Davenport Dunn, a Man of Our Day. Volume 2. Lever Charles James

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СКАЧАТЬ sure, friend Lazarus, that if I say eight or ten thousand, – for I don’t want more, – Davis will be as willing to back the bill?”

      “I am quite sure.”

      “Well, now, I am not so very certain of that; and as it is Davis will have to book up, it might be safer, perhaps, that I did n’t go beyond the amount he mentions, – eh?”

      “As you will, – as you please yourself. I only say, dere is der Herr Davis’s name; he send it to me and say, ‘Milord will do de rest.’”

      “So that he sent you a blank acceptance?” cried Beecher, in amazement.

      “Yaas, Just as you see, – ‘Christopher Davis,’ and de flourish as usual. Ach, der Davis!” and he sighed once more.

      The man who held Grog’s signature on a blank stamp assumed no common shape in Annesley Beecher’s eyes, and he continued to gaze on the old man with a strange sense of awe and astonishment. If he had not the document there before him on the table, he would not have believed it. The trustful courage of Van Amburgh, who used to place his head in the lion’s mouth, seemed poor in comparison with such heroic boldness as this; and he gazed at the writing in a sort of fascination.

      “And Grog actually sent you that over by letter?” asked he again.

      “Yaas, as you see,” was the calm answer.

      “Well, here goes then, Abraham – Lazarus, I mean; make it out for a matter of – five – no, eight – hang it, let as say ten thousand florins when we are about it! Ten thousand, at six months, – eh?”

      “Better at tree months, – we can always renew,” said Stein, calmly.

      “Of course; and by that time we may want a little more liquor in the decanter, – eh! old boy?” said Beecher, laughing joyfully.

      “To be sure, vaary mush more liquor as you want it.”

      “What a brick!” said Beecher, clapping him on the shoulder in all the ecstasy of delight.

      “Dere!” said the Jew, as he finished writing, “all is done; only to say where it be paid, – what bank at London.”

      “Well, that is a bit of a puzzle, I must own!” said Beecher, rubbing his chin with an air of doubt and hesitation.

      “Where do de Lord Lackington keep his account?” asked the Jew; and the question was so artfully posed that Beecher Answered promptly, —

      “Harmer and Gore’s, Lombard Street, or Pall Mall, whichever you like.”

      “Hanper and Gore. I know dem vaary well, – that will do; you do sign your name dere.”

      “I wish I could persuade you that Annesley Beecher would be enough, – eh?”

      “You write de name as der Davis say, and no oder!”

      “Here goes, then! ‘In for a penny,’ as the proverb says,” muttered he; and in a bold, dashing hand, wrote “Lackington” across the bill.

      “Ah!” said the Jew, as he examined it with his glass, and scanned every letter over and over; “and now, vat you say for de Cuyp, and de Mieris, and de Ostade, – vill you take ‘era all, as I say?”

      “I ‘ll think over it, – I ‘ll reflect a bit first, Master Stein. As for pictures, they ‘re rather an encumbrance when a man has n’t a house to hang them in.”

      “You have de vaary fine house in town, and an oder vaary fine house in de country, beside a what you call box – shoot-box – ”

      “Nothing of the kind, Lazarus. I haven’t a thing as big as the crib we are standing in. Your mind is always running upon my brother; but there’s a wide difference between our fortunes, I assure you. He drew the first ticket in the lottery of life; and, by the way, that reminds me of something in Grog’s letter that I was to ask you.” And Beecher took the epistle from his pocket and ran his eye over it. “Ah! here it is! ‘Ask Stein what are the average runs at rouge-et-noir, what are the signs of an intermitting game, and what are the longest runs he remembers on one color?’ Can you answer me these?”

      “Some of dem I have here,” said Stein, taking down from a shelf a small vellum-bound volume, fastened with a padlock and chain, the key of which he wore attached to his watch. “Here is de grand ‘arcanum,’” said he, laughing; “here are de calculs made in de experience of forty-one year! Where is de man in Europe can say as mush as dat? In dis book is recounted de great game of de Duc de Brancas, where he broke de bank every night of de week till Saturday, – two million tree hundred tousand francs! Caumartin, the first croupier, shot hisself, and Nogeot go mad. He reckon de moneys in de casette, for when he say on Friday night, ‘Monseigneur,’ say he, ‘we have not de full sum here, – there’s one hundred and seventy tousand francs too little,’ de Duc reply, ‘Never mind, mon cher Monsieur Nogeot, I am noways pressed, – don’t distress yourself, – only let it be pay before I go home to bed.’ Nogeot lose his reason when he hear it. Ah! here is de whole ‘Greschichte,’ and here de table of chances.”

      Beecher gazed on the precious volume as Aladdin might have done on the lamp. It was the mystic key to untold riches. With that marvellous book a man needed no more in life; there lay all the “cabals,” all the “martingales,” that years of intense toil and deep study had discovered. To win that knowledge, too, what hearts had been broken, what desolation, what death! It was a record of martyrs in his eyes, and he really regarded it with a sort of rapturous veneration.

      Old Lazarus did not fail to detect the expression of wonderment and admiration. He saw depicted there the glowing ecstasy that all the triumphs of high art could not call up. The vigorous energy of Wouvermans, the glowing coloring of Cuyp, the mellow richness of Mieris, had not touched that nature which now vibrated in every chord to the appeal of Fortune. It was the submissive worship of a devotee before some sacred relic! Stein read that gaze, and tracked its every motive; and with a solemn gesture he clasped the volume and locked it.

      “But you are surely going to show me – I mean, you are about to tell me the answer to these questions?”

      Stein shook his head dubiously, as he said: “Dat is my Kleinod, my idol, – in dat book lie de secret of secrets, and I say to myself, ‘Lazarus, be poor, be destitute, be houseless to-morrow, and you know how to get rich if you will.’ De great law of Chances – de rule dat guide what we call ‘Luck’ – dere it is written! I have but to say I will have, and I have! When I die, I will burn it, or have it lay wit me in my grave.”

      “It’s not possible you could do this!” cried Beecher, in horror: far less of indignation had it cost him to hear that any one should carry out of the world with him the cure of cancer, of cholera, or some such dread scourge of poor humanity. The black-hearted selfishness of such a crime seemed without a parallel, and for a second or two, as he looked at the decrepid object before him, and saw the lonely spot, the isolation, and the propitious moment, a strange wild thought flashed across his mind that it might be not only pardonable, but praiseworthy, to seize upon and carry it off by force.

      Whether the old man read what was passing within him is hard to say, but he returned the other’s look as steadily and as fiercely, and Beecher felt abashed and cowed.

      “I’ ll tell you what, Stein,” said he, after a pause, “I ‘ll buy that same old volume of yours, just for the curiosity of the thing, and I ‘ll make you a sporting offer, – I ‘ll give you ten thousand СКАЧАТЬ