Mysterious Mr. Sabin

by E. Phillips Oppenheim

Of all unhappy men he is assuredly the most unhappy who, ambitious, patient, and doggedly persevering, has chosen the moment to make his supreme venture and having made it has reaped failure instead of success. The gambler while he lives may play again; the miser, robbed, embark once more upon his furtive task of hoarding money; even the rejected lover need not despair of some day, somewhere finding happiness, since no one heart has a monopoly of love. But to him who aspires to shape the destiny of nations, to control the varying interests of great powers and play upon the emotions of whole peoples, there is never vouchsafed more than one opportunity. And failure then does more than bring upon the schemer the execration of the world he would have controlled: it clears eyes into which he had thrown dust, awakens passions he had lulled to sleep, provokes hostility where he had made false peace, and renders for ever impossible the recombination of conditions under which alone he could, if at all, succeed. For such an one life has lost all its savour. Existence may perhaps be permitted to him, but no more. He stakes his all upon one single venture, and, win or lose, he has no second throw. Failure is absolute, and spells despair.

In such unhappy state was Mr. Sabin. More than ten days had passed since the tragedy in Boston Harbour, and now he sat alone in a private room in a small but exclusive hotel in New York. He had affected no small change in his appearance by shaving off his imperial and moustache, but a far more serviceable disguise was provided for him by the extreme pallor of his face and the listlessness of his every movement. He had made the supreme effort of his life and had failed; and failure had so changed his whole demeanour that had any of his recent companions on the Calipha been unexpectedly confronted with him it is doubtful if they would have recognised him.

For a brief space he had enjoyed some of the old zest of life in scheming for the freedom of his would-be murderer, in outwitting the police and press-men, and in achieving his own escape; but with all this secured, and in the safe seclusion of his room, he had leisure to look within himself and found himself the most miserable of men, utterly lonely, with failure to look back upon and nothing for which to hope.

He had dreamed of being a minister to France; he was an exile in an unsympathetic land. He had dreamed of restoring dynasties and readjusting the balance of power; he was an alien refugee in a republic where visionaries are not wanted and where opulence gives control. America held nothing for him; Europe had no place; there was not a capital in the whole continent where he could show himself and live. And his mind dwelt upon the contrast between what might have been and what was, he tasted for the first time the full bitterness of isolation and despair. To his present plight any alternative would be preferable—even death. He took the little revolver which lay near him on the table and thoughtfully turned it over and over in his hand. It was as it were a key with which he could unlock the portal to another world, where weariness was unknown, and where every desire was satisfied, or unfelt: and even if there were no other existence beyond this, extinction was not an idea that repelled him now. It would be an “accident”; so easy to come by; so little painful to endure. Should he? Should he not? Should he?

He was so engrossed in his own thoughts that he did not hear the soft knock at the door nor the servant murmuring the name of a visitor; but becoming conscious of the presence of some one in the room, he looked up suddenly to see a lady by his side.

“Is there not some mistake?” he said, rising to his feet. “I do not think I have the pleasure——”

She laughed and raised her veil.

“Does it make so much difference?” she asked lightly. “Yet, really, Mr. Sabin, you are more changed than I.”

“I must apologize,” he said; “golden hair is—most becoming. But sit down and tell me how you found me out and why.”

She sank into the chair he brought for her and looked at him thoughtfully.