CHAPTER XLII.—L’EMBARRAS DES RICHESSES.
The reader, if that noble myth who rules the destiny of us poor writers be possessed of an average amount of memory, will recollect that on the evening when Lord Alfred Courtland entertained Jack Beaupeep and friends at his comfortable bachelor lodgings, a gentleman then first mentioned, bearing the euphonious patronymic of Le Roux, conveyed to Monsieur Guillemard the startling intelligence that the Russian Count Ratrapski had broken the bank in J———— Street. How, although immediately after receiving this news, Horace D’Almayne had proceeded to Lady Trottemout’s soirée, and, according to his wont, made himself universally agreeable, and transacted a more than usual amount of mischief, by bringing about the most serious disagreement which had yet occurred between Harry Coverdale and Alice his wife, it must not be supposed that the intelligence did not interest him. On the contrary, it appealed to him in his weakest point—the pocket; for in that gambling establishment (of which D’Almayne was part proprietor) had he invested his little all, and the losses incurred by the good fortune of Count Ratrapski swallowed up every farthing he had in the world, leaving him nothing but his debts and his talents to live upon. This position, however, by no means possessed the charm of novelty for our excellent young friend; on the contrary, as it was a favourite theory of his—which he never lost any opportunity of reducing to practice—that it was the duty of those who had money to support those who had not, he rather preferred being insolvent; and, paradoxical as it may appear, considered himself best off when he was worst off—for then he was obliged to exert all his energies to ensure that some purse better filled than his own should relax its strings to provide for his necessities.
Thus, on the very day on which Arthur Hazlehurst had his unsatisfactory interview with Kate Crane, the husband of that proud beauty met by appointment, at an office not far from the Royal Exchange, Monsieur Guillemard,—Mr. Vondenthaler, a Belgian capitalist,—Mr. Bonus Nugget, a man well known upon ’Change,—the Hon. Captain O’Brien,—and last, though not least, Horace D’Almayne. Mr. Crane having seated himself, after undergoing the ceremony of introduction to Mr. Vondenthaler, who was the only member of the party unknown to him, D’Almayne opened the proceedings by observing—
“Well, gentlemen, I am glad to tell you that everything is progressing as we could wish, and that my previous calculations, which I had the honour of laying before you at our last meeting, appear likely not only to be verified, but exceeded. Mr. Vondenthaler informs me that the applications for shares from the principal foreign merchants are incessant; and Mr. Nugget and Captain O’Brien will tell you the same in regard to their own connection. Is it not so, Captain?”
“Indeed, and it is, thin,” replied the gentleman thus accosted, who possibly, from his having mixed so much with the aristocracy of Europe generally, spoke with a strong Irish accent. “Bedad, sir, the way they come tumbling in is perfectly astonishing; ’tis, upon me conscience!”
“The only thing that remains then, before we proceed to issue the shares and receive deposits, is to decide how many we shall allot to each director ex officio, and how many you gentlemen may desire to retain for—your friends,” observed D’Almayne, glancing expressively towards Mr. Crane as he spoke.
“In regard to the shares to be held by directors, I would suggest five hundred,” began Mr. Crane.
“Das ist gut; dat shall be him,” muttered Mr. Vondenthaler.
“I’ll not object to that same,” exclaimed the Captain, “if you leave a thundering wide margin for the shares we may retain for our friends; for, to be plain with ye, gentlemen, my best friend in the world, and that’s Terence O’Brien, means to go in for this business in real earnest; and if I can’t invest capital that will take five figures to write, bedad I’d rather be out of it altogether.”
“Ten thousand, which I presume is the sum you hint at, Captain O’Brien, could not I think be objected to,” observed Mr. Bonus Nugget, as if £10,000 were a mere cab-fare.
“Mais oui, we will all demand so much as him, he is so small; n’est-ce pas, mon cher?” interposed Monsieur Guillemard, favouring Horace D’Almayne with a grimace indicative of the tenderest affection.
“If I might be allowed—if I might venture to suggest,” began Mr. Crane, timidly, “I would propose that, at so early a stage in the affair, no limit should be placed to the number of shares the directors may hold. I am, ahem! a—myself I am a man who has been tolerably fortunate in my commercial speculations, and might be disposed—in fact, I may say I am disposed—to embark an amount of capital considerably above the sum lately mentioned by Captain O’Brien.”
“Sir! your sentiments do you honour! Sir, I’m proud of your acquaintance; you’re not one to do things by halves, I see. I like plain speaking—the speculation’s a davlish good speculation, or you would not find such men as Mr. Vondenthaler and my friend Bonus Nugget in it. We’re going to give our valuable time and trouble to work the thing ship-shape; and bedad, sir, if we’re not to profit by it, I’d jist like to know who should!”
“Yes; that is all very well for you, O’Brien,” observed Mr. Nugget, speaking with an air of authority; “but I happen to know a thing or two. Mr. Crane, gentlemen, is—I say it to his face—able to go down to his bankers, and draw a cheque, which they will honour, for more money than any two of us could raise between us. Very well; now it’s no news to any of us to be told that ‘money is power.’ But if Mr. Crane thinks, because he can embark his £50,000,—or I believe I might raise the figure as high again without overstating the matter,—that he is going to ride rough-shod over the practical men who have started this scheme, and to take the lion’s share of the enormous profits that he is sharp enough to foresee must accrue, I for one beg to tell him I won’t stand it.”
“Ya! ya! das ist gut! Ve have not started to be shod rough by Cranes! Herr Bonus he knows a thing! das ist recht und gut! Ve vill not be roughed by Cranes!” muttered Mr. Vondenthaler through the thick hay-coloured moustachios invariably worn by Belgian capitalists.
“Mais oui, you have reasons, Monsieur Vondenthaler, mon ami: but if you yourself have mistaken, n’est-ce pas?” interposed Monsieur Guillemard, eagerly. “I am assured Monsieur Crane is not un homme comme ça; he shall not se promener a cheval—vot you call ride on a horseback ovaire us du tout; au contraire, zies grate skim whom we are zie undairetakers for, shall advance herself on his capital for zie goods of us all. Voyez vous, cher Monsieur Bonous!”
“’Pon me conscience, now ye’re the first set of men I ever yet clapped eyes on that made a fuss about taking money when it was offered to ’em!” exclaimed the Hon. Captain O’Brien, surprised into a stronger brogue than he had yet allowed to appear. “Sure, now, by the time we’ve tunnelled under the whole of Arabia Pethreea, and flung our Britannia-metal tubular bridge across the Persian Gulf, we’ll find money growing pretty tight with us.”
“As there seems some difference of opinion on the point,” returned Mr. Bonus Nugget, “I would suggest that we summon a general meeting of all the directors, and appoint a managing committee to decide such matters for the future.”
This proposition was agreed to nem. con., and a day having been fixed for their next meeting, D’Almayne began:—
“In my capacity as secretary, I have to call your attention to one point before this meeting breaks up. I have, in accordance with a resolution passed at the last board, gone into the current outlay, and find that to pay the engineers now surveying the portion of the line already decided on, and other expenses which I will not detain you by enumerating, the account at our bankers is overdrawn. I would propose, therefore, that two of the directors should sign a cheque for £3000, to be placed to the company’s credit.”
“Better say five,” interposed Nugget; “it don’t do to be overdrawing our account; I’ve known a trifle like that ruin a speculation as promising even as the present one. Don’t let this occur again, D’Almayne; I can let you have money at any moment, as you are well aware.”
“Ya! ya! or I, vin you please; you must not starve him for no accounts,” chimed in the Belgian capitalist.
“Certainly, £5000 should be paid in at once,” observed Mr. Crane, producing a cheque-book. “I shall have much pleasure in advancing the sum, if you gentlemen will sanction my so doing.”
This both Nugget and the Belgian protested against, each urging their claims as originators of the scheme; but O’Brien silenced their opposition, and settled the matter by exclaiming in his off-hand manner—
“Let Mr. Crane have his way, sir!—he’s a fine fellow entirely—a liberal and enlightened man he is—one of the merchant princes of this great counthry; and though I’d the misfortune to be born an aristocrat myself, I’ve no class bigotry about me. I admire a true Briton when I meet with one; and whoever wishes to bully and browbeat that Briton in my presence, must do it some time when Terence O’Brien isn’t there to stand up for him. Shake hands, Mr. Crane—I’m proud to know you. Take this pen and write, sir! Browbeat a man like that, indeed!—’pon my conscience, what next I wonder!”
And so, under cover of the Captain’s blustering, Mr. Crane signed a cheque for £5000, for which D’Almayne gave him a receipt in the name of the company; then bowing to his co-directors, and exchanging a word or two aside with D’Almayne, he departed. As the sound of his retreating footsteps died away in the distance, D’Almayne, quietly pocketing the cheque, observed—
“If we can but get the shares to sell for—say twenty thousand, the speculation will not pay badly. You see, Guillemard, these crafty islanders—these denizens of ‘perfide Albion’—their pockets are not impregnable when you assault them judiciously. Five thousand pounds from one man is not such a bad morning’s work!”
“Thrue for you, me boy!” exclaimed the Irishman; “by the powers, a few more such mornings’ work will make men of us, if it please providence to keep us out of jail so long; but it’s a dangerous game your playing. Sure now there’s jist five of us here present—why wouldn’t we take a thousand a-piece, and make ourselves scarce without any more ado? I’m content for one, bedad.”
“You’ll do nothing of the sort, Terence,” was the reply: “for two very good reasons: one being, that if you remain quiet and follow my lead, I will enable you to bolt—if it come to bolting—with £10,000 instead of one; and the other, that Mr. Crane’s cheque is very safely buttoned up in my pocket, to be applied as I think best; and any man who attempts to take it from me will become practically acquainted with the merits of this ingenious little instrument,” and as he spoke he drew from his breastpocket a small, beautifully-finished revolving pistol, whereupon the individual termed Nugget interposed by observing—
“Nonsense, D’Almayne, put that thing away: we’re not in New Orleans, man; and the report of that would blow our schemes to the devil long before the bullet had penetrated O’Brien’s thick skull. But really there is nothing to disagree about that I can see: it’s quite clear, gentlemen, that D’Almayne knows perfectly well what he’s doing, and that our interests could not be in better hands. We meet again on Friday. D’Almayne, you’ll see me to-night in J———— Street; and now that we’re in funds again, Ratrapski will be as good as a fortune to us: a man does not break the bank twice.” Then, nodding familiarly to the others, Mr. Bonus Nugget resumed his usual “City” look (worth five hundred a-year to him at the most moderate computation), and departed.
“Terence, never look sulky, man; I meant no harm; what I said was as much for your good as my own,” began D’Almayne, in a conciliatory tone. “Come, I want you and Guillemard to dine at Blackwall, to meet an unfledged lordling, to whom I’ll allow you to sell a horse, if you like; and you may do a little bit of ‘turf’ business too, if he’ll bite; only it must be done in a quiet, gentlemanly way mind, because I’ve ulterior views in regard to my young friend: he has a taste for the club in J———— Street—you understand?”
“I believe ye, me boy! an it’s a fine child ye are intirely; and the way ye’ve cut yer wisdom teeth is a credit to yer blessed mother—always supposing ye ever possessed such a respectible relative,” was the Hibernian’s reply.
“By the way, if you’re really going in for the horse business,” resumed D’Almayne, meditatively, “you may as well do the thing properly. Get a flash trap, you know, and drive us down; and—who’s that sporting-looking young fellow you had packing you at Epsom—dark curly hair, and grey hawk’s eyes?”
“Oh, Phil Tirrett, the great Yorkshire breeder’s son; he is his father’s London agent, and a very promising young—”
“Scoundrel,” interposed D’Almayne, “I read it in his face. However, you’ll want somebody to back up your lies, and he’ll pass with such green boys as we shall have to-day; so bring him. Let me see—it’s now two o’clock—call for me at the Pandemonium at five; and, excuse me, but drop the Irish blackguard, and assume the foreign militaire as much as you conveniently can. Remember, you’re captain in the Austrian service, and I was in your regiment, your sub., for a year.”
“Bedad! it’s as well you reminded me of that same, for it had slipped my memory some way,” was the affable reply, as, arranging his auburn, not to say red, hair under his hat, the gallant Captain prepared to take himself off. Ere he did so, however, he chanced to cast his eyes on the Belgian capitalist, who was amusing his leisure moments by performing some intricate manœuvres with a pack of cards, an occupation which he interrupted by slapping Vondenthaler on the back with such force that a covey of cards flew out of the pack about the room.
“What devil’s dodge are you planning there, you old sinner!” he exclaimed; “let’s look at ye!” he continued, seizing him by the chin, and turning his head so that the light fell upon his countenance; “bedad! them moustachios alter you surprising! Nobody that had not known ye as I’ve done, since I could handle a dice-box, and that was before I was into me teens, would recognise in Mr. Vondenthaler, the Belgian merchant, Le Roux the old croupier!”
“Leave him alone,” observed D’Almayne; “Le Roux’s a steady, sensible man, and one I have a great respect for; he knows his work, and does it well and quietly; and I’d back his long head against your noisy talent (for the ‘gift of the gab,’ as you term it, is a noisy talent and a dangerous one) any day, Captain.” Then, turning to Le Roux, he said—“The bank will re-open to-night, and we shall be there in force. Mind the Champagne’s better than the last batch. Let everything be in first-rate style, and spare no expense. Guillemard, you heard the rendezvous? Five o’clock, messieurs, au revoir.”
So saying, D’Almayne bowed with as much scrupulous politeness to the worshipful fraternity of ——— men of science he was quitting, as if he had been leaving the council-chamber of a prince. Calling a Hansom cab, this industrious and zealous young man drove to his west-end lodgings, and exchanging his suit of quiet black, in which he had dressed the man-of-business character he had been pleased to enact, for more butterfly garments, went down to a certain fashionable club, where he felt sure of meeting Lord Alfred Courtland, and found him accordingly, but by no means in the amiable, docile frame of mind in which he usually rejoiced. The hour preceding that at which D’Almayne entered the club had been spent by Lord Alfred in concocting, pursuant to Arthur Hazlehurst’s advice, a penitent letter to Alice Coverdale—a composition which had cost him much trouble and anxiety, and wherein he had endeavoured in some measure to justify himself, by shifting as much of the blame as he truthfully could on to the shoulders of Horace D’Almayne; and he had just closed and dispatched this accusatory epistle when, as though to overwhelm him with shame at such a betrayal of one who professed himself, and whom in great measure he still believed to be, his friend, his aspersed mentor seated himself opposite to him, and addressing him by his usual endearing epithet of “mon cher,” invited him to dine with him that day, and meet a few choice spirits at Blackwall.
“You’re very kind, but you really must excuse me,” was Lord Alfred’s reply. “I’ve been knocking about a good deal lately, and begin to want a little quiet.”
“Yes, I know,” was D’Almayne’s rejoinder; “such is always one’s morning theory—but one never puts it in practice; when eight o’clock comes, il faut diner! Seriously, however, I can’t let you off. I have asked two or three men to meet you, who are most anxious to make your acquaintance”—(this was strictly true),—“and who will be awfully savage if you don’t come.”
“Come—of course he’ll come, and so will I too, if anybody will ask me, and there’s a lark in hand—what does Milton say?—
‘A bird in hand is better far,
Than two that in the bushes are.’
Fine poem, Paradise Lost. By the way, did you ever hear my riddle on that head? ‘Why is the fact of the contents of a backgammon-board having been thrown out of the window like Milton’s chef-d’œuvre?’ Do you give it up? Because it’s a pair o’ dice lost.’ None so dusty that—eh? for a commoner like me? We poor devils that have to grind all day to procure our modest chop and our unassuming pint of London porter, can’t be expected to say such brilliant things as you noble swells, who have had nothing to do but cultivate your understandings ever since you came into the world with gold spoons in your mouths. But you have not told me what’s up yet.”
Here the speaker, who was none other than the facetious Jack Beaupeep, paused for want of breath, and D’Almayne interposed with a reply to his question—
“The particular event exalted at the moment you joined us is a bachelor dinner at Blackwall to-day, for which I am trying to beat up a few recruits; let me hope you will enlist under my banner, and, with such a reinforcement, I am sure Lord Alfred will surrender at discretion.”
“All serene!” rejoined the voluble Jack; “I was ‘to let unfurnished’ (with a dinner)—and let me tell you a Blackwall feed is a special mercy that’s not to be sneezed at. Come, Alfred, my boy, merge the haughty noble in the jolly-good-fellow till further notice, and say ‘I will.’”
“Have it your own way. Since you’re both determined on my capture, it’s hopeless to resist,” said Lord Alfred, his feeble attempt at reformation completely defeated; “but I certainly had made up my mind to spend a quiet evening.”
“So had I,” returned Jack; “but then I did not expect such luck as to come in for a noisy one. What time, and where do we meet?”
“At the Pandemonium, at five o’clock,” was D’Almayne’s reply; “and mind you are both punctual.”