Part 12 (1/2)

CHAPTER XIII

ALBAN REVISITS UNION STREET

Alban escaped from the Sporting Club at a quarter to eleven, sick of its fetid atmosphere and wearied by its mock brutalities. He made no apologies for quitting w.i.l.l.y Forrest--for, truth to tell, that merry worthy was no longer capable of understanding them. Frequent calls for whisky-and-soda, added to a nice taste for champagne at dinner, left the Captain in that maudlin condition in which a man is first cousin to all the world--at once garrulous and effusive and generally undesirable.

Alban had, above all things, a contempt for a drunken man; and leaving Forrest to the care of others of his kind, he went out into the street and made his way slowly eastward.

It was an odd thing to recall; but he had hardly set foot east of the Temple, he remembered, since the day when the bronze gates of Richard Gessner's house first closed upon him and the vision of wonderland burst upon his astonished eyes. The weeks had been those of unending kindness, of gifts showered abundantly, of promises for the future which might well overwhelm him by their generosity. Let him but consent to claim his rights, Gessner had said, and every ambition should be gratified. No other explanation than that of a lagging justice could he obtain--and no other had he come to desire. If he remained at Hampstead, the image of Anna Gessner, of a perfect womanhood as he imagined it, kept him to the house. He did not desire his patron's money; he began to discover how few were his wants and how small the satisfaction of their gratification could be. But the image he wors.h.i.+pped ever--and at its feet all other desires were forgotten.

And now reality had come with its sacrilegious hand, warring upon the vision and bidding him open his eyes and see. It was easy enough to estimate this adventurer w.i.l.l.y Forrest at his true worth, less easy to bind the wounds imagination had received and to set the image once more upon its ancient pedestal. Could he longer credit Anna with those qualities with which his veneration had endowed her? Must there not be heart searchings and rude questionings, the abandonment of the dream and the stern corrections of truth? He knew not what to think. A voice of reproach asked him if he also had not forgotten. The figure of little Lois Boriskoff stood by him in the shadows, and he feared to speak with her lest she should accuse him.

Let it be said in justice that he had written to Lois twice, and heard but lately that she had left Union Street and gone, none knew whither.

His determination to do his utmost for her and her father, to bid them share his prosperity and command him as they would, had been strong with him from the first and delayed only by the amazing circ.u.mstances of his inheritance. He did not understand even yet that he had the right to remain at ”Five Gables,” but this right had so often been insisted upon that he began at last to believe in its reality and to accept the situation as a _chose jugee_. And with the conviction, there came an intense longing to revisit the old scenes--who knows, it may have been but the promptings of a vanity after all.

It was a great thing, indeed, to be walking there in the glare of the lamps and telling himself that fortune and a future awaited him, that the instrument of mighty deeds would be his inheritance, and that the years of his poverty were no more. How cringingly he had walked sometimes in the old days when want had shamed him and wealth looked down upon him with contempt. To-night he might stare the boldest in the face, nurse fabulous desires and know that they would be gratified, peer through the barred windows of the shops and say all he saw was at his command. A sense of might and victory attended his steps. He understood what men mean when they say that money is power and that it rules the world.

He turned eastward, and walking with rapid strides made his way down the Strand and thence by Ludgate Circus to Aldgate and the mean streets he knew so well. It was nearly midnight when he arrived there, and yet he fell in with certain whom he knew and pa.s.sed them by with a genial nod.

His altered appearance, the black overcoat and the scarf which hid his dress clothes, called for many a ”Gor blime” or ”Strike me dead.” Women caught his arm and wrestled with him, roughs tried to push him from the pavement and were amazed at his good humor. In Union Street he first met little red-haired Chris Denham and asked of her the news. She shrank back from him as though afraid, and answered almost in a whisper.

”Lois gone--she went three weeks ago. I thought you'd have know'd it--I thought you was sweet on her, Alban. And now you come here like that--what's happened to you, whatever have you been doing of?”

He told her gaily that he had found new friends.

”But I haven't forgotten the old ones, Chris, and I'm coming down to see you all some day soon. How's your mother--what's she doing now?”

The girl shrugged her shoulders and the glance she turned upon him seemed to say that she would sooner speak on any other subject.

”What should she be doin'--what's any of us doin' but slave our bones off and break our hearts. You've come to see Lois' father, haven't you?

Oh, yes, I know how much you want to talk about my mother. The old man's up there in the shop--I saw him as I came by.”

Alban stood an instant irresolute. How much he would have liked to offer some a.s.sistance to this poor girl, to speak of real pecuniary help and friends.h.i.+p. But he knew the people too well. The utmost delicacy would be necessary.

”Well,” he said, ”I'm sorry things are not better, Chris. I've had a good Sat.u.r.day night, you see, and if I can do anything, don't you mind letting me know. We'll talk of it when we have more time. I'm going on to see Boriskoff now, and I doubt that I'll find him out of bed.”

She laughed a little wildly, still turning almost pathetic eyes upon him.

”Is it true that it's all off between you and Lois--all the Court says it is. That's why she went away, they say--is it true, Alb, or are they telling lies? I can't believe it myself. You're not the sort to give a girl over--not one that's stood by you as well as Lois. Tell me it ain't true or I shall think the worse of you.”

The question staggered him and he could not instantly answer it. Was it true or false? Did he really love little Lois and had he still an intention to marry her? Alban had never looked the situation straight in the face until this moment.

”I never tell secrets,” he exclaimed a little lamely, and turning upon his heel, he shut his ears to the hard laugh which greeted him and went on, as a man in a dream, to old Boriskoff's garret. A lamp stood in the window there and the tap of a light hammer informed him that the indefatigable Pole was still at work. In truth, old Paul was bending copper tubing--for a firm which said that he had no equal at the task and paid him a wage which would have been despised by a crossing-sweeper.

Alban entered the garret quietly and was a little startled by the sharp exclamation which greeted him. He knew nothing, of course, of the part this crafty Pole had played or what his own change of circ.u.mstance owed to him. To Alban, Paul Boriskoff was just the same mad revolutionary as before--at once fanatic and dreamer and, before then, the father of Lois who had loved him. If the old fellow had no great welcome for the young Englishman to-night, let that be set down to his sense of neglect and, in some measure, to his daughter's absence.

”Good evening, Mr. Boriskoff, you are working very late to-night.”

Alban stood irresolute at the door, watching the quick movements of the s.h.a.ggy brows and wondered what had happened to old Paul that he should be received so coolly. Had he known what was in the Pole's mind he would have as soon have jumped off London Bridge as have braved the anger of one who judged him so mercilessly in that hour. For Boriskoff had heard the stories which Hampstead had to tell, and he had said, ”He will ruin Lois' life and I have put the power to do so in his hands.”

”The poor do not choose their hours, Alban Kennedy. Sit down, if you please, and talk to me. I have much to say to you.”