World's End Part 8

Theodore was much older--fully thirty at this time; but he was as eager for enjoyment, and perhaps more so.

To make the story short, they ran through every species of extravagance--visited Paris, Vienna, and all the continental centres of dissipation.

Ten whole years pa.s.sed away. John Marese Baskette was by this time a thorough man of the world, deeply in debt, brilliant and fascinating in manner, false and selfish to the backbone. He inherited his mother's beauty. A tall, broad, well-made man, dark curling hair, large dark eyes, and large eyelashes, bronzed complexion, which, when he was excited, glowed with almost womanly brilliance; strong as a lion, gentle in manner, and fierce as a tiger under the velvet glove. Polished and plausible, there were those who deemed him shallow and wholly concerned with the pleasure of the hour; but they were mistaken.

John Marese Baskette had rubbed off all the soft and good aspirations of his boyhood; but the ambition which was at the bottom of those schemes remained, and had intensified tenfold. He was burning with ambition.

The hereditary mind of the Baskettes, their brain power, had descended to him in full vigour (though hitherto he had wasted it), and he also inherited their thirst for wealth. But his idea of obtaining it was totally opposed to the family tradition. The family tradition was a private life devoted with the patience and self-denial of a martyr to the acc.u.mulation of gold.

Marese's one absorbing idea was power. To be a ruler, a statesman, a leader, was his one consuming desire. As a ruler he thought, as a member of the Cabinet, it would be easy for him to affect the market in his favour, for Marese was a gambler already upon a gigantic scale. The Stock Exchange and the Bourse were his arena.

The intense vanity of the man, which led him to seriously hope even for the English Premiership, was, doubtless, a _trait_ derived from his mother. "If I had my rights," he was accustomed to say to Theodore, "I should be not only the wealthiest man in England, but in Europe and America. My father's property has more than doubled in value. In England the wealthiest man at once takes a position above crowds of clever people who have nothing but their talents. Without any conceit, I can safely say that I am clever. A clever, wealthy man is so great a rarity that my elevation is a certainty. But nothing can be done without money. At present my wealth is a shadow only. The one thing, Theodore, is money. Our Stock Exchange labour is, in a sense, wasted; our operations are not large enough. What we make is barely sufficient to provide us with common luxuries (he did not pretend to say necessities) and to keep our creditors quiet. Nothing remains for bolder actions. I am thirty, and I have not yet entered the House."

This last remark was always the conclusion of his reflections. In a sense, it was like Caesar lamenting upon seeing a statue of Alexander-- that he had done nothing at an age when Alexander had conquered the world. He had not even the means to fight the enemies who withheld his birthright from him. The bitterness engendered of these wrongs, the constant brooding over the career that was lost to him, obscured what little moral sense had been left in him after the course of life he had been through; and the once gentle boy was now ripe for any guilt. The verse so often upon the lips of the tyrant was for ever in his mind, and perpetually escaped him unconsciously--

Be just, unless a kingdom tempt to break the laws, For sovereign power alone can justify the cause.

Like his father Sternhold, he looked upon the undisputed possession of such an estate as conferring powers and position nothing inferior to that of a monarch. His dislike to all things American--in consequence of the claims, now more loudly proclaimed than ever, of the Baskettes from the States--grew to be almost a monomania. He wished that the United States people had but one neck, that he might destroy them all at once--applying the Roman emperor's saying to his own affairs.

His especially favourite study was "The Prince" of Machiavelli, which he always carried with him. His copy was annotated with a scheme for applying the instructions therein given to modern times--the outline of the original requiring much modification to suit the changes in the const.i.tution of society. Some day he hoped to utilise the labours of the man whose name has become the familiar soubriquet of the Devil.

Theodore, whom Aurelian had made qualify as a surgeon, was imbued with an inherited taste for recondite research. He would return from a wild scene of debauchery at early dawn, and drawing the curtains and lighting his lamp to exclude daylight, plunge into the devious paths of forbidden science. Keen and shrewd as he was, he did not disdain even alchemy, bringing to the crude ideas of the ancients all the knowledge of the moderns. Cruel by nature, he excelled in the manipulation of the dissecting knife, and in the cities upon the Continent where their wanderings led them, lost no opportunity of practising with the resident medical men, or of studying those wonderful museums which are concealed in certain places abroad. Marese was the fiery charger, ready to dash at every obstacle Theodore was the charioteer--the head which guided and suggested. Yet all their concentrated thought could not devise a method by which Marese might obtain the full enjoyment of his estate. Briefly, this was the condition of Marese's mind and his position, when the death of Aurelian took place, and a letter reached them written by him in his last hours, entreating their return to Stirmingham for reasons connected with the estate. They went, and a woman went with them as far as London--a woman whom we must meet hereafter, but who shall be avoided as much as possible.

They arrived at Stirmingham unannounced, and examined the papers which the deceased had particularly recommended to their study. Aurelian, as has been said, was baffled but not beaten. The fascination of the vast estate held his mind, as it held so many others, in an iron vice. The whole of his life was devoted to it. He had searched and searched back into the past, groping from point to point, and he had acc.u.mulated such a ma.s.s of evidence as had never been suspected.

He knew far more even than poor Sternhold, who had occupied himself exclusively with the future.

Marese and Theodore, living quietly in the residence attached to the asylum for the insane, which Aurelian had continued to keep, carefully studied these papers by the light of the lucid commentary the dead man had left. It is needless to recount the whole of the contents--most of them are known already to the reader. But the substance of it all was that three great dangers menaced the estate. The first was the claims of the Baskettes from America.

The evidence which Aurelian had collected was clear that the land they had occupied in the Swamp had been practically theirs, since they had paid no rent; but as to their power of handing it over to Sternhold, it was extremely questionable. The second great danger was the claim of a new tribe that had recently started up--the descendants of James Sibbold, who had also expatriated themselves.

It was doubtful if the transfer made by their ancestors could be maintained, and for this simple reason--it was doubtful whether James Sibbold himself had any right to the property his sons sold to Sternhold. He was not the eldest son. The eldest son, Arthur, had disappeared for a number of years; but there was not the slightest proof that he had died childless. Far from it. Aurelian, incessantly searching, had found out what no one else yet knew--that Arthur had married, had had children, and that one at least of his descendants was living but a short time since.

When Marese had read thus far his countenance turned livid, and Theodore feared he would have fallen in a fit. The savage pa.s.sions inherited from his mother surged up in his frame, and overmastered him. He was ill for days, almost unconscious--the shock was so great, his pa.s.sion so fierce--but presently recovering, read on.

Aurelian had traced Arthur in his wanderings, had traced his marriage-- but there was one loophole. Do what he might, Aurelian could not discover _where_ Arthur had married. It was in London, but a minute search failed to discover the church, and the register could not be found.

This fact, and the fact of the long silence, the absence of any claim being put forward, led Aurelian to believe that there really was no legal marriage--that it was only reputed. He hoped as much, at all events.

There was another loophole--the deed which old Sibbold had so treasured in his padlocked oaken chest--the deed which settled the inheritance (on the female as well as the male)--had disappeared. Sternhold had searched for it and failed. It was lost. If the marriage could not be proved, and if the deed was really lost, then there was no danger from Arthur Sibbold's descendants; but there remained those "ifs." Also, if Arthur's claim was put aside, then the succession would of course belong to his brother James Sibbold's descendants: but then again came in the question--Could these Sibbolds sign away (to Sternhold) an inheritance which at the time was _entailed_?

Aurelian finished with several hints and schemes which need not be gone into here, and indeed were never carried out. But his one great point throughout was a warning against the living descendant of Arthur Sibbold, whose name and present address he had discovered and left for Marese, and against the companies who held the leases. "For," said he, "these companies would foster any and every claim against the estate; anything to bar the succession of Marese, the heir, in order to obtain a grant or extension of time from the courts of law, to enable them to hold the property till the succession to the estate was established."

These companies were so rich and powerful that it was difficult to contend against them. Their strength was money, their weapons were the various claimants.

"Therefore," wrote Aurelian, "the first thing is money, and I wish my property to be used freely for this end, convinced that you will do Theodore full justice; and I bid you, if possible, to take the _weapons_ of the companies out of their hands. Without the claimants they are powerless."

These papers, and the facts and reflections they contained, made the deepest impression upon Marese and Theodore. In secret they walked through the city of Stirmingham, and marked its wealth, its vastness, its trade and population.

"And nearly all this is mine," whispered Marese, pale as death in his subdued excitement. He had to hold Theodore's arm to sustain his body, for, strong as he was, he trembled.

Next day they left for London, for Marese could not bear the Tantalus-like view of the wealth which was and was not his. In London they thought and planned as only such men seeking such an end can think and plan.

VOLUME ONE, CHAPTER ELEVEN.

While Marese and Theodore are maturing their plans, it will conduce to the easier comprehension of the horrible, complicated events which followed, if the past history of the estate be briefly summed up in such a manner that this chapter can be used for reference.

In the commencement, nearly a century previous to the present time, we have seen old Sibbold, the morose miser, gloating over his money, and studying his t.i.tle-deeds. These gave him an unquestioned right to the farm he occupied, and to the Swamp, or waste land, which had been squatted on by Will Baskette and his companions. This right mainly depended, though not entirely, upon a certain deed of entail. Without that deed Sibbold had still sufficient evidence to prove his right to his farm, but not to the Swamp; without that deed there was no fixed succession--that is to say, he could have devised it to any one he chose.

There was, therefore, just the possibility that, hating his eldest son Arthur, he had himself destroyed this deed, in order to prepare the way for his second son, James. But against this supposition there was the known character of the man, which led one to imagine that he would rather have died than give up the smallest fraction of his possessions.

At all events, this deed was missing, as were several others of little or no value, such as expired leases of fields to tenants, which had once been kept in Sibbold's oaken press, under padlock and key.

When Sibbold met with his death at the hands of highwaymen, the farm and waste lands, in the natural course of things, would have pa.s.sed to his eldest son, Arthur, but he having disappeared, and not appearing to make a claim, James Sibbold, the younger son, took the property. The majority of people always thought, from the fact of Arthur's not returning to claim his birthright, that he had had a hand in the slaughter of old Will Baskette, and that his conscience drove him away.

James Sibbold, after a while, married, and had several sons. In time he died, and these sons, though married, still all remained living on the farmstead, or in the outhouses; for as it was known that James' right was doubtful, they could not agree about the succession, and preferred to live like pigs rather than go to law and have it settled, since the result was so uncertain. At the same time the squatters, basket-makers, reed-cutters, clothes-peg makers, etc, who resided in the Swamp which the rat had caused, had considerably increased in numbers, and were always called, after their former chief, by the name of Baskette.

This chief at the date of his death had two sons. The eldest went off with his mother, and joined the original gipsy tribe; the youngest, whose name or nickname was Romy, entered the service of the clergyman.

The eldest was never heard of more; but Romy prospered, and in early middle age bought an estate and country mansion, not far from his birthplace.

It was he who opened up the concealed mineral wealth of coal and iron, and thus, as everything goes by contradiction in this world, it happened that the descendant of gipsies, notorious for their wandering habits and dislike of houses, was the founder of one of the largest cities in the world.

He married with every legal formality, and his son, Sternhold Baskette, imbued with the firmest convictions that in the future the young city would prosper to an unprecedented extent, employed the whole of the wealth he inherited in purchasing land and erecting houses.

In the course of his transactions he desired to purchase the Wick Farm, where old Sibbold had dwelt, and the Swamp where the Baskette tribe flourished. Finding the t.i.tle of the vendors imperfect, he devised the strongest safeguard he could think of, which was to make all the Sibbolds then living or known, to sign one doc.u.ment, and all the reputed Baskettes to sign another. He then transhipped them all to America-- first, to get complete possession; secondly, in the hope that they would never return to trouble him.

He proceeded to drain the Swamp, and to convert it into the Belgravia of Stirmingham. But this project required an enormous expenditure, and just at that moment the first railway to the place, which he had largely supported, came to a standstill, and ate up all his available capital.

When, therefore, a return of commercial prosperity took place, he found it impossible alone to complete the vast scheme of streets, squares, etc, which had been commenced.

Then the building lease plan was resorted to--the very keystone of all this curious history. First, the Corporation of the city took a large slice of the uncompleted property of him on a building lease for a term of years, on the expiration of which the whole reverted to him or his heirs (practically his heirs, as he was not likely to live to the age of 120 years).

After they had commenced building some uncertainty arose as to whether or no they had the power to enter into such an agreement; they could bind themselves, but could they bind their successors in office? This took place, it must be remembered, long, long before the recent sanitary legislation, which gives such extensive powers to local bodies.

In order to confirm their proceedings they obtained a private Act of Parliament, which, when it was drawn up, seemed to be worded clearly enough. But every one knows that after the lapse of thirty years or less, words in an inexplicable manner seem to lose their meaning, and to become capable of more than one interpretation. This is perhaps because the persons who read them are influenced unconsciously by a series of circ.u.mstances which did not exist at the time the doc.u.ment was composed.

At any rate, at the date when Marese and Theodore were thinking and scheming, there had already been a great deal of contention over the precise scope of several sentences in this Act: a part of which arose over the question of repairs to the buildings, and partly as to whether, by a little straining, the seventy years of the lease might not be construed to mean practically for ever.

This little straining was managed in this way. When did the lease commence? Had not each successive Mayor got the right to say, "This lease, as interpreted by the Private Act, means, not seventy years from the days of my predecessor, but seventy years from the commencement of my term of office." By this way of looking at it, so long as there was a Mayor the Corporation would always have seventy years to look forward to.

Of course all such reasoning was nothing but pure sophistry; but then most law is sophistry, and sophistry when supported by a rich body of men and called Vested Interest, is often much stronger than the highly belauded and really feeble truth.

Here was a tough Gordian knot, to add to the already difficult question of original t.i.tle. But this was only the preface to the complications to follow. There still remained, after the Corporation had taken a part, a huge howling wilderness of streets with walls two feet high.

Companies or syndicates were formed (eight companies in all)--perhaps they had better be called in modern parlance building societies--who took this howling wilderness on the same system of building leases, to fall in at a certain date.

Apparently in this case it was all plain, straightforward sailing; but not so. Sternhold Baskette got into difficulties over Railway Number 2, and had to borrow money. He also had to borrow money to complete portions of the estate which he had kept in his own hands, and to acquire lands just outside the city. Lastly, he had to borrow money to support the extravagance of his wife. In the aggregate these sums were something enormous.

At the moment of borrowing he was under the impression that he had dealt with independent persons--with financiers, in fact, of London, being so a.s.sured by his solicitors. These solicitors had had a pretty picking out of his railways and estates; they had grown fat and prosperous upon him, and might, one would have thought, have been trusted to serve him honestly.

But no--whenever was there a friendship formed in business? Ostensibly, the financiers who advanced the cash were independent; in reality, they acted for certain of these very aforesaid building societies who had taken the building leases! Four at least of them had their money thus out upon good security; and Sternhold, unknowingly at first, owed them a large fortune.

For their own interest they had proved easy creditors. They had not called in the loans; not a fraction of the original sums borrowed from them to complete Railway Number 2, to finish houses, buy fresh lands, to pay for Lucia's extravagance, had been repaid. Very little of the interest had been cleared off; none while Sternhold lived. They knew that they were safe. The railway was now paying a fair dividend, the houses and lands had trebled in value; as for Lucia's waste it was small in comparison--when they chose to call in their money they could seize upon property to twice the amount due, even with added interest.