The Late Tenant

by Louis Tracy

In one matter, the sorely tried mother and daughter were fortunate; there was no inquest. The doctor who was present at Van Hupfeldt’s death, after consulting the coroner and a West End specialist who had warned the sufferer of his dangerous state, was able to give a burial certificate in due form. Thus all scandal and sensation-mongering were avoided. The interment took place in Kensal Green cemetery. Van Hupfeldt’s mortal remains were laid to rest near to those of the woman he loved.

Violet was his sole heiress under the will he had executed. A sealed letter, attached by him to that document, explained his motive. In case of accident prior to the contemplated marriage, he thereby surmounted the legal difficulty and inevitable exposure of providing for the child. He asked Violet to take the requisite steps to administer the estate, bidding her reserve a capital sum sufficient to provide the ten thousand pounds per annum given her by the marriage settlement, and set apart the residue, under trustees, for the benefit of the boy.

At first she refused to touch a penny of the money; but wiser counsels prevailed. There would not only be a serious tangle in the business if she declined the bequest, but Van Hupfeldt was so rich that nearly five times the amount was left for the child, the value of the estate being considerably over a million sterling.

The requisite investigation of the sources of his wealth cleared up a good deal that was previously obscure. Undoubtedly he had been helped in his early career, that of a musician, by a Mrs. Strauss, widow of a California merchant. She educated him, and, yielding to a foolish passion, offered to make him her heir if he married her and assumed the name of Strauss, she having already attained some notoriety in Continental circles under that designation. She was a malade imaginaire, in the sense that she would seldom reside more than a few weeks in any one place, while she positively detested both England and America.

He was kind to her, and she was devoted to him; but unlimited wealth cloyed when it involved constant obedience to her whims. Yet, rather than lose him altogether, she agreed to his occasional visits to England during the season, and when hunting was toward. Eager to shake off the thraldom of the Strauss régime, he then invariably passed under his real name of Van Hupfeldt.

Hence, when he fell in love with Gwendoline, and resolved to make her his in defiance of all social law, he was obliged to tell her that he was also Johann Strauss, and under an obligation to the Mrs. Strauss who had adopted him. Gwendoline’s diary, which, with the certificates, was found in a bureau, became clear enough when annotated with these facts. Van Hupfeldt himself left the fewest possible papers, the letter accompanying the will merely setting forth his wishes, and announcing that he desired to marry Violet as an act of reparation to the memory of her sister. This had become a mania with him. The unhappy man thought that, this way, he could win forgiveness.

And then the bright world became a Valley of Despair for David Harcourt. During many a bitter hour he lamented Van Hupfeldt’s death. Alive, he was a rival to be fought and conquered; dead, he had interposed that insurmountable barrier of great wealth between Violet and one who was sick for love of her. Poor David! He sought refuge in work, and found his way up some rungs of the literary ladder; but he could neither forget his Violet nor follow her to Dale Manor, the inaccessible, fenced in now by a wall of gold.

Once, he was in a hansom on the way to Euston, telling himself he was going to Rigsworth to give the gamekeeper that promised licking; but he stopped the cab and returned, saying bitterly: “Why am I trying to fool myself? That is not the David of my acquaintance.”

So he went back, calling in at a florist’s and buying a huge bowlful of violets, thinking to reach Nirvana by their scent, and thereby humbugging himself so egregiously that he was in despondent mood when he sat down to a lonely tea in his flat. He had not seen or heard of Violet in three long months, not since he took Mrs. Mordaunt and her to the train for Warwickshire, and, walking afterward with Dibbin from the station, learned the fateful news of her intolerable inheritance.