliewood's own case.
But this was not the Charliewood crest. It was a wyvern charged on a shield, and the motto consisted of the single word "GARDEZ."
He gave a startled exclamation.
"What's the matter?" Sir William said, turning round sharply.
"I've got some other fellow's cigarette-case," Charliewood answered in amazement, opening it as he did so.
There was only one cigarette in the case, but there were several visiting-cards in one compartment, and moreover the name of the owner was cut in the inside of the lid.
The case dropped from Charliewood's fingers with a clatter, and he grew quite pale.
"What is it?" his host inquired again.
"Have you been playing some infernal trick on me, Gouldesbrough?" Charliewood said.
"No; why?"
"Because this cigarette-case, by some strange chance, is the cigarette-case of the man we've been talking about, this Guy Rathbone!"
He stood up, thrusting his hands deep into the pockets of the fur coat as he did so. Then he pulled out a letter, stamped and addressed and obviously ready for the post.
"Good heavens!" he said, "here's something else. It's a letter for the post."
"Who is it addressed to?" Sir William asked in a curious voice.
Charliewood looked at it and started again.
"As I live," he answered, "it's addressed to Miss Poole, 100A, Curzon Street!"
There was a curious silence for a moment or two. Both men looked at each other, and mingled astonishment and alarm were on the face of either. The whole thing seemed uncanny. They seemed, while concocting something like a plot, to have trodden unawares into another.
Suddenly Charliewood stamped his foot upon the ground and peeled off his overcoat.
"I've got it," he cried. "Why, of course I've seen the very man myself this morning. This is his coat, not mine. I went to a hairdresser's this morning and left my coat in the ante-room while I was going through a massage treatment. When I came out there was a man waiting there for his turn, and I must have taken his coat in exchange for mine. And the man was this Mr. Guy Rathbone, of course. You know these dark blue coats lined with astrachan are quite ordinary, everybody is wearing them this year. And I noticed, by Jove, that the thing seemed a little tight in the cab! It's about the oddest coincidence that I've ever come across in my life!"
Sir William bowed his head in thought for a minute or two.
"Well, this is the very best opportunity you could have, my dear fellow," he said, "of making the man's acquaintance. Of course you can take him back the coat and the cigarette-case at once."
"And the letter?" Charliewood said swiftly. "The letter to Miss Poole?"
Sir William looked curiously at his guest.
"I think," he said slowly, "that I'll just spend half-an-hour with this letter first. Then you can take it away with the other things. I assure you that it will look just the same as it does now."
Charliewood shrugged his shoulders.
"Have it your own way," he said contemptuously, "but don't ask me to open any letters to a lady, that's all."
Sir William flushed up and was about to make an angry reply, when the door of the study was suddenly thrown open and they saw the butler standing there.
There was a rustle of skirts in the passage.
"Lady Poole and Miss Poole, sir," said the butler.
CHAPTER III
NEWS OF A REVOLUTION
Marjorie and Lady Poole came into the room. For two at least of the people there it was an agonizing moment. But a second before, Sir William Gouldesbrough had been proposing to steal and open a letter written by another man to his fiancée. But a second before, Mr. Eustace Charliewood, the well-known society man, had sullenly acquiesced in the proposal. And now here was Marjorie Poole confronting them.
"We thought we'd come to tea, William," Lady Poole said effusively, going forward to shake hands with her future son-in-law. "Ah, Mr. Charliewood, how do you do?" She gave him a bright nod, and he turned to Marjorie, while her mother was shaking hands with the scientist.
Charliewood's face was flushed a deep red, and his hand trembled so that the tall girl looked at him in some surprise.
Marjorie Poole was a maiden for whom many men had sighed. The oval face with its pure olive complexion, the large brown eyes, clear as a forest pool, the coiled masses of hair, the colour of deeply ripened corn, made up a personality of singular distinction and charm. She was the sort of girl of whom people asked, "Who is she?" And if younger sons and other people who knew that they could never win and wear her, said that she was a little too reserved and cold, it was only a prejudiced way of expressing her complete grace and ease of manner.
"How are you, Mr. Charliewood?" she said in a clear, bell-like voice. "I haven't seen you since the Carr's dance."
"Well, to tell the truth, Miss Poole," Charliewood answered with a voice that had a singular tremor in it, "you startled me out of my wits when you came in. Just a moment before, Sir William had mentioned your name, and we were both thinking of you when, as quick as one of those ridiculous entrances on the stage, pat upon the very word, the butler threw open the door and you came in."
"Oh, a stage entrance!" Marjorie answered. "I don't like stage entrances;" and turning away she went up to her fiancé, making it quite clear that, whatever her opinions about the conventions of the boards might be, she did not like Mr. Charliewood.
The big, light-haired man stayed for a moment or two, made a few conventional remarks, and then wished his host farewell.
As he crossed the hall he began mechanically to put on the heavy astrachan coat upon his arm, then, with a muttered curse which surprised the butler, he took it off again and hurriedly left the house.
"Well, and how are you, William?" said Lady Poole, sitting down by the fire. "Are you going to give us some tea? We have been paying calls, and I told Marjorie that we would just come on and see how you were, in case you might be in. And how is the electricity going? Why don't you invent a flying-machine? I'm sure it would be more useful than the things you do invent. How charming it would be to step out of one's bedroom window into one's aëriel brougham and tell the man to fly to the Savoy!"
Gouldesbrough did not immediately reply, but old Lady Poole was used to this.
She was a tall, florid old thing, richly dressed, with an ample and expansive manner. Now that Sir William had proposed and the forthcoming marriage was an accepted thing, the good lady felt her duty was done. Having satisfied herself of Sir William's position, his banking account and his general eligibility, she cared for nothing else, and she had grown quite accustomed to the little snubs she received from his hands from time to time.
Gouldesbrough was looking at Marjorie. His deep blue eyes had leapt up from their usual intense calm into flame. The thin-cut lips were slightly parted, the whole man had become humanized and real in a single moment.
The sinister suggestion had dropped from him as a cloak is thrown off, and he remembered nothing of the plot he had been hatching, but only saw before him the radiant girl he adored with all the force of his nature and all the passion of a dark but powerful soul, to which love had never come before.
"How are you, dearest?" he said anxiously. "Do you know that I haven't heard from you or seen you for nearly four days? Tell me all that you have been doing, all that you have been thinking."
"Four days, is it?" Lady Poole broke in. "Well, you know, my dear William, you will have plenty of time with Marjorie in the future, you mustn't attempt to monopolize her just at present. There have been so many engagements, and I'm sure you have been entirely happy with the electricity, haven't you? Such a comfort, I think, to have a hobby. It gives a real interest in life. And I'm sure, when a hobby like yours has proved so successful, it's an additional advantage. I have known so many men who have been miserable because they have never had anything to do to amuse them. And unless they take up wood-carving or fretwork or something, time hangs so heavily, and they become a nuisance to their wives. Poor Sir Frederick only took up tact as a hobby. Though that was very useful at a party, it was horribly boring in private life. One always felt he understood one too well!"
Up to the present Marjorie had said nothing. She seemed slightly restless, and the smile that played about her lips was faint and abstracted. Her thoughts seemed elsewhere, and the scrutiny of the deep blue eyes seemed slightly to unnerve her.
At that moment the butler entered, followed by a footman carrying a tea-table.
Marjorie sank down with a sigh of relief.
"I'm so tired," she said in a quiet voice. "Mother's been dragging me about to all sorts of places. William, why do you have that horrid man, Eustace Charliewood, here? He always seems about the house like a big tame cat. I detest him."
Gouldesbrough winced at the words. He had put his hand into the side-pocket of his coat, and his fingers had fallen upon a certain letter. Ah! why, indeed, did he have Charliewood for a friend?
His answer was singularly unconvincing, and the girl looked at him in surprise. He was not wont to speak thus, with so little directness.
"Oh, I don't know, dear," he answered. "He's useful, you know. He attends to a lot of things for me that I'm too busy to look after myself."
Again Marjorie did not answer.
"What have you been doing, William?" she said at length, stirring the tea in her cup.
"I've been thinking about you principally," he answered.
She frowned a little. "Oh, I don't mean in that way," she answered quickly. "Tell me about real things, important things. What are you working at now? How is your work going?"
He noticed that something like enthusiasm had crept into her voice – that she took a real interest in his science. His heart throbbed with anger. It was not thus that he wished to hear her speak. It was he himself, not his work, that he longed with all his heart and soul this stately damsel should care about.
But, resolute always in will, completely master of himself and his emotion, he turned at once and began to give her the information which she sought.
And as he spoke his voice soon began to change. It rang with power. It became vibrant, thrilling. There was a sense of inordinate strength and confidence in it.
While old Lady Poole leant back in her chair with closed eyes and a gentle smile playing about her lips, enjoying, in fact, a short and well-earned nap, the great scientist's passionate voice boomed out into the room and held Marjorie fascinated.
She leant forward, listening to him with strained attention – her lips a little parted, her face alight with interest, with eagerness.
"You want to hear, dearest," he said, "you want to hear? And to whom would I rather tell my news? At whose feet would I rather lay the results of all I am and have done? Listen! Even to you I cannot tell everything. Even to you I cannot give the full results of the problems I have been working at for so many years. But I can tell you enough to hold your attention, to interest you, as you have never been interested before."
He began to speak very slowly.
"I have done something at last, after years of patient working and thought, which it is not too much to say will revolutionize the whole of modern life – will revolutionize the whole of life, indeed, as it has never been changed before. All the other things I have done and made, all the results of my scientific work have been but off-shoots of this great central idea, which has been mine since I first began. The other things that have won me fame and fortune were discovered upon the way towards the central object of my life. And now, at last, I find myself in full possession of the truth of all my theories. In a month or two from now my work will be perfected, then the whole world will know what I have done. And the whole world will tremble, and there will be fear and wonder in the minds of men and women, and they will look at each other as if they recognized that humanity at last was waking out of a sleep and a dream."
"Is it so marvellous as all that?" she said almost in a whisper, awed by the earnestness of his manner.
