It shall be all right with me too;—I swear it. When will you come back to London, Captain Scarborough?"
Then there came an angry dispute in the gambling-room, during which Mr. Hart by no means strove to repress his voice. Captain Scarborough asserted his rights as a free agent, declaring himself capable, as far as the law was concerned, of going wherever he pleased without reference to Mr. Hart; and told that gentleman that any interference on his part would be regarded as an impertinence. "But my money—my money, which you must pay this minute, if I please to demand it."
"You did not lend me five-and-twenty thousand pounds without security."
"It is forty-five—now, at this moment."
"Take it, get it; go and put it in your pocket. You have a lot of writings; turn then into cash at once. Take them to any other Jew in London and sell them. See if you can get your five-and-twenty thousand pounds for them—or twenty-five thousand shillings. You certainly cannot get five-and-twenty pence for them here, though you had all the police of this royal kingdom to support you. My father says that the bonds I gave you are not worth the paper on which they were written. If you are cheated, so have I been. If he has robbed you, so has he me. But I have not robbed you, and you can do nothing to me."
"I vill stick to you like beesvax," said Mr. Hart, while the look of good-humor left his countenance for a moment. "Like beesvax! You shall not escape me again."
"You will have to follow me to Constantinople, then."
"I vill follow you to the devil."
"You are likely to go before me there. But for the present I am off to Constantinople, from whence I intend to make an extended tour to Mount Caucasus, and then into Thibet. I shall be very glad of your company, but cannot offer to pay the bill. When you and your companions have settled yourselves comfortably at Tretton, I shall be happy to come and see you there. You will have to settle the matter first with my younger brother, if I may make bold to call that well-born gentleman my brother at all. I wish you a good-morning, Mr. Hart." Upon that he walked out into the hall, and thence down the steps into the garden in front of the establishment, his own attendant following him.
Mr. Hart also followed him, but did not immediately seek to renew the conversation. If he meant to show any sign of keeping his threat and of sticking to the captain like beeswax, he must show his purpose at once. The captain for a time walked round the little enclosure in earnest conversation with the attendant, and Mr. Hart stood on the steps watching them. Play was over, at any rate for that day, as far as the captain was concerned.
"Now, Captain Scarborough, don't you think you've been very rash?" said the attendant.
"I think I've got six hundred and fifty napoleons in my pocket, instead of waiting to get them in driblets from my brother."
"But if he knew that you had come here he would withdraw them altogether. Of course, he will know now. That man will be sure to tell him. He will let all London know. Of course, it would be so when you came to a place of such common resort as Monte Carlo."
"Common resort! Do you believe he came here as to a place of common resort? Do you think that he had not tracked me out, and would not have done so, whether I had gone to Melbourne, or New York, or St. Petersburg? But the wonder is that he should spend his money in such a vain pursuit."
"Ah, captain, you do not know what is vain and what is not. It is your brother's pleasure that you should be kept in the dark for a time."
"Hang my brother's pleasure! Why am I to follow my brother's pleasure?"
"Because he will allow you an income. He will keep a coat on your back and a hat on your head, and supply meat and wine for your needs." Here Captain Scarborough jingled the loose napoleons in his trousers pocket. "Oh, yes, that is all very well but it will not last forever. Indeed, it will not last for a week unless you leave Monte Carlo."
"I shall leave it this afternoon by the train for Genoa."
"And where shall you go then?"
"You heard me suggest to Mr. Hart to the devil—or else Constantinople, and after that to Thibet. I suppose I shall still enjoy the pleasure of your company?"
"Mr. Augustus wishes that I should remain with you, and, as you yourself say, perhaps it will be best."
CHAPTER XII.
HARRY ANNESLEY'S SUCCESS.
Harry Annesley, a day or two after he had left Tretton, went down to Cheltenham; for he had received an invitation to a dance there, and with the invitation an intimation that Florence Mountjoy was to be at the dance. If I were to declare that the dance had been given and Florence asked to it merely as an act of friendship to Harry, it would perhaps be thought that modern friendship is seldom carried to so great a length. But it was undoubtedly the fact that Mrs. Armitage, who gave the dance, was a great friend and admirer of Harry's, and that Mr. Armitage was an especial chum. Let not, however, any reader suppose that Florence was in the secret. Mrs. Armitage had thought it best to keep her in the dark as to the person asked to meet her. "As to my going to Montpelier Place," Harry had once said to Mrs. Armitage, "I might as well knock at a prison-door." Mrs. Mountjoy lived in Montpelier Place.
"I think we could perhaps manage that for you," Mrs. Armitage had replied, and she had managed it.
"Is she coming?" Harry said to Mrs. Armitage, in an anxious whisper, as he entered the room.
"She has been here this half-hour—if you had taken the trouble to leave your cigars and come and meet her."
"She has not gone?" said Harry, almost awe-struck at the idea.
"No; she is sitting like Patience on a monument, smiling at grief, in the room inside. She has got horrible news to tell you."
"Oh, heavens! What news?"
"I suppose she will tell you, though she has not been communicative to me in regard to your royal highness. The news is simply that her mother is going to take her to Brussels, and that she is to live for a while amid the ambassadorial splendors with Sir Magnus and his wife."
By retiring from the world Mrs. Mountjoy had not intended to include such slight social relaxations as Mrs. Armitage's party, for Harry on turning round encountered her talking to another Cheltenham lady. He greeted her with his pleasantest smile, to which Mrs. Mountjoy did not respond quite so sweetly. She had ever greatly feared Harry Annesley, and had to-day heard a story very much, as she thought, to his discredit. "Is your daughter here?" asked Harry, with well-trained hypocrisy. Mrs. Mountjoy could not but acknowledge that Florence was in the room, and then Harry passed on in pursuit of his quarry.
"Oh, Mr. Annesley, when did you come to Cheltenham?"
"As soon as I heard that Mrs. Armitage was going to have a party I began to think of coming immediately." Then an idea for the first time shot through Florence's mind—that her friend Mrs. Armitage was a woman devoted to intrigue. "What dance have you disengaged? I have something that I must tell you to-night. You don't mean to say that you will not give me one dance?" This was merely a lover's anxious doubt on his part, because Florence had not at once replied to him. "I am told that you are going away to Brussels."
"Mamma is going on a visit to her brother-in-law."
"And you with her?"
"Of course I shall go with mamma." All this had been said apart, while a fair-haired, lackadaisical young gentleman was standing twiddling his thumbs waiting to dance with Florence. At last the little book from her waist was brought forth, and Harry's name was duly inscribed. The next dance was a quadrille, and he saw that the space after that was also vacant;