Geoffrey Hampstead: A Novel

The veil very nearly became altered in its condition as she thought of these things, but she put it on, and smothered her wrath until they got out upon the highway. Then she said, after a long silence: "Would it not be as well to let Margaret wear this brown veil a few times, Geoffrey? She has a right to drive about with you, and if people thought it was only she, their curiosity might cease."

A farm-house cur came barking after the dog-cart just then, and Geoffrey's anger expended itself partly on the dog, instead of being embodied in a reply.

The whip descended so viciously through the air that a more careful person might have seen that the suggestion had not improved his temper.

Except this, he gave no answer. She pressed the subject, although she knew he was angry. "Don't you think, Geoffrey, that that would be a good thing to do? It would quite remove curiosity, and would, in any case, be only fair to me."

Now, if there was one thing Hampstead could not and would not endure, it was to have a woman he amused himself with attempt to put herself on a par with the one he reverenced. Margaret was about all that remained of his conscience. She embodied all the good he knew. Every resolve and hope of his future depended upon her. He could not as yet, he thought, find it possible always to live as she would like; but in a calm way, so controlled as to seem almost dispassionate, he worshiped her, as it were, in the abstract.

His ideas concerning her were so rarefied that, in any other person, he might have called them fanatical. He was bad, but he felt that he would rather hang himself than allow so much as a breath to dim the fair mirror of Margaret's name. At the very mention of her as wearing this brown veil he grew pale with anger, and the barking cur got the benefit of it, and at Nina's insistence his face and eyes grew like steel.

"Heavens above! Can't you let her name alone? Is it not enough for you to raise the devil in me, without scheming to give her trouble? Do you think I will allow her to step in and be blamed for what it was your whim to go in for – risks and all?"

Nina was ready now to let the proposition drop, but she could not refrain from adding: "She would not be blamed for very much if she were blamed for all that has happened between us."

There was truth in what she said, but Geoffrey had looked upon these meetings as anything but innocent. Argument on the point was insufferable, and it only made him lash out worse, as he interrupted her.

"Good God, Nina! you must be mad! Don't you see? Don't you understand?"

Nina waited a second while she thought over what he meant, and her blood seemed to boil as she considered different things.

"Yes, I do understand. You need say no more," cried she, with her eyes blazing. "You want me to realize that I am so much beneath her – that she is so far above me – that, although I have done nothing much out of the way, the imputation of her doing the same thing is a kind of death to you. You go out of your way to try and hurt me – "

"No, no, Nina," said Geoffrey, controlling himself, "I do not want to hurt your feelings. If we must continue speaking on this unpleasant subject, I will explain."

"That will do, Geoffrey Hampstead," she exclaimed in a rage; "I don't want to hear your explanation. I hate you and despise you! I have been a fool myself, but you have been a greater one. I could have made a prince of you. I was fool enough to do this, and now," here Nina tore the veil off her head, and threw it on the road, "and now," she continued, as she faced him with flashing eyes, "you will always remain nothing but a miserable bank-clerk. Who are you that you should presume to insult me? and who is she that she should be held over my head? I am as good in every way as she is, and, if all that's said is true, I am a good deal better."

Geoffrey listened silently to all she said, and to her blind imputation against Margaret. Gazing in front of him with a look that boded ill, he reduced the horse's pace to a walk, so that he need not watch his driving, and turned to her, speaking slowly, his face cruel and his eyes small and glittering.

"Listen! You have consciously played the devil with me ever since I knew you. You have known from the first how you held me; you played your part to perfection, and I liked it. It amused me. It made better things seem sweeter after I left you. It is not easy to be very good all at once, and you partly supplied me with the opposite. I don't blame you for it, because I liked it, and I confess to encouraging you, but the fact is – you sought me. Hush! Don't deny it! As women seek, you sought me. We tacitly agreed to be untrue to every tie in order to meet continually, and in a mild sort of way try to make life interesting. Did either of us ever try by word or deed to improve the other? Certainly not. Nor did we ever intend to do so. We taught each other nothing but scheming and treachery. And you thought that you would make the devil so pleasing that I could not do without him. This is the plain truth – in spite of your sneer. Recollect, I don't mind what you say about me, but you have undertaken to insult and lay schemes for somebody else, and that I'll not forgive. For that, I say what I do, and I make you see your position, when you, who have been a mass of treachery ever since you were born, dare to compare yourself with – no matter who. I won't even mention her name here. That's how I look upon this affair, if you insist upon plain speech. Now we understand things."

It was a cruel, brutal tirade. Truth seems very brutal sometimes. He began slowly, but as he went on, his tongue grew faster, until it was like a mitrailleuse. Nina was bewildered. She had angered him intentionally; but she had not known that on one subject he was a fanatic, and thus liable to all the madness that fanaticism implies. She said nothing, and Hampstead, with scarcely a pause, added, in a more ordinary tone: "It will be unpleasant for us to drive any further together. You are accustomed to driving. I'll walk."

He handed the reins to Nina and swung himself out without stopping the horse. She took the reins in a half-dazed way and asked vaguely:

"What will I do with the horse when I get to the town?"

"Turn him adrift," said Geoffrey, over his shoulder, as he proceeded up a cross-road, feeling that he never wished to see either her or the trap again.

Nina stopped the horse to try to think. She could not think. His biting words had driven all thought out of her. She only knew he was going away from her forever. She looked after him, and saw him a hundred yards off lighting a cigar with a fusee as he walked along. She called to him and he turned. The country side was quiet, and he could hear her say, "Come here!" He went back, and found her weeping. All she could say was "Get in." Of course he got in, and they drove off up the cross-road so as to meet no person until she calmed herself. After a while she sobbed out:

"Oh, you are cruel, Geoffrey. I may be a mass of treachery, but not to you – not to you, Geoffrey. Having to put on the veil angered me. I have been wicked. We have both been wicked. But you are so much worse than I am. You know you are!"

As she said this it sounded partly true and partly whimsical, so she tried to smile again. He could not endeavor to resist tears when he knew that he had been unnecessarily harsh, and he was glad of the opportunity to smile also and to smooth things over.

As a tacit confession that he was sorry for his violence, he took the hand that lay beside him into his, and so they drove along toward the city, each extending to the other a good deal of that fellow-feeling which arises from community in guilt. Both felt that in tearing off the mask for a while they had revealed to each other things which, being confessed, left them with hardly a secret on either side, and if this brought them more together, by making them more open with each other, both felt that they now met upon a lower platform.

CHAPTER XVII

Consider the work of God: for who can make that straight, which he hath made crooked? —Ecclesiastes vii, 13.

A few days after the disturbance in the dog-cart Geoffrey and Maurice Rankin were dining, on a Sunday, with the Mackintoshes. After dinner a walk was proposed, and Margaret went out with them, very spick-and-span and charming in an old black silk "made over," and with a bright bunch of common geraniums at her belt. She had invited the young lawyer partly because he had seemed so distrustful of Geoffrey, and she wished to bring the two more together, so that Maurice might see that he had misjudged him. In the course of their walk Geoffrey asked, for want of something better to say:

"How goes the law, Rankin? Things stirring?"

"Might be worse," replied Maurice. "By the way, Margaret, I forgot to tell you Mr. Bean actually brought in a client the other day."

"Somebody he had been drinking with, I suppose," said Margaret, who had heard of Mr. Bean.

"Right you are. They supported each other into the office, and before Bean sank into his chair I was introduced by him as his 'jun'or par'ner.'"

"Could not Mr. Bean do the same every day? Supply the office by bringing up his friends when prepared to be lavish with money?"

"I'm afraid not. Bean would be always tipsy himself before the victim was ready. Still, your idea is worth consideration. Of course nobody would want law from Bean unless he were pretty far gone, and in this case the poor old chap knew no more about what was wanted than the inquirer."

"Had the client any money?" asked Geoffrey.

"Money? He was reeking with it. What he wanted, he said, was a quiet lawyer. I told him that the quietness of our business was its strong point, only equaled, in fact, by the unpleasant grave. Then it appeared that he had come on a trip from the States with a carpet-bag full of money which he said he had borrowed, and he wished, in effect, to know whether the United States could take him back again, vi et armis. I told him 'No,' and knocked ten dollars out of him before you could say 'knife.'"

"You might have made it fifty while you were about it," said Geoffrey.

"Well, you see, the man was not entirely sober, and, after all, ten dollars a word is fair average pay. I never charge more than that."

"You mean that the unfortunate was too sober to be likely to pay any more," said Margaret.

Maurice shrugged his shoulders in deprecation of this idea.

Said Geoffrey: "I often meet Mr. Bean on the street. He is a very idle man; I know by the way he carries his pipe in his mouth."

"What has that to do with it?"

"Everything. He smokes with his pipe in the center of his mouth."

"Well?"

"Well, no one does that unless very old or very idle. Men get the habit from smoking all day while sitting down or lounging. No one can walk hurriedly with his pipe in that position; it would jar his front teeth out. I have noticed that an active man invariably holds his pipe in the side of his mouth, where he can grasp it firmly."

"Hampstead, you should have been a detective."

"Such is genius," said Margaret. "Geoffrey has any quantity of unprofitable genius."

"That reminds me that I once heard my grandfather telling my father the same thing, but it was not very correct about my father."

"Indeed! By the way, Geoffrey, if it is not an impertinent question for your future wife to ask, who was your grandfather?"

This ignorance on the part of an engaged girl made Maurice cackle.

"Who is he, you mean. He is still alive, I think, and as old as the hills."

"Dear me! How very strange that you never told me of his existence before!"

"His existence is not a very interesting one to me – in fact, quite the reverse; besides I don't think we have ever lacked a more interesting topic, have we Margaret?"

"I imagine not," quoth Rankin dryly. Margaret stopped; she thought there might be something "queer" about this grandfather that Geoffrey might not care to speak about before a third person. She merely said, therefore, intending to drop the matter gently:

"How very old the senior Mr. Hampstead must be?"

"Hampstead is only the family name. The old boy is Lord Warcote. I am a sort of a Radical you know, Margaret, and the truth is I had a quarrel with my family. Only for this, I might have gone into the matter before."

"Never mind going into anything unpleasant. You told my father, of course, that you were a son of Mr. Manson Hampstead, one of the old families in Shropshire. And so you are. We will let it rest at that. Family differences must always be disagreeable subjects. Let us talk about something else."

"Now we are on the subject, I might as well tell you all about it. First, I will secure Rankin's secrecy. Behold five cents! Mr. Rankin, I retain you with this sum as my solicitor to advise when called upon concerning the facts I am about to relate. You are bound now by your professional creed not to divulge, are you not?"

"Drive on," said Maurice, "I'm an oyster."

"There is not a great deal to tell," said Geoffrey. "The unpleasant part of it has always made me keep the story entirely to myself. When I came to this continent I was in such a rage with everything and everybody that I abandoned the chance of letters of introduction. Nobody here knows who I am. I have worked my own way to the exalted position in which you find me. A good while ago my father was in the English diplomatic service, and he still retains, I believe, a responsible post under the Government. Like a good many others, though, he was, although clever, not always quite clever enough, and in one episode of his life, in which I am interested, he failed to have things his own way. For ten years he was in different parts of Russia, where his duties called him. He had acquired such a profound knowledge of Russian and other languages that these advantages, together with his other gifts, served to keep him longer in a sort of exile for the simple reason that there were few, if any, in the service who could carry out what was required as well as he could himself. From his official duties and his pleasant manner he became well known in Russian society, and he counted among his intimate friends several of the nobility who possessed influence in the country. After a long series of duties he and some young Russians, to whom passports were almost unnecessary, used to make long trips through the country in the mild seasons to shoot and fish. In this way some of the young nobles rid themselves of ennui, and reverted by an easy transition to the condition of their immediate ancestors. They had their servants with them, and lived a life of conviviality and luxury even in the wildest regions which they visited. When they entered a small town on these journeyings they did pretty much what they liked, and nobody dared to complain at the capital. If a small official provoked or delayed them they horsewhipped him. In fact, what they delighted in was going back to savagery and taking their luxuries with them, dashing over the vast country on fleet horses, making a pandemonium whenever and wherever they liked; in short, in giving full swing to their Tartar and Kalmuck blood. On one occasion my father was feeling wearied to death with red tape, but nobody was inclined at the time for another expedition. He therefore obtained leave to go with a military detachment to Semipalatinsk, from which town some prisoners had to be brought back to St. Petersburg. There was little trouble in obtaining his permit, especially as he had been partly over the road before. So he went with his horses and servant as far as the railway would take him, and then joined a band of fifty wild-looking Cossacks and set out. When within a hundred and fifty versts from Semipalatinsk they encountered a warlike band of about twenty-five well mounted Tartars returning from a marauding expedition. They had several horses laden with booty, also some female prisoners. It was the old story of one tribe of savages pillaging another. The Cossacks were out in the wilderness. Although supposed to be under discipline, they were one and all freebooters to the backbone. Their captain, under pretense of seeing right done, allowed an attack to be made by the Cossacks. They drove off the other robbers, ransacked the booty, took what they wanted, and under color of giving protection, took the women also, hoping to dispose of them quietly as slaves at some town. These women were then mounted on several of the pack-horses, and the Cossacks rode off on their journey, leaving everything else on the plain for the other robbers to retake.

"My father had kept aloof from the disturbance. It was none of his business. He sat on his horse and quietly laughed at the whole transaction. He had become very Russian in a good many ways, and he certainly knew what Cossacks were, and that any protest from him would only be useless. It was simply a case of the biter bit. He joined the party as they galloped on to make up for lost time.

"As for the women, it was now nothing to them that their captors had changed. Early in the morning their village had been pillaged and their defenders slain. It was all one to them, now. Slavery awaited them wherever they went. So they sat their horses with their usual ease, veiled their faces, and resigned themselves to their fate. But as the afternoon wore on, the wily captain began to think that my father would certainly see through the marauding escapade of his, and that it would be unpleasant to hear about it again from the authorities, and so he cast about him for the easiest way to deceive or propitiate him. That evening, as my father was sitting in his kibitka, the curtain was raised and the captain smilingly led in one of the captive slaves – a woman of extraordinary beauty. And who do you think she was?"

Margaret turned pale. She grasped Geoffrey's arm, as her quick intelligence divined what was coming.

"No, no," she said. "You are not going to tell me that?"

"Yes," said Geoffrey with a pinched expression on his face. "That is just what I am going to tell you. That poor slave – that ignorant and beautiful savage was my mother."

Margaret was thunderstruck. She did not comprehend how things stood, but with a ready solicitude for him in a time of pain, she passed her hand through his arm and drew herself closer to him, as they walked along.

As for Maurice, he ground his teeth as he witnessed Margaret's loving solicitude. It was a relief to him to rasp out his dislike for Geoffrey under his breath. "I always knew he was a wolf," he muttered to himself.

"You will see now," continued Geoffrey, "why I preferred not to be known in this country. To be one of a family with a title in it did not compensate me for being a thorough savage on my mother's side.

"But I will continue my story. The beauty of the woman attracted my father. He spoke to her kindly in her own language and made her partake of his dinner with him. He thought that in any case he could save her from being sold into slavery by the Cossacks.

"These wild half-brothers of mine took it as a matter of course that my father would be pleased with his acquisition, but they suggested vodki and got it – so that my mother was in reality purchased from them for a few bottles of whisky.

"They went on toward Semipalatinsk and got the prisoners. My father intended to leave the woman at that town, but she wished to see the White Czar and his great city, of which she had heard, and she begged so hard to be taken back with him that he began to think he might as well do so.

"The fact was that a whim seized him to see her dressed as a European, and as they waited at Semipalatinsk for ten days before returning, he had time to have garments made which were as near to the European styles as he could suggest. It was evidently the clothes that decided the matter. In her coarse native habiliments she was simply a savage to a fastidious man, but when she was arrayed in a familiar looking dress assisted by the soft silken fabrics of the East, he was bewitched. She told him, on the journey back, how her father had always counted upon having enough to live on for the rest of his life when she was sold to the traders who purchased slaves for the harems at Constantinople.

"My father took her to St. Petersburg with him, where they lived for three years together. Such a thing as marrying her never entered his head. He simply lived like his friends. I never found out how much she was received in society – no doubt she had all the society she wanted – but I did hear from an old friend of my father, who spoke of her with much respect, that her beauty created the greatest sensation in St. Petersburg, and that when she went to the theatre the spectators were all like astronomers at a transit of Venus. She made good use of her time, however, and at the end of three years she could speak and write English a little.

"At the end of three years from the time he met her, my father was called back to England. He left her in his house in St. Petersburg with all the money necessary, and came home. I think he intended to go back to her when he got ready. But she settled that question by coming to England herself. She could not bear the separation after three months of waiting. Imagine the scene when she arrived! Lord and Lady Warcote were having a dinner party, when in came my mother, as lovely as a dream, and throwing her arms round my father she forgot her English and addressed him fondly in the Tartar dialect.

"My father, for a moment, was paralyzed; but, in spite of the enervating effect of this exotic's sudden appearance, he could not help feeling proud of her when he saw how magnificent she was in her new Paris costume, and it occurred to him that her wonderful beauty would carry things off with a high hand for a while, until he could perhaps get her back to Russia. She, however, after the moment in which she greeted him, stood up to her full height, and glancing rapidly around the table at all the speechless guests, recognized my grandfather from a photograph she had seen. Lord Warcote was sitting – starchy and speechless – at the end of the table.

"'Ah! zo! Oo are ze little faäzer!' And before he could say a word the handsomest woman in England had kissed him, and had taken his hand and patted it."

"Another brisk look around, and she recognized Lady Warcote in the same way. She floated round the table to greet 'dear mutter.' But here she saw she was making a mistake – that everything was not all right. Lady Warcote was not so susceptible to female beauty as she might have been. She arose from her chair, her face scarlet with anger, and motioned my mother away.

"'Manson,' she said, addressing my father, 'is this woman your wife?'"

"My father had now recovered from his shock, and was laughing til the tears ran down his face. My mother, seeing his merriment, took courage again and said gayly:

"'Yes, yes! He have buy me – for one – two – tree bottle vodki.' She counted the numbers on the tips of her fingers, her shapely hands flashing with jewels. Then her laughter chimed merrily in with my father's guffaw. She ran back to him, took his head in both her hands and said, imitating a long-drawn tone of childish earnestness:

"'It was cheap – che-ap. I was wort' more dan vodki.'

"Lord Warcote had lived a fast life in his earlier days. After Nature had allowed him a rare fling for sixty years she was beginning to withdraw her powers, and my grandfather had become as religious as he had been fast. The effect of my mother's presence upon him was to make him suddenly young again, and although he soon assumed his new Puritan gravity he could not keep his eyes off her. On a jury he would have acquitted her of anything, and when she turned around imperiously and told a servant to bring a chair, 'Good Lord!' he said, 'she's a Russian princess!' and he jumped up like an old courtier to get the chair himself. The more he heard of her story the more interested he became, and when he had heard it all, nothing would suffice but an immediate marriage. My father protested on several grounds, but his protests made no difference to the old man. His will, he said, would be law until he died, and even after he died, and, what with my mother's beauty, which made him take what he understood to be a strong religious interest in her behalf, and one thing and another, he got quite fanatical on the point. He forgot himself several times, and swore he would cut father off with nothing if he refused.