Rivers was, like most members of that Bohemian institution, a devil-may-care, erratic fellow, whom the outside world regarded as rather a shady character. Nobody knew exactly what was his profession. Since I first became acquainted with him, in the days when I was a working journalist, he had been, first, an actor, then manager of a touring dramatic company, a playwright, and afterwards traveller for a firm of wine merchants, besides executing commissions on the turf. Cards and billiards he played with skill acquired by long practice, and was usually victor whenever he took a hand at nap or baccarat.
I had not seen him since my Italian tour, as he had suddenly embarked for Australia, presumably upon business connected with a theatrical speculation, although compulsory exile had more than once been hinted at by those who were not his friends.
Be that how it may, he was back again. His age was about thirty, tall, dark, and not bad looking. The beard he had grown had considerably altered his appearance, and had I met him in the street I confess I should scarcely have recognised him.
Many were the whispers I had heard that Ted Rivers was not a model of uprightness; nevertheless, I had always found him a good-hearted, genial Philistine in my bachelor days, and now, over our meal, he cracked his jokes and beamed with that bonhomie as was his wont in times gone by.
Bob, Ted, Demetrius and myself, were a merry quartette, despite the anxiety and the many maddening thoughts gnawing constantly at my heart. The dinner passed off pleasantly, Ted giving a humorous description of life among Australian squatters. Although he asserted that dramatic business took him to the Antipodes, he admitted that he had been compelled to go up-country in search of work, and that his employment at one period had been that of a shepherd in Gippsland.
His description of the shifts which he had been put to in order to obtain a crust—he, a curled darling of Society, whilom actor at a West End theatre, and pet of the ladies—was very amusing, and caused us to roar with laughter.
“And how have you been all this time, Burgoyne?” he asked of me, when he had finished his narrative.
“Oh! Frank’s a Benedict now,” interposed Bob, laughing. “Married a fair Russian.”
“What!” exclaimed Ted in surprise. “Well, well, it’s what all of us must come to, sooner or later. But Burgoyne’s different from us poor beggars; he’s rich, and can afford matrimony.”
“I don’t see what money has to do with it,” I said. “Many poor men are happy with good helpmates.”