A Mortal Antipathy Part 11

Paolo was pleased. His skill and judgment were recognized. He felt grateful to the stranger, who had given him, an opportunity of conferring a favor. He selected two, after careful examination and grave deliberation. The Interviewer had sense and tact enough not to offer him an orange, and so shift the balance of obligation.

"How is Mr. Kirkwood, to-day?" he asked.

"Signor? He very well. He always well. Why you ask? Anybody tell you he sick?"

"No, n.o.body said he was sick. I have n't seen him going about for a day or two, and I thought he might have something the matter with him. Is he in the house now?"

"No: he off riding. He take long, long rides, sometime gone all day.

Sometime he go on lake, paddle, paddle in the morning, very, very early,--in night when the moon shine; sometime stay in house, and read, and study, and write,--he great scholar, Misser Kirkwood."

"A good many books, has n't he?"

"He got whole shelfs full of books. Great books, little books, old books, new books, all sorts of books. He great scholar, I tell you."

"Has n't he some curiosities,--old figures, old jewelry, old coins, or things of that sort?"

Paolo looked at the young man cautiously, almost suspiciously. "He don't keep no jewels nor no money in his chamber. He got some old things,--old jugs, old bra.s.s figgers, old money, such as they used to have in old times: she don't pa.s.s now." Paolo's genders were apt to be somewhat indiscriminately distributed.

A lucky thought struck the Interviewer. "I wonder if he would examine some old coins of mine?" said he, in a modestly tentative manner.

"I think he like to see anything curious. When he come home I ask him.

Who will I tell him wants to ask him about old coin?"

"Tell him a gentleman visiting Arrowhead Village would like to call and show him some old pieces of money, said to be Roman ones."

The Interviewer had just remembered that he had two or three old battered bits of copper which he had picked up at a tollman's, where they had been pa.s.sed off for cents. He had bought them as curiosities.

One had the name of Gallienus upon it, tolerably distinct,--a common little Roman penny; but it would serve his purpose of asking a question, as would two or three others with less legible legends. Paolo told him that if he came the next morning he would stand a fair chance of seeing Mr. Kirkwood. At any rate, he would speak to his master.

The Interviewer presented himself the next morning, after finishing his breakfast and his cigar, feeling reasonably sure of finding Mr. Kirkwood at home, as he proved to be. He had told Paolo to show the stranger up to his library,--or study, as he modestly called it.

It was a pleasant room enough, with a lookout on the lake in one direction, and the wooded hill in another. The tenant had fitted it up in scholarly fashion. The books Paolo spoke of were conspicuous, many of them, by their white vellum binding and tasteful gilding, showing that probably they had been bound in Rome, or some other Italian city. With these were older volumes in their dark original leather, and recent ones in cloth or paper. As the Interviewer ran his eye over them, he found that he could make very little out of what their backs taught him. Some of the paper-covered books, some of the cloth-covered ones, had names which he knew; but those on the backs of many of the others were strange to his eyes. The cla.s.sics of Greek and Latin and Italian literature were there; and he saw enough to feel convinced that he had better not attempt to display his erudition in the company of this young scholar.

The first thing the Interviewer had to do was to account for his visiting a person who had not asked to make his acquaintance, and who was living as a recluse. He took out his battered coppers, and showed them to Maurice.

"I understood that you were very skilful in antiquities, and had a good many yourself. So I took the liberty of calling upon you, hoping that you could tell me something about some ancient coins I have had for a good while." So saying, he pointed to the copper with the name of Gallienus.

"Is this very rare and valuable? I have heard that great prices have been paid for some of these ancient coins,--ever so many guineas, sometimes. I suppose this is as much as a thousand years old."

"More than a thousand years old," said Maurice.

"And worth a great deal of money?" asked the Interviewer.

"No, not a great deal of money," answered Maurice.

"How much, should you say?" said the Interviewer.

Maurice smiled. "A little more than the value of its weight in copper,--I am afraid not much more. There are a good many of these coins of Gallienus knocking about. The peddlers and the shopkeepers take such pieces occasionally, and sell them, sometimes for five or ten cents, to young collectors. No, it is not very precious in money value, but as a relic any piece of money that was pa.s.sed from hand to hand a thousand or fifteen hundred years ago is interesting. The value of such relics is a good deal a matter of imagination."

"And what do you say to these others?" asked the Interviewer. Poor old worn-out things they were, with a letter or two only, and some faint trace of a figure on one or two of them.

"Very interesting, always, if they carry your imagination back to the times when you may suppose they were current. Perhaps Horace tossed one of them to a beggar. Perhaps one of these was the coin that was brought when One said to those about Him, 'Bring me a penny, that I may see it.'

But the market price is a different matter. That depends on the beauty and preservation, and above all the rarity, of the specimen. Here is a coin, now,"--he opened a small cabinet, and took one from it. "Here is a Syracusan decadrachm with the head of Persephone, which is at once rare, well preserved, and beautiful. I am afraid to tell what I paid for it."

The Interviewer was not an expert in numismatics. He cared very little more for an old coin than he did for an old b.u.t.ton, but he had thought his purchase at the tollman's might prove a good speculation. No matter about the battered old pieces: he had found out, at any rate, that Maurice must have money and could be extravagant, or what he himself considered so; also that he was familiar with ancient coins. That would do for a beginning.

"May I ask where you picked up the coin you are showing me?" he said

"That is a question which provokes a negative answer. One does not 'pick up' first-cla.s.s coins or paintings, very often, in these times. I bought this of a great dealer in Rome."

"Lived in Rome once?" said the Interviewer.

"For some years. Perhaps you have been there yourself?"

The Interviewer said he had never been there yet, but he hoped he should go there, one of these years, "suppose you studied art and antiquities while you were there?" he continued.

"Everybody who goes to Rome must learn something of art and antiquities.

Before you go there I advise you to review Roman history and the cla.s.sic authors. You had better make a study of ancient and modern art, and not have everything to learn while you are going about among ruins, and churches, and galleries. You know your Horace and Virgil well, I take it for granted?"

The Interviewer hesitated. The names sounded as if he had heard them.

"Not so well as I mean to before going to Rome," he answered. "May I ask how long you lived in Rome?"

"Long enough to know something of what is to be seen in it. No one should go there without careful preparation beforehand. You are familiar with Vasari, of course?"

The Interviewer felt a slight moisture on his forehead. He took out his handkerchief. "It is a warm day," he said. "I have not had time to read all--the works I mean to. I have had too much writing to do, myself, to find all the time for reading and study I could have wished."

"In what literary occupation have you been engaged, if you will pardon my inquiry? said Maurice.

"I am connected with the press. I understood that you were a man of letters, and I hoped I might have the privilege of hearing from your own lips some account of your literary experiences."

"Perhaps that might be interesting, but I think I shall reserve it for my autobiography. You said you were connected with the press. Do I understand that you are an author?"

By this time the Interviewer had come to the conclusion that it was a very warm day. He did not seem to be getting hold of his pitcher by the right handle, somehow. But he could not help answering Maurice's very simple question.

"If writing for a newspaper gives one a right to be called an author, I may call myself one. I write for the 'People's Perennial and Household Inquisitor'."

"Are you the literary critic of that well-known journal, or do you manage the political column?"

"I am a correspondent from different places and on various matters of interest."

"Places you have been to, and people you have known?"

"Well, yes,-generally, that is. Sometimes I have to compile my articles."

"Did you write the letter from Rome, published a few weeks ago?"

The Interviewer was in what he would call a tight place. However, he had found that his man was too much for him, and saw that the best thing he could do was to submit to be interviewed himself. He thought that he should be able to pick up something or other which he could work into his report of his visit.

"Well, I--prepared that article for our columns. You know one does not have to see everything he describes. You found it accurate, I hope, in its descriptions?"