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The Last Hope

H >> Henry Seton Merriman >> The Last Hope




"What do you mean?"

"Well--I noticed at Farlingford a certain reluctance to begin. It is in
the blood, I suppose. There is, you know, in the Bourbon blood a certain
strain of--well, let us say of reluctance to begin. Others call it by a
different name. One is not a Bourbon for nothing, I suppose. And
everything--even if it be a vice--that serves to emphasise identity is to
be cultivated. But, as I say, you will have to put your back into it
later on. At present there will be less to do. You will have to play
close and hold your hand, and follow any lead that is given you by de
Gemosac, or by my humble self. You will find that easy enough, I know.
For you have all a Frenchman's quickness to understand. And I suppose--to
put it plainly as between men of the world--now that you have had time to
think it over--you are not afraid, Barebone?"

"Oh no!" laughed Barebone. "I am not afraid."

"One is not a Barebone--or a Bourbon--for nothing," observed Colville, in
an aside to himself. "Gad! I wish I could say that I should not be afraid
myself under similar circumstances. My heart was in my mouth, I can tell
you, in that cabin when de Gemosac blurted it all out. It came suddenly
at the end, and--well!--it rather hit one in the wind. And, as I say, one
is not a Bourbon for nothing. You come into a heritage, eight hundred
years old, of likes and dislikes, of genius and incapacity, of an
astounding cleverness, and a preposterous foolishness without compare in
the history of dynasties. But that doesn't matter nowadays. This is a
progressive age, you know; even the Bourbons cannot hold back the advance
of the times."

"I come into a heritage of friends and of enemies," said Barebone,
gaily--"all ready made. That seems to me more important."

"Gad! you are right," exclaimed Colville. "I said you would do the moment
I saw you step ashore at Farlingford. You have gone right to the heart of
the question at the first bound. It is your friends and your enemies that
will give you trouble."

"More especially my friends," suggested Loo, with a light laugh.

"Right again," answered Colville, glancing at him sideways beneath the
brim of his hat. And there was a little pause before he spoke again.

"You have probably learnt how to deal with your enemies at sea," he said
thoughtfully at length. "Have you ever noticed how an English ship comes
into a foreign harbour and takes her berth at her moorings? There is
nothing more characteristic of the nation. And one captain is like
another. No doubt you have seen Clubbe do it a hundred times. He comes
in, all sail set, and steers straight for the berth he has chosen. And
there are always half a dozen men in half a dozen small boats who go out
to meet him. They stand up and wave their arms, and point this way and
that. They ask a hundred questions, and with their hands round their
faces, shout their advice. And in answer to one and the other the Captain
looks over the side and says, 'You be damned.' That will be the way to
deal with some of your friends and all your enemies alike, Barebone, if
you mean to get on in France. You will have to look over the side at the
people in small boats who are shouting and say, 'You be damned.'"

They were at the gate of a house now, set down in a clearing amid the
pine-trees.

"This is my cousin's house," said Dormer Colville. "It is to be your home
for the present. And you need not scruple, as she will tell you, to
consider it so. It is not a time to think of obligations, you understand,
or to consider that you are running into any one's debt. You may remember
that afterward, perhaps, but that is as may be. For the present there is
no question of obligations. We are all in the same boat--all playing the
same game."

And he laughed below his breath as he closed the gate with caution; for
it was late and the house seemed to hold none but sleepers.

"As for my cousin herself," he continued, as they went toward the door,
"you will find her easy to get on with--a clever woman, and a
good-looking one. _Du reste_--it is not in that direction that your
difficulties will lie. You will find it easy enough to get on with the
women of the party, I fancy--from what I have observed."

And again he seemed to be amused.




CHAPTER XVI


THE GAMBLERS

In a sense, politics must always represent the game that is most
attractive to the careful gambler. For one may play at it without having
anything to lose. It is one of the few games within the reach of the
adventurous, where no stake need be cast upon the table. The gambler who
takes up a political career plays to win or not to win. He may jump up
from the gutter and shout that he is the man of the moment, without
offering any proof of his assertion beyond the loudness of a strident
voice. And if no one listens to him he loses nothing but his breath.

And in France the man who shouts loudest is almost certain to have the
largest following. In England the same does not yet hold good, but the
day seems to be approaching when it will.

In France, ever since the great Revolution, men have leapt up from the
gutter to grasp the reins of power. Some, indeed, have sprung from the
gutter of a palace, which is no more wholesome, it would appear, than the
drain of any street, or a ditch that carries off the refuse of a cheap
Press.

There are certain rooms in the north wing of the Louvre, in Paris, rooms
having windows facing across the Rue de Rivoli toward the Palais Royal,
where men must have sat in the comfortable leather-covered chair of the
High Official and laughed at the astounding simplicity of the French
people. But he laughs best who laughs last, and the People will
assuredly be amused in a few months, or a few years, at the very sudden
and very humiliating discomfiture of a gentleman falling face-foremost
into the street or hanging forlornly from a lamp-post at the corner of
it. For some have quitted these comfortable chairs, in these quiet
double-windowed rooms overlooking the Rue de Rivoli, for no better fate.

It was in the August of 1850 that a stout gentleman, seated in one of
these comfortable chairs, succumbed so far to the warmth of the palace
corridors as to fall asleep. He was not in the room of a high official,
but in the waiting-room attached to it.

He knew, moreover, that the High Official himself was scarcely likely to
dismiss a previous visitor or a present occupation any the earlier for
being importuned; for he was aware of the official's antecedents, and
knew that a Jack-in-office, who has shouted himself into office, is
nearly always careful to be deaf to other voices than his own.

Moreover, Mr. John Turner was never pressed for time.

"Yes," he had been known to say, "I was in Paris in '48. Never missed a
meal."

Whereas others, with much less at stake than this great banker, had
omitted not only meals, but their night's rest--night after night--in
those stirring times.

John Turner was still asleep when the door leading to the Minister's room
was cautiously opened, showing an inner darkness such as prevails in an
alcove between double doors. The door opened a little wider. No doubt the
peeping eye had made sure that the occupant of the waiting-room was
asleep. On the threshold stood a man of middle height, who carried
himself with a certain grace and quiet dignity. He was pale almost to
sallowness, a broad face with a kind mouth and melancholy eyes, without
any light in them. The melancholy must have been expressed rather by the
lines of the brows than by the eye itself, for this was without life or
expression--the eye of a man who is either very short-sighted or is
engaged in looking through that which he actually sees, to something he
fancies he perceives beyond it.

His lips smiled, but the smile died beneath a neatly waxed moustache and
reached no higher on the mask-like face. Then he disappeared in the outer
darkness between the two doors, and the handle made no noise in turning.

In a few minutes an attendant, in a gay uniform, came in by the same
door, without seeking to suppress the clatter of his boots on the oak
floor.

"Holà! monsieur," he said, in a loud voice. And Mr. John Turner crossed
his legs and leant farther back in the chair, preparatory to opening his
eyes, which he did directly on the new-comer's face, without any of that
vague flitting hither and thither of glance which usually denotes the
sleeper surprised.

The eyes were of a clear blue, and Mr. Turner looked five years younger
with them open than with them shut. But he was immensely stout.

"Well, my friend," he said, soothingly; for the Minister's attendant had
a truculent ministerial manner. "Why so much noise?"

"The Minister will see you."

John Turner yawned and reached for his hat.

"The Minister is pressed for time."

"So was I," replied the Englishman, who spoke perfect French, "when I
first sat down here, half an hour ago. But even haste will pass in time."

He rose, and followed the servant into the inner room, where he returned
the bow of a little white-bearded gentleman seated at a huge desk.

"Well, sir," said this gentleman, with the abrupt manner which has come
to be considered Napoleonic on the stage or in the political world
to-day. "Your business?"

The servant had withdrawn, closing the door behind him with an emphasis
of the self-accusatory sort.

"I am a banker," replied John Turner, looking with an obese deliberation
toward one of the deep windows, where, half-concealed by the heavy
curtain, a third person stood gazing down into the street.

The Minister smiled involuntarily, forgetting his dignity of a two-years'
growth.

"Oh, you may speak before Monsieur," he said.

"But I am behind him," was the immediate reply.

The gentleman leaning against the window-breast did not accept this
somewhat obvious invitation to show his face. He must have heard it,
however, despite an absorption which was probably chronic; for he made a
movement to follow with his glance the passage of some object of interest
in the street below. And the movement seemed to supply John Turner with
the information he desired.

"Yes, I am a banker," he said, more genially.

The Minister gave a short laugh.

"Monsieur," he said, "every one in Europe knows that. Proceed."

"And I only meddle in politics when I see the possibility of making an
honest penny."

"Already made--that honest penny--if one may believe the gossip--of
Europe," said the Minister. "So many pence that it is whispered that you
do not know what to do with them."

"It is unfortunate," admitted Turner, "that one can only dine once a
day."

The little gentleman in office had more than once invited his visitor to
be seated, indicating by a gesture the chair placed ready for him. After
a slow inspection of its legs, Mr. John Turner now seated himself. It
would seem that he, at the same time, tacitly accepted the invitation to
ignore the presence of a third person.

"Since you seem to know all about me," he said, "I will not waste any
more of your time, or mine, by trying to make you believe that I am
eminently respectable. The business that brought me here, however, is of
a political nature. A plain man, like myself, only touches politics when
he sees his gain clearly. There are others who enter that field from
purer motives, I am told. I have not met them."

The Minister smiled on one side of his face, and all of it went white. He
glanced uncomfortably at that third person, whom he had suggested
ignoring.

"And yet," went on John Turner, very dense or greatly daring, "I have
lived many years in France, Monsieur le Ministre."

The Minister frowned at him, and made a quick gesture of one hand toward
the window.

"So long," pursued the Englishman, placidly, "as the trains start
punctually, and there is not actually grape-shot in the streets, and one
may count upon one's dinner at the hour, one form of government in this
country seems to me to be as good as another, Monsieur le Ministre. A
Bourbon Monarchy or an Orleans Monarchy, or a Republic, or--well, an
Empire, Monsieur le Ministre."

"_Mon Dieu!_ have you come here to tell me this?" cried the Minister,
impatiently, glancing over his shoulder toward the window, and with one
hand already stretched out toward the little bell standing on his desk.

"Yes," answered Turner, leaning forward to draw the bell out of reach. He
nodded his head with a friendly smile, and his fat cheeks shook. "Yes,
and other things as well. Some of those other matters are perhaps even
more worthy of your earnest attention. It is worth your while to listen.
More especially, as you are paid for it--by the hour."

He laughed inside himself, with a hollow sound, and placidly crossed his
legs.

"Yes; I came to tell you, firstly, that the present form of government,
and, er--any other form which may evolve from it--"

"Oh!--proceed, monsieur!" exclaimed the Minister, hastily, while the man
in the recess of the window turned and looked over his shoulder at John
Turner's profile with a smile, not unkind, on his sphinx-like face.

"--has the inestimable advantage of my passive approval. That is why I am
here, in fact. I should be sorry to see it upset."

He broke off, and turned laboriously in his chair to look toward the
window, as if the gaze of the expressionless eyes there had tickled the
back of his neck like a fly. But by the time the heavy banker had got
round, the curtain had fallen again in its original folds.

"--by a serious Royalist plot," concluded Turner, in his thick,
deliberate way.

"So, assuredly, would any patriot or any true friend of France," said the
Minister, in his best declamatory manner.

"Um--m. That is out of my depth," returned the Englishman, bluntly. "I
paddle about in the shallow water at the edge and pick up what I can, you
understand. I am too fat for a _voyant_ bathing-costume, and the deep
waters beyond, Monsieur le Ministre."

The Minister drummed impatiently on his desk with his five fingers, and
looked at Turner sideways beneath his brows.

"Royalist plots are common enough," he said, tentatively, after a pause.

"Not a Royalist plot with money in it," was the retort. "I dare say an
honest politician, like yourself, is aware that in France it is always
safe to ignore the conspirator who has no money, and always dangerous to
treat with contempt him who jingles a purse. There is only a certain
amount of money in the world, Monsieur le Ministre, and we bankers
usually know where it is. I do not mean the money that the world pours
into its own stomach. That is always afloat--changing hands daily. I mean
the Great Reserves. We watch those, you understand. And if one of the
Great Reserves, or even one of the smaller reserves, moves, we wonder why
it is being moved and we nearly always find out."

"One supposes," said the Minister, hazarding an opinion for the first
time, and he gave it with a sidelong glance toward the window, "that it
is passing from the hands of a financier possessing money into those of
one who has none."

"Precisely. And if a financier possessing money is persuaded to part with
it in such a quarter as you suggest, one may conclude that he has good
reason to anticipate a substantial return for the loan. You, who are a
brilliant collaborateur in the present government, should know that, if
any one does, Monsieur le Ministre."

The Minister glanced toward the window, and then gave a good-natured and
encouraging laugh, quite unexpectedly, just as if he had been told to do
so by the silent man looking down into the street, who may, indeed, have
had time to make a gesture.

"And," pursued the banker, "if a financier possessing money parts with
it--or, to state the case more particularly, if a financier possessing no
money, to my certain knowledge, suddenly raises it from nowhere definite,
for the purposes of a Royalist conspiracy, the natural conclusion is that
the Royalists have got hold of something good."

John Turner leant back in his chair and suppressed a yawn.

"This room is very warm," he said, producing a pocket-handkerchief. Which
was tantamount to a refusal to say more.

The Minister twisted the end of his moustache in reflection. It was at
this time the fashion in France to wear the moustache waxed. Indeed, men
displayed thus their political bias to all whom it might concern.

"There remains nothing," said the official at length, with a gracious
smile, "but to ask your terms."

For he who was afterward Napoleon the Third had introduced into French
political and social life a plain-spoken cynicism which characterises
both to this day.

"Easy," replied Turner. "You will find them easy. Firstly, I would ask
that your stupid secret police keeps its fingers out; secondly, that
leniency be assured to one person, a client of mine--the woman who
supplies the money--who is under the influence--well, that influence
which makes women do nobler and more foolish things, monsieur, than men
are capable of."

He rose as he spoke, collected his hat and stick, and walked slowly to
the door. With his hand on the handle, he paused.

"You can think about it," he said, "and let me know at your leisure. By
the way, there is one more point, Monsieur le Ministre. I would ask you
to let this matter remain a secret, known only to our two selves and--the
Prince President."

And John Turner went out, without so much as a glance toward the window.




CHAPTER XVII


ON THE PONT ROYAL

It would appear that John Turner had business south of the Seine, though
his clients were few in the Faubourg St. Germain. For this placid British
banker was known to be a good hater. His father before him, it was said,
had had dealings with the Bourbons, while many a great family of the
Emigration would have lost more than the esteem of their fellows in their
panic-stricken flight, had it not been that one cool-headed and calm man
of business stayed at his post through the topsy-turvy days of the
Terror, and did his duty by the clients whom he despised.

On quitting the Louvre, by the door facing the Palais Royal, Turner moved
to the left. To say that he walked would be to overstate the action of
his little stout legs, which took so short a stride that his progress
suggested wheels and some one pushing behind. He turned to the left
again, and ambled under the great arch, to take the path passing behind
the Tuileries.

His stoutness was, in a sense, a safeguard in streets where the
travelling Englishman, easily recognised, has not always found a welcome.
His clothes and his walk were studiously French. Indeed, no one, passing
by with a casual glance, would have turned to look a second time at a
figure so typical of the Paris streets.

Mr. Turner quitted the enclosure of the Tuileries gardens and crossed the
quay toward the Pont Royal. But he stopped short under the trees by the
river wall, with a low whistle of surprise. Crossing the bridge, toward
him, and carrying a carpet-bag of early Victorian design, was Mr.
Septimus Marvin, rector of Farlingford, in Suffolk.

After a moment's thought, John Turner went toward the bridge, and
stationed himself on the pavement at the corner. The pavement is narrow,
and Turner was wide. In order to pass him, Septimus Marvin would need to
step into the road. This he did, without resentment; with, indeed, a
courtly and vague inclination of the head toward the human obstruction.

"Look here, Sep," said Turner, "you are not going to pass an old
schoolfellow like that."

Septimus Marvin lurched onward one or two steps, with long loose strides.
Then he clutched his carpet-bag with both hands and looked back at his
interlocutor, with the scared eyes of a detected criminal. This gave
place to the habitual gentle smile when, at last, the recognition was
complete.

"What have you got there?" asked Turner, pointing with his stick at the
carpet-bag. "A kitten?"

"No--no," replied Marvin, looking this way and that, to make sure that
none could overhear.

"A Nanteuil--engraved from his own drawing, Jack--a real Nanteuil. I have
just been to a man I know--the print-shop opposite the statue on the Quai
Voltaire--to have my own opinion verified. I was sure of it. He says that
I am undoubtedly right. It is a genuine Nanteuil--a proof before
letters."

"Ah! And you have just picked it up cheap? Picked it up, eh?"

"No, no, quite the contrary," Marvin replied, in a confidential whisper.

"Stolen--dear, dear! I am sorry to hear that, Septimus."

And Septimus Marvin broke into the jerky, spasmodic laugh of one who has
not laughed for long--perhaps for years.

"Ah, Jack," he said; "you are still up to a joke."

"Well, I should hope so. We are quite close to my club. Come, and have
luncheon, and tell me all about it."

So the Social and Sporting Club, renowned at that day for its matchless
cuisine and for nothing else of good repute at all, entertained an angel
unawares, and was much amused at Septimus Marvin's appearance, although
the amusement was not apparent. The members, it would appear, were
gentlemen of that good school of old France which, like many good things
both French and English, is fast disappearing. And with all those faults,
which we are so ready to perceive in any Frenchman, there is none on
earth who will conceal from you so effectually the fact that in his heart
he is vastly amused.

It was with some difficulty that Septimus was persuaded to consign his
carpet-bag to the custody of the hall-porter.

"If it wasn't a Nanteuil," he explained in a whisper to his friend, "I
should have no hesitation; for I am sure the man is honest and in every
way to be relied upon. But a Nanteuil--_ad vivum_--Jack. There are none
like him. It is priceless."

"You used not to be a miser," said Turner, panting on the stairs, when at
last the bag was concealed in a safe place. "What matter what the value
may be, so long as you like it?"

"Oh! but the value is of great importance," answered Septimus, rather
sheepishly.

"Then you have changed a good deal since you and I were at Ipswich school
together. There, sit down at this table. I suppose you are hungry. I hope
you are. Try and think--there's a good fellow--and remember that they
have the best cook in Paris here. Their morals ain't of the first water,
but their cook is without match. Yes, you have changed a good deal, if
you think of money."

Septimus Marvin had changed colour, at all events, in the last few
minutes.

"I have to, Jack, I have to. That is the truth of it. I have come to
Paris to sell that Nanteuil. To realise, I suppose you would call it in
the financial world. _Pro aris et focis_, old friend. I want money for
the altar and the hearth. It has come to that. I cannot ask them in
Farlingford for more money, for I know they have none. And the church is
falling about our ears. The house wants painting. It is going the way of
the church, indeed."

"Ah!" said Turner, glancing at him over the bill of fare. "So you have to
sell an engraving. It goes to the heart, I suppose?"

Marvin laughed and rubbed his spare hands together, with an assumption of
cheerfulness in which some one less stout and well-to-do than his
companion might have perceived that dim minor note of pathos, which
always rings somewhere in a forced laugh.

"One has to face it," he replied. "_Ne cedas malis_, you know. I suddenly
found it was necessary. It was forced upon me, in fact. I found that my
niece was secretly helping to make both ends meet. A generous action,
made doubly generous by the manner in which it was performed."

"Miriam?" put in John Turner, who appeared to be absorbed in the
all-important document before him.

"Yes, Miriam. Do you know her? Ah! I forgot. You are her guardian and
trustee. I sometimes think my memory is failing. I found her out quite by
accident. It must have been going on for quite a long time. Heaven will
reward her, Turner! One cannot doubt it."

He absent-mindedly seized two pieces of bread from the basket offered to
him by a waiter, and began to eat as if famished.

"Steady, man, steady," exclaimed Turner, leaning forward with a
horror-stricken face to restrain him. "Don't spoil a grand appetite on
bread. Gad! I wish I could fall on my food like that. You seem to be
starving."

"I think I forgot to have any breakfast," said Marvin, apologetically.

"I dare say you did!" was the angry retort. "You always were a bit of an
ass, you know, Sep. But I have ordered a tiptop luncheon, and I'll
trouble you not to wolf like that."

"Well--well, I'm sorry," said the other, who, even in the far-off days at
Ipswich school, had always been in the clouds, while John Turner moved
essentially on the earth.

"And do not sell that Nanteuil to the first bidder," went on Turner, with
a glance, of which the keenness was entirely disarmed by the good-natured
roundness of his huge cheeks. "I know a man who will buy it--at a good
price, too. Where did you get it?"

"Ah! that is a long story," replied Marvin, looking dreamily out of the
window. "I bought it, years ago, at Farlingford. But it is a long story."

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