World's End Part 5

It was found out afterwards that he had visited every theatre in London, but finally was suited on the boards of a fourth-rate "gaff" in Stirmingham itself.

There was a girl there--or rather a woman, for she was all five-and-twenty--who was certainly as fine a specimen of _female_ humanity as ever walked. Tall, but not too tall, she presented a splendid development of bust, torso, and limbs. Her skin was of that peculiar dusky hue--not dark, but dusky--which gives the idea of intense vitality. Her eyes were as coals of fire--large, black, deep-set, under heavy eyebrows. Her hair at a distance was superb--like night in hue, and glossy, curling in rich ma.s.ses. Examined closer it was coa.r.s.e, like wire. Her nose was the worse feature; it wanted shape, definition. It was a decided _retrousse_, and _thick_; but in the flush of her brilliant colour, her really grand carriage, this was pa.s.sed over. Her lips were scarlet, and pouted with a tempting impudence.

This was the very woman Sternhold sought. She was vitality itself impersonified. He saw her, offered his hand, and was instantly accepted. He wished her to keep it quiet; and notwithstanding her feminine triumph she managed to do so, and not a soul in Stirmingham guessed what was in the wind.

Sternhold went to London, got a special licence, and the pair were married in Sternhold's private apartments at his hotel in the presence of three people only, one of whom was the astounded Dodd. They left by the next train for London, where the bride went to Regent Street to choose her trousseau, with her husband at her, side.

Not a bell was rung in Stirmingham. The news spread like wildfire, and confounded the city. People gathered at the corners of the streets.

"He is certainly mad," they said. Most of them were in some way disappointed.

"He may be," said a keener one than the rest; "he may be--but _she_ is not."

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER SEVEN.

Lucia Marese, now Mrs Sternhold Baskette, was the daughter of an Italian father and an English mother, and had a tolerably accurate acquaintance with Leicester Square and Soho. She was not an absolutely bad woman in the coa.r.s.est sense of the term--at least not at that time, she had far too much ambition to destroy her chance so early in life.

Physiologists may here discuss the question as to whether any latent trace of the old gipsy blood of the Baskettes had in any way influenced Sternhold in his choice. Ambitious as she was, and possessed of that species of beauty which always takes with the mult.i.tude, Lucia had hitherto been a failure. Just as in literature and in art, the greatest genius has to wait till opportunity offers, and often eats its own heart in the misery of waiting, so she had striven and fought to get to the front, and yet was still a stroller when Sternhold saw her. She knew that if only once she could have made her appearance on the London boards, with her gorgeous beauty fully displayed, and a.s.sisted by dress and music, that she should certainly triumph. But she could not get there.

Other girls less favoured by Nature, but more by circ.u.mstance, and by the fickle and unaccountable tastes of certain wealthy individuals, had forestalled her, and she stored up in her mind bitter hatred of several of these who had snubbed and sneered at her.

The fairy prince of her dream, however, came at last in the person of an old man of three score years and ten, and she snapped him up in a trice.

No doubt, like all Stirmingham, she entertained the most fabulous ideas of Sternhold's wealth.

These dreams were destined to be rudely shattered. She seems to have had pretty much her own way at first. Doubtless the old man was as wax in her hands, till his former habits began to pull at him. She had one good trait at all events, if it could be called good--the first use she made of her new position was to provide for her family, or rather for the only member of it in England.

This was Aurelian Marese, her brother, who must have been a man of some talent and energy, for despite all obstacles of poverty he contrived to pa.s.s his examination and obtain a diploma from the College of Surgeons.

He came to Stirmingham, and with the a.s.sistance of Sternhold's purse set up as a mad doctor, in plain parlance, or in softer language, established a private lunatic asylum. Oddly enough, it would seem that notwithstanding the immense population of the city, there was not till that time any establishment of the kind in the place, and the result was that Aurelian prospered. He certainly was a clever fellow, as will be presently seen, though some fancy he over-reached himself. When at last Sternhold, worn out with the unwonted gaieties into which Lucia plunged him, showed unmistakable signs of weariness, and desired to return to Stirmingham, she yielded with a good grace. She reckoned that he could not last long, and it was her game to keep him in good temper; for she had learnt by this time that he had the power to dispose of his property just as he chose.

We can easily imagine the restlessness of this creature confined in the dull atmosphere of three or four rooms at Dodd's Hotel, South Street.

But she bore it, and to her it was a species of martyrdom--the very reverse of what she had pictured.

After a while, as time went on, whispers began to fly about--people elevated their eyebrows and asked questions under their breath, exchanged nods and winks. The fact was apparent; Sternhold could scarce contain himself for joy. There was an undoubted prospect of The Heir.

The old man got madder than ever--that is, in the sense of self-laudation. He could not admire himself sufficiently. The artful woman played upon him, you may be sure; at all events there was a deed of gift executed at this time conveying to her certain valuable estates lying outside the city, and tolerably unenc.u.mbered. Why she came to select those particular estates which were not half so valuable as others she might have had, was known only to herself then; but doubtless Aurelian had heard about the Yankee claims, and advised her to take what was safe. These estates were, in fact, bought with old Romy's money made by the nail factory, and were quite apart from the rest.

About this time, also, Sternhold left Dodd's Hotel. This was another evidence of her power over him. The best joke was, that although there was old Romy's country mansion about five miles from Stirmingham, although Sternhold had since purchased four other mansions, and had nominally street upon street of houses in the town, he had not a place to take his wife to. He was obliged to rent one of his own houses of the company who had built it on a building lease.

Mrs Sternhold now had her great wish gratified to some extent. She was the observed of all observers. They tell you tales now in Stirmingham of her extravagance, and the lengths she went. Her carriages, her horses, her servants, her dinners, parties, and what not, were the one topic of conversation. Even old-fashioned, straitlaced people found their objections overcome by curiosity, and accepted her invitations.

Old Sternhold was never visible at these gatherings; but he rejoiced in them. He was proud of his wife. He looked upon her as a prodigy. He gave her the reins. But personally he practically returned to his old habits. He still retained his old apartments at Dodd's; and there he might be found, at almost all hours, sitting at his desk, and eagerly, joyously receiving every visitor who came to tell him of some fresh extravagance, some fresh frolic of his wife's!

How was all this expenditure supported, since his actual income was so small? By a series of loans, which there were always men ready to offer, and whose terms Sternhold always signed. Once or twice he did remonstrate, but darling Lucia went into tears, and her brother Aurelian a.s.sured him that, in her state of health, any vexation was dangerous, etc. Aurelian, through the Sternhold connexion, was now a fashionable physician.

At last the event happened, and a son was born. The memory of the week succeeding that day will not soon pa.s.s away in Stirmingham.

Old Sternhold, himself a most temperate man, declared that he would make every one in the city tipsy; and he practically succeeded. He had barrels of ale and gallons of spirits and wine offered free to all comers at every public-house and tavern. He had booths erected in an open field just outside the town, for dancing and other amus.e.m.e.nts, and here refreshments of all kinds were served out gratis.

The police were in despair. The cells overflowed, and would hold no more, and the streets reeled with drunken men, and still more drunken women.

This saturnalia reigned for four days, and would soon have culminated-- at least, so the police declared--in a general sack of the city by the congregated ruffians. A detachment of dragoons was actually sent for, and encamped in Saint George's Square, with their horses and arms ready at a moment's notice. But it all pa.s.sed off quietly; and from that hour Sternhold, and more particularly the infant son, became the idol of the populace.

They still look back with regret to those four days of unlimited licence, and swear by the son of Sternhold.

This boy was named John Marese Baskette, but was always called Marese.

Singularly enough, the birth of this child, which one would have prophesied would have completed the hold Lucia had over the father, was the beginning of the difficulties between them. It began in his very nursery. Proud of her handsome figure, and still looking forward to popular triumphs, Lucia flatly refused to nurse the infant herself.

This caused a terrible quarrel. Old Sternhold had old-fashioned ideas.

But there is no need to linger on this. Lucia, of course, had her own way, and Sternhold retired to sulk at Dodd's Hotel. From that time the c.h.i.n.k widened, and the mutual distrust strengthened.

There never was any real doubt that the boy was legitimate; but some devil whispered the question in Sternhold's mind, and, he brooded over it. I say some devil, but, in actual fact, it was one of those parasites who have been once or twice alluded to. Is there anything that cla.s.s will stop at in the hope of a few formal lines in a rich man's will?

It was their game to destroy Lucia. The plan was cunningly formed. As if by accident, pa.s.sages in Lucia's previous life, when she was a stroller, were alluded to in Sternhold's presence.

He grew excited, and eager to hear more; to probe her supposed dishonour. The parasites distinctly refused; it was too serious a matter. Still, if he wished to hear--it was common talk--all he had to do was to go into the billiard rooms. Some of the fellows there did not know him by sight, and they were sure to talk about it.

Sternhold went. Of all the sights in the world, to see that old man making a miserable attempt to play billiards while his ears were acutely listening to the infamous tales purposely started to inflame him, nothing could be more deplorable. The upshot was he grew downright mad, but not so mad that anything could be done with him. He watched over Lucia like a hawk. She could not move; her life became really burdensome.

It must be remembered that at that time she really was, though wild enough in blood, perfectly stainless in fact. The temper in the woman was long restrained. In the first place, she wanted his money; in the next place, there was her son, whom she loved with all the vigour of her nature. She bore it for a year or two, then the devil in her began to stir.

Old Sternhold, who had watched and inquired hour by hour all this time, had found nothing wrong; but this very fact was turned against her by those devils, his lickspittles. They represented that this was part of her cunning--that she had determined he should have no hold upon her, in order that her son might inherit. They reminded Sternhold that, although he could not divorce her, he could alter his will. Here they rather overshot the mark, because he began to reflect that if he cut off his son the old question would arise--To whom should he leave his city, as he called it?

The miserable dilemma haunted and worried his already weakened brain and body till he grew a shadow, and Lucia had hopes that he would die. But he did not; in a month or two the natural strength of his const.i.tution brought him round.

All this time Lucia was in dread about his will. Aurelian astute and cunning as he was hardly knew what to advise or how to act. He had his spies--for he was wealthy now to a certain degree, and could afford it.

He had his strong suspicions that some of the companies who had leased the property for building had a hand in the persecution of Lucia, and in the inflammation of Sternhold's jealousy. It was certainly their interest to get the boy disinherited. Aurelian began to grow seriously alarmed. Sternhold was stronger and better--perhaps if he had had Aurelian for physician he would not have recovered so fast; but with his distrust of Lucia, came an equal distrust of her brother, and he would not acknowledge him.

Aurelian looked at it like this: Sternhold was now about seventy-five, and had no organic disease. His father, Romy, had lived to a ripe old age; his grandfather, the basket-maker, though shot in the prime of life, came of a hardy, half-gipsy stock. The chances were that Sternhold, with all the comforts that money could buy, would live another ten years. This very worry, this jealousy, by keeping his mental faculties alive, might contribute to longevity. In ten years, in a year, in a month, what might not happen?

His greatest fear was in Lucia herself, who had shown signs of late that she must burst forth. If she did, and without his being near her, there was no knowing what indiscretion she might not commit. It was even suspicious that Sternhold had recovered. It looked as if he had made up his mind, and had signed a will averse to Lucia's interest and his son's--had settled it and dismissed it. This was a terrible thought, this last. When he suggested the possibility of it to Lucia, you should have seen her. She raved; her features swelled up and grew inflamed; her frame dilated; her blood seemed as if it would burst the veins: till at last she hissed out, "I'll kill him!" and fell fainting.

Aurelian determined one point at once. There must be no more delay; action was the order. But what? Suppose the worst. Suppose the will already made, and against Lucia's interests, what was the course to be taken? Why, to acc.u.mulate evidence to invalidate it. _Prove him mad_!

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER EIGHT.

The idea having been once entertained, grew and grew, till it overshadowed everything else. The singular circ.u.mstance then happened of one man slowly and carefully collecting evidence during another's lifetime to prove him insane the moment he died.

Aurelian placed his princ.i.p.al reliance upon the violent jealousy Sternhold had exhibited. So vehement and irregulated a pa.s.sion founded upon mere phantasms of the imagination, was in itself strong presumptive proof of an unsound mind. He had no difficulty in finding witnesses to Sternhold's outrageous conduct. The old man had been seen walking up and down the street, on the opposite side of the pavement to the house in which Lucia lived, for hours and hours at a time, simply watching.

He had been heard to use violent and threatening language. He had made himself ill. The mind was so overwrought by excitement that it reacted upon the body, and it was some time before the balance was restored--if indeed it could ever be restored.

There were many trifling little things of manner--of fidgetiness--absurd personal habits--which, taken in conjunction with the bad temper he had displayed, went to make up the case. Aurelian added to this the vanity Sternhold had of late openly indulged in. This was notorious, and had become a by-word.

But when Aurelian had written all this out upon paper--when he had, as it were, prepared his brief--his shrewd sense told him that in truth it was very weak evidence. Any lawyer employed for the defence could easily find arguments to upset the whole.

Day by day, as he thought it over, his reliance upon the insanity resource grew less and less--and yet he could not see what else there was to do. He racked his brain. The man, like others, was in fact fascinated by the enormous property at stake: he could not get it out of his mind. It haunted him day and night. He ransacked his memory, called up all his reading, all his observation, all that he had heard-- every expedient and plan that had come under his notice for gaining an end.

For a time, however, it was in vain. It is often the case that when we seek an idea it flies from us, and will not be constrained, not even by weeks of the deeply-pondering state. Often the more we think upon a subject, the less we seem to see our way clear. And so it was with him.

Sometimes a little change of scene, even a little manual exercise, will stimulate the imagination. So it was with him.