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

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СКАЧАТЬ it’s a splendid bid, if you come to think of it; for, just suppose it be everything you say – and I own I can’t believe it is, – but suppose it were, who is to guarantee the continuance of these great public play-tables? All the Governments of Europe are setting their faces against them, – not a year passes without one or two being closed. This very spring there was a talk of suppressing play at Baden. Who can tell what the first outbreak of fanatic zeal may effect?”

      “No, no. So long as men live, dey will do tree tings, – make love, make war, and gamble. When dey give up dese, de world shut up.”

      There was a truthful force about this Beecher felt could not be gainsaid, and he stood silent and confuted. There was another appeal that he had not tried, and he resolved to neglect nothing that gave even the faintest chance of success. He addressed himself to the Jew’s goodness of heart, – to the benevolence that he knew must have its home in his nature. To what end, therefore, should he carry to the grave, or destroy, a secret that might be a blessing to thousands? He depicted, not without knowledge, some of the miseries of the man “forgotten of Fortune,” – the days of fevered anxiety, – the nights of agonizing torture, as, half maddened by his losses, he played wildly, recklessly on, – suicide in all its darkest forms ever present to his aching faculties, while all this time one glance within that little book would save him. And he wound up all by a burst of enthusiastic praise of a man who could thus transmit happiness to generations unborn.

      “I never wish to sell dat book. I mean it alway to die wit myself! but if you will give me one tousand pounds, it is yours. If you delay, I will say two tousands.”

      “Done – I take it. Of course a bill will do – eh?”

      “Yaas, I will take a bill, – a bill at tree months. When it is yours, I will tell you dat you are de luckiest man in all Europe. You have dere, in dat leetle volume, all man strive for, fight for, cheat for, die for!”

      As he said this, he sat down again at his desk to write the acceptance Beecher was to sign; while the other, withdrawing into the window recess, peered eagerly into the pages of the precious book.

      “Mind,” said the Jew, “you no let any one see de ‘Cabal.’ If it be once get abroad, de bank will change de play. You just carry in your head de combinations, and you, go in, and win de millions dat you want at de time.”

      “Just so,” said Beecher, in ecstasy, the very thought of the golden cataract sending a thrill of rapture through him. “I suppose, however, I may show it to Davis?”

      “Ach, der Davis, yaas, – der Davis can see it,” said the Jew, with a laugh whose significance it were very hard to interpret. “Dere now,” said Stein, handing him the pen, “write de name dere as on de oder.”

      “Still Lackington, I suppose – eh?” asked Beecher.

      “Yaas, – just de same,” said Stein, gravely.

      “‘Just as good for a sheep as a lamb,’ as the proverb says,” muttered Beecher. And he dashed off the name with a reckless flourish. “I ‘ll tell you one thing, Master Stein,” said he, as he buttoned up the magic volume in the breast of his coat, “if this turn out the good dodge you say it is, I ‘ll behave handsomely to you. I pledge you my word of honor, I’ll stand to you for double – treble the sum you have got written there. You don’t know the fellow you’re dealing with, – very few know him, for the matter of that, – but though he has got a smart lesson or two in life, he has good stuff in him still; and if– I say if, because, of course, all depends on that—if I can give the bank at Hamburg a spring in the air with the aid of this, I ‘ll not forget you, old boy.”

      “You make dem all spring in de air! – Ems, Wiesbaden, Baden – all go up togeder!” And the Jew laughed with the glee of a demon.

      “Not that I want to hurt any one, – not that I ‘d like to squeeze a fellow too hard,” broke in Beecher, suddenly, for a quick thrill of superstitious fear – the gambler’s innate conscience – shot through him, and made him tremble to think that by a chance word or thought he might disgust the Fortune he would propitiate. “No, no; my motto is, ‘Live and let live!’ There’s room for us all!” And with the utterance of a sentiment he believed so truly generous, he took leave of the Jew, and departed.

      CHAPTER V. A VILLAGE NEAR THE RHINE

      It was at a little village called Holbach, about fifteen miles from the right bank of the Rhine, Grog Davis had taken up his quarters while awaiting the arrival of his daughter. Near as it was to that great high-road of Europe, scarcely out of earshot of whizzing steamers and screaming trains, the spot was wonderfully secluded and unvisited. A little trout-stream, known to a few, who treasured the secret like fishermen, made the inn resorted to in the months of May and June; but for the rest of the year the “Golden Hook” had few customers, and the landlord almost abdicated his functions till spring came round again. The house, originally intended for a mill, was built over the river itself, so that the indolent angler might actually have fished from the very window. The pine-clad mountains of Nassau enclosed the narrow glen, which straggled irregularly along for miles, now narrowing to a mere strip, now expanding into little plains of fertile meadow-land, with neat cottages and speckled cattle scattered around them. A narrow belt of garden flanked the river, on whose edge a walk of trellised vines was fashioned, – a charming spot in the sultry heat of summer, with its luxuriant shade above and the rippling stream below. Davis had seen the place years before in some hurried Journey; but his retentive mind carried a full memory of the spot, and he soon found that it comprised all he was in search of, – it was easy of access, secret, and cheap.

      Only too well pleased to meet with a guest at this dead season of the year, they gave up to him the choicest apartment, and treated him with every solicitude and attention.

      His table was supplied well, almost luxuriously; the good wine of Ettleberg given in liberal profusion; the vine alley converted into a pistol gallery for his use; and all for such a sum per diem as would not have satisfied a waiter at the Clarendon. But it was the calm seclusion, the perfect isolation that gratified him most. Let him stroll which way he would, he never chanced upon a traveller. It was marvellous, indeed, how such a place could have escaped that prying tribe of ramblers which England each year sends forth to wrangle, dispute, and disparage everything over Europe; and yet here were precisely the very objects they usually sought after, – beautiful scenery, a picturesque peasantry, and a land romantic in all its traits and traditions.

      Not that Grog cared for these: rocks, waterfalls, ruins, leafy groves, or limpid streams made no appeal to him, He lived for the life of men, their passions and their ambitions. He knew some people admired this kind of thing, and there were some who were fond of literature; others liked pictures; others, again, fancied old coins. He had no objection. They were, if not very profitable, at least, harmless tastes. All he asked was, not to be the companion of such dreamers. “Give me the fellow that knows life,” would he say; and I am afraid that the definition of that same “life” would have included some things scarcely laudable.

      If the spot were one to encourage indolence and ease, Davis did not yield to this indulgence. He arose early; walked for health; shot with the pistol for practice; studied his martingale for the play-table; took an hour with the small-sword with an old maître d’armes whom he found in the village; and, without actually devoting himself to it as a task, practised himself in German by means of conversation; and, lastly, he thought deeply and intently over the future. For speculations of this kind he had no mean capacity. If he knew little of the human heart in its higher moods, he understood it well in its shortcomings and its weaknesses; to what temptations a man might yield, when to offer them, and how, were mysteries he had often brooded over. In forecastings of this order, therefore, СКАЧАТЬ