They said no more upon the matter until the end of the dinner, and it was not referred to in the smoking room after. We quitted the club at an early hour to hear a song at a music-hall which the Colonel raved about; and after that I left them and returned to Bayswater, with the recollection of my rash promise gone clean out of my head. I did not even recall it on the following morning, and it was some three days after that I received a note from the Colonel saying that he had, during Bracebridge's absence from town, made an appointment for me with Miss Jessie Fleming—for such was the fair alchemist's name—and that she would be glad to tell me anything she could about her work on the following afternoon at half-past two o'clock. The letter at once brought to my mind the whole of the conversation, at the club. I remembered with a smile of contempt that the lady was to show me, during a short interview, how the whole of a jeweler's occupation was soon to be done with; how diamonds and sapphires and even the precious metal itself, were presently to be as common as pebbles in a brook; and I concluded with easy assurance that if any children's hospital depended upon my being convinced, it would have to close its doors at an early date. I had seen so much of this sort of thing; so many stories of fortunes lying in a metal pot had been whispered into my ear; this could be but an addition to the list; it remained to see if it would be an amusing addition.
I will confess readily that if the pretender had been a man, I would have declined curtly to see him. The whole of those who had come to me hitherto with a pretended insight into the arcana of metals were men—mostly half-pay officers—whose wits were half gone with their money. Here, however, was, by all accounts, a charming professor of the lost art. The season was beginning to be dull; there were no more "at homes"; possibly she would amuse me. I had given my promise to the men—and to put it briefly I found myself at Miss Jessie Fleming's door on the following day, not a little expectant, disdainfully incredulous, and exceedingly anxious to prove for myself if the physiognomist's personal attractions were even a tithe of those which had been claimed for her by so many long headed and usually sensible men.
My knock at the modest-looking portal was answered by a formidable flunky, who did not wait to hear my name, but conducted me up a staircase draped almost to darkness with heavy curtains, and so to a well-furnished waiting-room on the first floor. Here three women, all well known in society, were engaged in an heroic effort to appear absorbed in the illustrated papers; but they were obviously uncomfortable at my presence, and cast furtive looks over the pages as though in appeal to me to make no mention of anything I had seen. I had no opportunity, however, to abate their fear of publicity; for scarce was I come into the room when the flunky appeared again at the folding-doors which cut it off from the sanctum of My Lady, and beckoned me to follow him.
I had come out on this expedition purely, as I have said, to be amused. When I found myself at last before the new Pythia of London, enthroned as she was for the immediate interpretation of the oracle, I confess that I did not foresee any disappointment of the venture. The room was half in darkness, but there was light enough by which to observe many fine pieces of china and delicate sketches upon its gold and green walls; and to note the quaint conceits of the whole scheme of decoration. A lamp of Eastern shape spread a soft red glow upon sofas and seductive lounges; a conservatory, heaped up with shade-suggesting palms, gave off at one end of it through doors of exquisitely colored glass; there was a strange tripod of brass before the fireplace; and flowers everywhere, seeming to grow from the very grate, to flourish in all the crannies, to cover tables and bookcases, and even to decorate the dress of the young girl who now stood to receive me, and welcomed me with cordiality.
My first impression of the physiognomist—an impression which remains with me—was the outcome of her extremely youthful appearance. I am certain that whatever age she might have been she did not look it. Youth in rich generosity was stamped upon her slightest action and her most serious word. It flashed from her eyes, was seen in the unsurpassable freshness of her complexion, in the golden sheen of her hair, in the rotundity of her arms, and the development of her slight but well-formed figure. If she had any serious mood, it was not apparent when first I spoke to her; nor did a rapid analysis of her face tell me of any uncommon mental power. Her chin was a firm one, it is true; but I noticed that she had little height of head above her ears, and that there was even something of weakness in her forehead. At the same time there could not be two opinions of the general charm of her manner; and she possessed in a very large degree that magnetic power of attracting sympathy and admiration which is peculiarly the attribute of women.
Directly I had come into the pretentious chamber of audience, and the flunky had closed the folding-doors behind me, this fascinating little prophetess began to talk, her words rippling over one another like the waves of a river; her natural excitement betraying itself in the obvious restraint of her gestures.
"I'm so glad it's you!" she exclaimed, clasping her hands together, as though in ecstasy. "Those old women bother me to death, and there have been twelve of them here this morning. Colonel Oldfield told me all about you yesterday, and I was interested at once. We must have a good long talk. Oh, do listen to that dreadful creature; she talks in scales beginning at the lower C and going up to no possible note in the music of heaven or earth. I suppose she won't go away."
Her remark, and the clapping of her little hands to equally little ears, followed upon the sound of altercation between one of the ladies in the waiting-room and the flunky of formidable mien. Apparently the lady would not depart without a séance, and the footman was compelling her. In the end she went, declaring the whole thing a cheat, and "that chit of a girl" a particular imposture. When the sound of her voice had died away upon the stairs, My Lady took up the thread of her remarks.
"Now," said she, "I want to have a good look at you, and you must have a good look at me. People like ourselves should know each other to begin with. Don't think I'm going to bore you with the nonsense I trade in—you are far too clever for that, and would find me out in a minute. You see, I'm like a man with a good cellar: I keep the old wine for the old birds who are not caught with chaff. That's a delightfully mixed metaphor, isn't it? and not very polite, when I think of it. But come and sit down near the light, where I can see you."
She spoke so quickly that I did not pretend to hear half of that which she said, or to answer her; but I seated myself upon the ottoman near the entrance to the conservatory; and when she had thrown open the glass doors, she herself took the low arm-chair facing me. I saw then that she wore a strange dress in the Egyptian fashion, and that her breast was all covered with jingling gold medals, while her hair was similarly ornamented.