Part 21 (1/2)

”You will return me my money, and my book, and I will go elsewhere.”

”The ma.n.u.script, yes--but if I refuse to give back the money?”

”Ha! ha! ha!” M. De Bac's mirthless laugh chilled Brown to the bone.

”Very good, Brown--but you won't refuse. Sign that like a good fellow,” and he flung a piece of paper towards Brown, who saw that it was a promissory note, drawn up in his name, agreeing to pay M. De Bac the sum of six thousand pounds on demand.

”I shall do no such thing,” said Brown stoutly.

M. De Bac made no answer, but calmly touched the bell. In a half-minute Simmonds appeared.

”Be good enough to witness Mr. Brown's signature to that doc.u.ment,”

said De Bac to him, and then fixed his gaze on Brown. There was a moment of hesitation, and then--the publisher signed his name, and Simmonds did likewise as a witness. When the latter had gone, De Bac carefully put the paper by in a letter-case he drew from his vest pocket.

”Your scientific people would call this an exhibition of odic force, Brown--eh?”

Brown made no answer. He was shaking in every limb, and great pearls of sweat rolled down his forehead.

”You see, Brown,” continued De Bac, ”after all you are a free agent.

Either agree to my terms and keep the money, or say you will not, pay me back, receive your note-of-hand, and I go elsewhere with my book.

Come--time is precious.”

”And from Brown's lips there hissed a low 'I agree.'

”Then that is settled,” and De Bac rose from his chair. ”There is a little thing more--stretch out your arm like a good fellow--the right arm.”

Brown did so; and De Bac placed his forefinger on his wrist, just between what palmists call ”the lines of life.” The touch was as that of a red-hot iron, and with a quick cry Brown drew back his hand and looked at it. On his wrist was a small red trident, as cleanly marked as if it had been tattooed into the skin. The pain was but momentary; and, as he looked at the mark, he heard De Bac say, ”Adieu once more, Brown. I will find my way out--don't trouble to rise.” Brown heard him wish Simmonds an affable ”Good-day,” and he was gone.

CHAPTER III.

”THE MARK OF THE BEAST.”

It was early in the spring that Brown published ”The Yellow Dragon”--as the collection of tales left with him by De Bac was called--and the success of the book surpa.s.sed his wildest expectations. It became the rage. There were the strangest rumours afloat as to its authors.h.i.+p, for no one knew De Bac, and the name of the writer was supposed to be an a.s.sumed one. It was written by a clergyman; it was penned by a schoolgirl; it had employed the leisure of a distinguished statesman during his retirement; it was the work of an ex-crowned head. These, and such-like statements, were poured forth one day to be contradicted the next. Wherever the book was noticed it was either with the most extravagant praise or the bitterest rancour.

But friend and foe were alike united on one thing--that of ascribing to its unknown author a princely genius. The greatest of the reviews, after pouring on ”The Yellow Dragon” the vials of its wrath, concluded with these words of unwilling praise: ”There is not a sentence of this book which should ever have been written, still less published; but we do not hesitate to say that, having been written and given to the world, there is hardly a line of this terrible work which will not become immortal--to the misery of mankind.”

Be this as it may, the book sold in tens of thousands, and Brown's fortune was a.s.sured. In ten years a man may do many things; but during the ten years that followed the publication of ”The Yellow Dragon,”

Brown did so many things that he astonished ”the city,” and it takes not a little to do that. It was not alone the marvellous growth of his business--although that advanced by leaps and bounds until it overshadowed all others--it was his wonderful luck on the Stock Exchange. Whatever he touched turned to gold. He was looked upon as the Napoleon of finance. His connection with ”The Yellow Dragon” was forgotten when his connection with the yellow sovereign was remembered. He had a palace in Berks.h.i.+re; another huge pile owned by him overlooked Hyde Park. He was a county member and a cabinet-minister. He had refused a peerage and built a church. Could ambition want more? He had clean forgotten De Bac. From him he had heard no word, received no sign, and he looked upon him as dead. At first, when his eyes fell on the red trident on his wrist, he was wont to shudder all over; but as years went on he became accustomed to the mark, and thought no more of it than if it had been a mole. In personal appearance he was but little changed, except that his hair was thin and grey, and there was a bald patch on the top of his head.

His wife had died four years ago, and he was now contemplating another marriage--a marriage that would ally him with a family dating from the Confessor.

Such was John Brown, when we meet him again ten years after De Bac's visit, seated at a large writing-table in his luxurious office. A clerk standing beside him was cutting open the envelopes of the morning's post, and placing the letters one by one before his master.

It is our friend Simmonds--still a young man, but bent and old beyond his years, and still on ”thirty bob” a week. And the history of Simmonds will show how Brown carried out De Bac's instructions.

When ”The Yellow Dragon” came out and business began to expand, Simmonds, having increased work, was ambitious enough to expect a rise in his salary, and addressed his chief on the subject. He was put off with a promise, and on the strength of that promise Simmonds, being no wiser than many of his fellows, married M'ria; and husband and wife managed to exist somehow with the help of the mother-in-law. Then the mother-in-law died, and there was only the bare thirty s.h.i.+llings a week on which to live, to dress, to pay Simmonds' way daily to the city and back, and to feed more than two mouths--for Simmonds was amongst the blessed who have their quivers full. Still the expected increase of pay did not come. Other men came into the business and pa.s.sed over Simmonds. Brown said they had special qualifications. They had; and John Brown knew Simmonds better than he knew himself. The other men were paid for doing things Simmonds could not have done to save his life; but he was more than useful in his way. A hundred times it was in the mind of the wretched clerk to resign his post and seek to better himself elsewhere. But he had given hostages to fortune.

There was M'ria and her children, and M'ria set her face resolutely against risk. They had no reserve upon which to fall back, and it was an option between partial and total starvation. So ”Sim,” as M'ria called him, held on and battled with the wolf at the door, the wolf gaining ground inch by inch. Then illness came, and debt, and then--temptation. ”Sim” fell, as many a better man than he has fallen.