CHAPTER XIII

ALBAN REVISITS UNION STREET

Alban escaped from the Sporting Club at a quarter to eleven, sick of its fetid atmosphere and wearied by its mock brutalities. He made no apologies for quitting w.i.l.l.y Forrest--for, truth to tell, that merry worthy was no longer capable of understanding them. Frequent calls for whisky-and-soda, added to a nice taste for champagne at dinner, left the Captain in that maudlin condition in which a man is first cousin to all the world--at once garrulous and effusive and generally undesirable.

Alban had, above all things, a contempt for a drunken man; and leaving Forrest to the care of others of his kind, he went out into the street and made his way slowly eastward.

It was an odd thing to recall; but he had hardly set foot east of the Temple, he remembered, since the day when the bronze gates of Richard Gessner's house first closed upon him and the vision of wonderland burst upon his astonished eyes. The weeks had been those of unending kindness, of gifts showered abundantly, of promises for the future which might well overwhelm him by their generosity. Let him but consent to claim his rights, Gessner had said, and every ambition should be gratified. No other explanation than that of a lagging justice could he obtain--and no other had he come to desire. If he remained at Hampstead, the image of Anna Gessner, of a perfect womanhood as he imagined it, kept him to the house. He did not desire his patron's money; he began to discover how few were his wants and how small the satisfaction of their gratification could be. But the image he worshipped ever--and at its feet all other desires were forgotten.

And now reality had come with its sacrilegious hand, warring upon the vision and bidding him open his eyes and see. It was easy enough to estimate this adventurer w.i.l.l.y Forrest at his true worth, less easy to bind the wounds imagination had received and to set the image once more upon its ancient pedestal. Could he longer credit Anna with those qualities with which his veneration had endowed her? Must there not be heart searchings and rude questionings, the abandonment of the dream and the stern corrections of truth? He knew not what to think. A voice of reproach asked him if he also had not forgotten. The figure of little Lois Boriskoff stood by him in the shadows, and he feared to speak with her lest she should accuse him.

Let it be said in justice that he had written to Lois twice, and heard but lately that she had left Union Street and gone, none knew whither.

His determination to do his utmost for her and her father, to bid them share his prosperity and command him as they would, had been strong with him from the first and delayed only by the amazing circ.u.mstances of his inheritance. He did not understand even yet that he had the right to remain at "Five Gables," but this right had so often been insisted upon that he began at last to believe in its reality and to accept the situation as a _chose jugee_. And with the conviction, there came an intense longing to revisit the old scenes--who knows, it may have been but the promptings of a vanity after all.

It was a great thing, indeed, to be walking there in the glare of the lamps and telling himself that fortune and a future awaited him, that the instrument of mighty deeds would be his inheritance, and that the years of his poverty were no more. How cringingly he had walked sometimes in the old days when want had shamed him and wealth looked down upon him with contempt. To-night he might stare the boldest in the face, nurse fabulous desires and know that they would be gratified, peer through the barred windows of the shops and say all he saw was at his command. A sense of might and victory attended his steps. He understood what men mean when they say that money is power and that it rules the world.

He turned eastward, and walking with rapid strides made his way down the Strand and thence by Ludgate Circus to Aldgate and the mean streets he knew so well. It was nearly midnight when he arrived there, and yet he fell in with certain whom he knew and pa.s.sed them by with a genial nod.

His altered appearance, the black overcoat and the scarf which hid his dress clothes, called for many a "Gor blime" or "Strike me dead." Women caught his arm and wrestled with him, roughs tried to push him from the pavement and were amazed at his good humor. In Union Street he first met little red-haired Chris Denham and asked of her the news. She shrank back from him as though afraid, and answered almost in a whisper.

"Lois gone--she went three weeks ago. I thought you'd have know'd it--I thought you was sweet on her, Alban. And now you come here like that--what's happened to you, whatever have you been doing of?"

He told her gaily that he had found new friends.

"But I haven't forgotten the old ones, Chris, and I'm coming down to see you all some day soon. How's your mother--what's she doing now?"

The girl shrugged her shoulders and the glance she turned upon him seemed to say that she would sooner speak on any other subject.

"What should she be doin'--what's any of us doin' but slave our bones off and break our hearts. You've come to see Lois' father, haven't you?

Oh, yes, I know how much you want to talk about my mother. The old man's up there in the shop--I saw him as I came by."

Alban stood an instant irresolute. How much he would have liked to offer some a.s.sistance to this poor girl, to speak of real pecuniary help and friendship. But he knew the people too well. The utmost delicacy would be necessary.

"Well," he said, "I'm sorry things are not better, Chris. I've had a good Sat.u.r.day night, you see, and if I can do anything, don't you mind letting me know. We'll talk of it when we have more time. I'm going on to see Boriskoff now, and I doubt that I'll find him out of bed."

She laughed a little wildly, still turning almost pathetic eyes upon him.

"Is it true that it's all off between you and Lois--all the Court says it is. That's why she went away, they say--is it true, Alb, or are they telling lies? I can't believe it myself. You're not the sort to give a girl over--not one that's stood by you as well as Lois. Tell me it ain't true or I shall think the worse of you."

The question staggered him and he could not instantly answer it. Was it true or false? Did he really love little Lois and had he still an intention to marry her? Alban had never looked the situation straight in the face until this moment.

"I never tell secrets," he exclaimed a little lamely, and turning upon his heel, he shut his ears to the hard laugh which greeted him and went on, as a man in a dream, to old Boriskoff's garret. A lamp stood in the window there and the tap of a light hammer informed him that the indefatigable Pole was still at work. In truth, old Paul was bending copper tubing--for a firm which said that he had no equal at the task and paid him a wage which would have been despised by a crossing-sweeper.

Alban entered the garret quietly and was a little startled by the sharp exclamation which greeted him. He knew nothing, of course, of the part this crafty Pole had played or what his own change of circ.u.mstance owed to him. To Alban, Paul Boriskoff was just the same mad revolutionary as before--at once fanatic and dreamer and, before then, the father of Lois who had loved him. If the old fellow had no great welcome for the young Englishman to-night, let that be set down to his sense of neglect and, in some measure, to his daughter's absence.

"Good evening, Mr. Boriskoff, you are working very late to-night."

Alban stood irresolute at the door, watching the quick movements of the s.h.a.ggy brows and wondered what had happened to old Paul that he should be received so coolly. Had he known what was in the Pole's mind he would have as soon have jumped off London Bridge as have braved the anger of one who judged him so mercilessly in that hour. For Boriskoff had heard the stories which Hampstead had to tell, and he had said, "He will ruin Lois' life and I have put the power to do so in his hands."

"The poor do not choose their hours, Alban Kennedy. Sit down, if you please, and talk to me. I have much to say to you."

He did not rise from his chair, but indicated a rude seat in the corner by the chimney and waited until his unwilling guest had taken it. Alban judged that his own altered appearance and his absence from Union Street must be the cause of his displeasure. He could guess no other reason.

"Do you love my daughter, Alban Kennedy?"

"You know that I do, Paul. Have we not always been good friends? I came to tell you about a piece of great good fortune which has happened to me and to find out why Lois had not written to me. You see for yourself that there is a great change in me. One of the richest men in London considers that I have a claim, to some of his money--through some distant relative, it appears--and I am living at his house almost as his own son."

"Is that why you forget your old friends so quickly?"

"I have never forgotten them. I wrote to Lois twice."

"Did you speak of marriage in your letters?"

The lad's face flushed crimson. He knew that he could not tell Paul Boriskoff the truth.

"I did not speak of marriage--why should I?" he exclaimed; "it was never your wish that we should speak of it until Lois is twenty-one. She will not be that for more than three years--why do you ask me the question to-night?"

"Because you have learned to love another woman."

A dead silence fell in the room. The old man continued to tap gently upon the coil of tube, rapidly a.s.suming a fantastic shape under the masterly touch of a trained hand. A candle flickered by him upon a crazy table where stood a crust of bread and a lump of coa.r.s.e cheese. Not boastfully had he told Richard Gessner that he would accept nothing for himself. He was even poorer than he had been six weeks ago when he discovered that his old enemy was alive.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "You love another woman, Alban Kennedy, and you have wished to forget my daughter."]

"You love another woman, Alban Kennedy, and you have wished to forget my daughter. Do not say that it is not the truth, for I read it upon your face. You should be ashamed to come here unless you can deny it. Fortune has been kind to you, but how have you rewarded those for whom she has nothing? I say that you have forgotten them--been ashamed of them as they have now the right to be ashamed of you."

He put his hammer down and looked the lad straight in the face. Upon Alban's part there was an intense desire to confess everything and to tell his old friend of all those distressing doubts and perplexities which had so hara.s.sed him since he went to Hampstead. If he could have done so, much would have been spared him in the time to come. But he found it impossible to open his heart to an alien,--nor did he believe Paul Boriskoff capable of appreciating the emotions which now tortured him.

"I have never been ashamed of any of my friends," he exclaimed hotly; "you know that it is not true, Paul Boriskoff. Where are the letters which I wrote to Lois? Why has she not answered them? If I had been ashamed, would they have been written? Cannot you understand that all which has happened to me has been very distracting. I have seen a new life--a new world, and it is not as our world. Perhaps there is no more happiness in it than in these courts and alleys where we have suffered so much. I cannot tell you truly. It is all too new to me and naturally I feel incapable of judging it. When I came to you to-night it was to speak of our old friendship. Should I have done so if I had forgotten?"

Old Paul heard him with patience, but his anger none the less remained.

The s.h.a.ggy eyebrows were at rest now, but the eyes were never turned from Alban's face.

"You are in love with Anna Gessner," he said quietly; "why do you not tell Lois so?"

"I cannot tell her so--it would not be true. She will always be the same little Lois to me, and when she is twenty-one I will marry her."

"Ha--when she is twenty-one. That seems a long time off to one who is your age. You will marry her, you say--a promise to keep her quiet while you make love to this fine lady who befools you. No, Alban Kennedy, I shall not let Lois imagine any such thing; I shall tell her the truth.

She will choose another husband--that is my wish and she will obey it."

"You are doing me a great injustice, Paul Boriskoff. I do not love Anna--perhaps for a moment I thought that I did, but I know now that I was deceiving myself. She is not one who is worthy of being loved. I believed her very different when first I went to Hampstead."

"Tell me no such thing. I am an old man and I know men's hearts. What shall my daughter and her rags be to you now that you have fine clothes upon your back? You are as the others--you have knelt down at the shrine of money and there you worship. This woman in her fine clothes--she is your idol. All your past is forgotten immediately you see her. A great gulf is set between you and us. Think not that I do not know, for there are those who bring me the story every day. You worship Anna Gessner, but you live in a fool's paradise, for the father will forbid you to marry her. I say it and I know. Be honest and speak to my daughter as I have spoken to you to-night."

He raised his hammer as though he would resume his work, and Alban began to perceive how hopeless an argument would be with him while in such a mood. Not deficient in courage, the lad could not well defend himself from so direct an attack, and he had the honesty to admit as much.

"I shall tell Lois the truth," he said: "she will then judge me and say whether you are right or wrong. I came here to-night to see if I could help you both. You know, Paul Boriskoff, how much I wish to do so. While I have money, it is yours also. Have not Lois and I always been as your children? You cannot forbid me to act as a son should, just because I have come into my inheritance. Let me find you a better home and take you away from this dismal place. Then I shall be doing right to worship money. Will you not let me do so? There is nothing in life half so good as helping those we love--I am sure of it already, and it is only five weeks since I came into my inheritance. Give me the right and let me still call you father."

Old Paul was much affected, but he would not let the lad see as much.

Avoiding the question discreetly but not unkindly, he muttered, "No, no, I need no help. I am an old man and what happens to me does not matter."