Dross Part 11

Of course I came at once. One must sacrifice everything to affairs."

Naturally I acquiesced fervently, for the last remark had been thrown to me for my good.

The Vicomte was looking for his spectacles.

"But, my friend," he said, "it is atrociously written. One cannot decipher such a scrawl as this."

In his impatience the Baron leant forward, and taking the paper from my patron, handed it to me.

"Here," he said, "the secretary--read it aloud."

Nothing loth, I read the communication in my loudest voice. The world holds that a loud voice indicates honesty or a lack of brain, and the Baron was essentially of that world. The anonymous letter was a warning that a general rising against the rule of the Emperor was imminent, and that in view of the probable state of anarchy that would ensue, wise men should not delay in transferring their wealth to more stable countries. Precisely--in a word--the information that it had been decided to withhold from the recipient of the letter.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE BARON BLEW AND PUFFED LIKE A PRIZE-FIGHTER WHEN I HAD FINISHED THE PERUSAL. "THERE," HE CRIED; "I RECEIVE A LETTER LIKE THAT--I, THE BARON GIRAUD--OF THE HIGH FINANCE."]

The Baron blew and puffed like a prize-fighter when I had finished the perusal.

"There," he cried; "I receive a letter like that--I, the Baron Giraud--of the high finance."

"My poor friend, calm yourself," urged the Vicomte.

It is easy enough to tell another to calm himself, but who among us can compa.s.s such a frame of mind when he is. .h.i.t in a vital spot? The Baron wiped his forehead nervously.

"But," he said, "is it true?"

The Vicomte spread out his hands, and never glanced at me as an ordinary man would have done towards one who shared his knowledge.

"Who can tell--but yes! So far as human foresight goes--it is true enough."

"Then what am I to do?"

I stared at the great financier asking such a question. a.s.suredly he, of all men, needed no one's counsel in a matter of money.

"Do as I have done," said the Vicomte; "send your money out of the country."

An odd look came over the Baron's face. He glanced from one of us to the other--with the cunning, and somewhat the look, of a cat. The Vicomte was blandly indifferent. As for me, I had, I am told, a hard face in those days--hardened by weather and a disbelief in human nature which has since been modified.

"It is a responsibility that you take there," said the financier.

"I take no responsibility. A man of my years, of my retired life, knows little of such matters." (I thought he looked older as he spoke.) "I only tell you what I have done with my small possessions."

The Baron shook his head with a sly scepticism. After all, the cheapest cunning must suffice for money-making, for I dare swear this man had little else.

"But how?" he said.

"In bank notes, by hand," was the Vicomte's astonis.h.i.+ng answer. And the Baron laughed incredulously. It seems that the highest aim of the high finance is to catch your neighbour telling the truth by accident.

It would almost be safe to tell the truth always, so rarely is it recognised.

It was not until the Vicomte produced his bankbook and showed the amounts paid in and subsequently withdrawn that the Baron Giraud believed what he had been told. My duties, it may be well to mention in pa.s.sing, had no part in the expenditure of the Vicomte de Clericy.

I had only to deal with the income derived from the various estates, and while being fully aware that large sums had been placed within the hands of his bankers, I had not troubled to be curious respecting the ultimate destination of such moneys. My patron possessed, as has already been intimated, a lively--nay, an exaggerated--sense of the value of money. He was, indeed, as I remember thinking at this time, somewhat of a miser, loving money for its own sake, and not, as did the Baron Giraud, merely for the grandeur and position to be purchased therewith.

"But I am not like you," said the financier at length.

"No; you have a thousand louis for every one that I possess."

"But I have nothing solid--no lands, no estates except my chateau in Var."

His panic had by no means subsided, and presently he found himself on the verge of tears--a pitiable, despicable object. The Vicomte--soothing and benevolent--went on to explain more fully the position of his own affairs. He told us that on information received from a sure source he had months earlier concluded that the Emperor's illness was of a more serious nature than the general public believed.

"You, my dear friend," he said, "engaged as you have been in the affairs of the outside world--the Suez Ca.n.a.l, Mexico, the Colonies--have perhaps omitted to watch matters nearer home. While looking at a distant mountain one may fall over a little stone--is it not so?"

He had, he informed us, withdrawn his small interest in such securities as depended upon the stability of the Government, but that for men occupying a public position, either by accident of birth or--and he bowed in his pleasant way towards the Baron--by the force of their genius, to send their money out of France by the ordinary financial channels would excite comment, and perhaps hasten the crisis that all good patriots would fain avoid. He talked thus collectedly and fairly while the Baron Giraud could but wipe his forehead with a damp handkerchief and gasp incoherent exclamations of terror.

"I could realize a couple of million," said the financier, "in two days, but there is much that I cannot sell just now--the fall of the government makes it necessary to hold much that I could have sold at a profit a fortnight ago."

The Vicomte was playing with a quill pen. How well I knew the action!

It seemed that the millionaire was recovering from his shock, of which re-establishment the outward and visible sign was a dawning gleam of cunning in the eyes.

"But I have no one I can trust," he said; and I almost laughed, so well the words bespoke the man. "It is different for you," he added; "you have--Monsieur."

And he glanced keenly at me. Indeed, we were a queer trio; and I began to think that I was as big a scoundrel as my maiden aunts maintained.

"I would trust Mr. Howard with all my possessions," said the old Vicomte, looking at me almost affectionately; "but in this matter I have found another messenger, less valuable to me personally, less necessary to my comfort and daily happiness, but equally trustworthy."

"And if I gave him twenty million francs to take abroad for me--?"

suggested the great financier.

"Then, my friend, we should be in the same boat--that is all."

"_Your_ boat," said the Baron, with an unpleasant laugh.

Monsieur de Clericy shrugged his shoulders and smiled. This grave political crisis had rejuvenated him, and he seemed to rise to meet each emergency with a buoyancy that sat strangely on white hairs.

They talked together upon the fascinating topic, while I, who had no part in the game, sat and listened. The Baron was very cunning, and, as it seemed to me, very contemptible. With all the vices that are mine, I thank heaven that I have never loved money; for that love, it seems, undermines much that is manly and honest in upright hearts.

Money, it will be remembered, was at the root of the last quarrel I had with my father--the last fatal breach, which will have to be patched up in another world. Money has, as it will be seen by such as care to follow me through these pages, dogged my life from beginning to end. I have run my thick head against those pursuing it, each in his different manner, getting lamentably in their way, and making deadly enemies for myself.

Monsieur de Clericy, in his frank and open way, gave fuller details of his own intentions. It seemed that his possessions were at that moment in the house--in a safe hiding-place; that the messenger was to make several journeys to London, carrying at one time a sum of money which would be no very pleasant travelling companion. A safe depository awaited the sums in England, and, in due course, reinvestment would follow. Money, it will be suspected, was by now beginning to be somewhat of a red rag for me, and I thought I saw some signs of its evil influence over my kindly patron. He spoke of it almost as if there were nothing else on earth worth a man's consideration. In the heat of argument he lowered his voice, and was no longer his open, genial self.

What astonished me most, however, was the facility with which the Baron made a catspaw of him. For the old Vicomte slowly stepped down as it were from his high standpoint of indifference, and allowed himself to be interested in the financier's schemes. It was out of keeping with the att.i.tude which my patron had a.s.sumed a few days earlier at the meeting which we had attended, and I was more than ever convinced that the Vicomte was too old and too simple to hold his own in a world of scoundrels.

The Baron led him on from one admission to another, and at last it was settled that twenty millions of francs were to be brought to the Hotel Clericy and placed in the Vicomte's keeping. To my mind the worst part of the transaction lay in the fact that the financier had succeeded in saddling my patron with a certain moral responsibility which the old man was in no way called upon to a.s.sume.

"Then," he said, "I may safely leave the matter thus in your hands? I may sleep to-night?"

"Ah!" replied the other. "Yes--you may sleep, my friend."

"And Monsieur shares the responsibility?" added the upstart, turning to me.

"Of course--for all I am worth," was my reply, and I did not at the time think that even the Vicomte, whose faculties were keener in such matters, saw the sarcasm intended by the words.