“Did you? Let’s hear it. A nice little scandal would do instead of a pick-me-up.”
“It’s not a scandal. Don’t raise your expectations. It’s the story of a successful scoundrel.”
And then I came out again in full vigour—nay, with vastly increased powers; for though Mark Shrewsbury did not add very much to me, or alter my appearance, yet his graphic words made me much more impressive than I had been under the management of Mrs. Selldon.
“H’m! that’s a queer story,” said the limp-looking young man from Switzerland. “I say, have a game of billiards, will you?”
Shrewsbury, with prodigious yawn, dragged himself up out of his chair, and the two went off together. As they left the room the only other man present looked up from his newspaper, following them with his eyes.
“Shrewsbury the novelist,” he thought to himself. “A sterling fellow! And he heard it from an Archdeacon’s wife. Confound it all! the thing must be true then. I’ll write and make full inquiries about this Zaluski before consenting to the engagement.”
And, being a prompt, business-like man, Gertrude Morley’s uncle sat down and wrote the following letter to a Russian friend of his who lived at St. Petersburg, and who might very likely be able to give some account of Zaluski:—
Dear Leonoff,—Some very queer stories are afloat about a young Polish merchant, by name Sigismund Zaluski, the head of the London branch of the firm of Zaluski and Zernoff, at St. Petersburg. Will you kindly make inquiries for me as to his true character and history? I would not trouble you with this affair, but the fact is Zaluski has made an offer of marriage to one of my wards, and before consenting to any betrothal I must know what sort of man he really is. I take it for granted that “there is no smoke without fire,” and that there must be something in the very strange tale which I have just heard on the best authority. It is said that this Sigismund Zaluski left St. Petersburg in March 1881, after the assassination of the late Czar, in which he was seriously compromised. He is said to be an out-and-out Nihilist, an atheist, and, in short, a dangerous, disreputable fellow. Will you sift the matter for me? I don’t wish to dismiss the fellow without good reason, but of course I could not think of permitting him to be engaged to my niece until these charges are entirely disproved.
With kind remembrances to your father,
I am, yours faithfully
Henry Crichton-Morley.
MY SEVENTH STAGE
Yet on the dull silence breaking
With a lightning flash, a word,
Bearing endless desolation
On its blighting wings, I heard;
Earth can forge no keener weapon,
Dealing surer death and pain,
And the cruel echo answered
Through long years again.A. A. Procter.