Part 6 (1/2)
”I am afraid you have received some pernicious teaching down yonder,” he said, with a shake of his abundant locks. ”Mr. Gessner, I may tell you, has an abhorrence of socialism. If you wish to please him, avoid the topic.”
”But I do not wish to please him--I do not even know him. And I'm not a socialist, sir. If Mr. Gessner had ever lived in Whitechapel; if he had starved in a garret, he would understand me. I don't suppose it matters, though, whether he does or not, for we are hardly likely to discuss such things together.”
”My dear lad, he has not sent for you for that, believe me. His conversation will be altogether of a different nature. Let me implore you to remember that he desires to be your benefactor--not your judge.
There is no kinder heart, no more worthy gentleman in all London to-day than Richard Gessner. That much I know and my opportunities are unique.”
Alban could make no reply to this; nor did he desire one. They had pa.s.sed the Jack Straw's Castle by this time, and now the carriage entered a small circular drive upon the right-hand side of the road and drew up before a modern red-bricked mansion, by no means ostentatious or externally characteristic of the luxury for which its interior was famed. Just a trim garden surrounded the house and boasted trees sufficient to hide the picturesque gables from the eyes of the curious.
There were stables in the northern wing and a great conservatory built out toward the south. Alban had but an instant to glance at the beautiful facade when a young butler opened the door to them and ushered them into a vast hall, panelled to the ceiling in oak and dimly lighted by Gothic windows of excellent stained gla.s.s. Here a silence, amazing in its profundity, permitted the very ticking of the clocks to be heard.
All sounds from without, the hoot of the motors, the laughter of children, the grating voices of loafers on the Heath, were instantly shut out. An odor of flowers and fine shrubs permeated the apartment.
The air was cool and clear as though it had pa.s.sed through a lattice of ice.
”Please to wait one moment, Kennedy, and I will go to Mr. Gessner. He expects us and we shall not have long to wait. Is he not in the library, Fellows--ah, I thought he would be there.”
The young butler said ”Yes, sir;” but Alban perceived that it was in a tone which implied some slight note of contempt. ”That fellow,” he thought, ”would have kicked me into the street if I had called here yesterday--and his father, I suppose, kept a public-house or a fish shop.” The reflection flattered his sense of irony; and sitting negligently upon a broad settee, he studied the hall closely, its wonderful panelling, the magnificently carved bal.u.s.trades, the great organ up there in the gallery--and lastly the portraits. Alban liked subject pictures, and these masterpieces of Sargent and Luke Fildes did not make an instantaneous appeal to him. Indeed, he had cast but a brief glance upon the best of them before his eye fell upon a picture which brought the blood to his cheeks as though a hand had slapped them. It was the portrait of the supposed Polish girl whom he had seen upon the balcony of the house in St. James' Square--last night as he visited the caves.
Alban stared at the picture open-mouthed and so lost in amazement that all other interests of his visit were instantly lost to his memory. A hard dogmatic common-sense could make little of a coincidence so amazing. If he had wished to think that the unknown resembled little Lois Boriskoff--if he had wished so much last night, the portrait, seen in this dim light, flattered his desire amazingly. He knew, however, that the resemblance was chiefly one of nationality; and in the same instant he remembered that he had been brought to the house of a Pole.
Was it possible, might he dare to imagine that Paul Boriskoff's friends.h.i.+p had contrived this strange adventure. Some excitement possessed him at the thought, for his spirit had ever been adventurous.
He could not but ask himself to whose house had he come then and for what ends? And why did he find a portrait of the Polish girl therein?
Alban's eyes were still fixed upon the picture when the young butler returned to summon him to the library. He was not a little ashamed to be found intent upon such an occupation, and he rose immediately and followed the man through a small conservatory, aglow with blooms, and so at once into the sanctum where the master of the house awaited him.
Perfect in its way as the library was, Alban had no eyes for it in the presence of Richard Gessner whom thus he met for the first time. Here, truly, he might forget even the accident of the portrait. For he stood face to face with a leader among men and he was clever enough to recognize as much immediately.
Richard Gessner was at that time fifty-three years of age. A man of medium height, squarely built and of fine physique, he had the face rather of a substantial German than of the usually somewhat cadaverous Pole. A tousled black beard hid the jowl almost completely; the eyes were very clear and light blue in color; the head ma.s.sive above the neck but a little low at the forehead. Alban noticed how thin and fragile the white hand seemed as it rested upon a strip of blotting-paper upon the writing-table; the clothes, he thought, were little better than those worn by any foreman in Yarrow's works; the tie was absolutely shabby and the watch-chain nothing better than two lengths of black silk with a seal to keep them together. And yet the mental power, the personal magnetism of Richard Gessner made itself felt almost before he had uttered a single word.
”Will you take a seat, Mr. Kennedy--I am dining in the city to-night and my time is brief. Mr. Geary, I think, has spoken to you of my intentions.”
Alban looked the speaker frankly in the face and answered without hesitation:
”He has told me that you wish to employ me, sir.”
”That I wish to employ you--yes, it is not good for us to be idle. But he has told you something more than that?”
”Indeed,” the curate interrupted, ”very much more, Mr. Gessner. I have told Kennedy that you are ready and willing to take an interest, the greatest possible interest, in his future.”
The banker--for as such Richard Gessner was commonly known--received the interjection a little impatiently and, turning his back slightly, he fixed an earnest look upon Alban's face and watched him critically while he spoke.
”Mr. Kennedy,” he said, ”I never give my reasons. You enter this house to confer a personal obligation upon me. You will remain in that spirit.
I cannot tell you to-night, I may be unable to tell you for many years why you have been chosen or what are the exact circ.u.mstances of our meeting. This, however, I may say--that you are fully ent.i.tled to the position I offer you and that it is just and right I should receive you here. You will for the present remain at Hampstead as one of my family.
There will be many opportunities of talking over your future--but I wish you first to become accustomed to my ways and to this house, and to trouble your head with no speculations of the kind which I could not a.s.sist. I am much in the city, but Mr. Geary will take my place and you can speak to him as you would to me. He is my Major Domo, and needless to say I in him repose the most considerable confidence.”
He turned again toward Mr. Geary and seemed anxious to atone for his momentary impatience. The voice in which he spoke was not unpleasant, and he used the English language with an accent which did not offend.
Rare lapses into odd and unusual sentences betrayed him occasionally to the keen hearer, but Alban, in his desire to know the man and to understand him, made light of these.
”I am to remain in this house, sir--but why should I remain, what right have I to be here?” he asked very earnestly.