A Simpleton

C >> Charles Reade >> A Simpleton


When, after a little struggle with his better angel, he rode past his
wife's gate, he intended, at first, only to go to Cape Town, sell the
diamonds, have a lark, and bring home the balance: but, as he rode
south, his views expanded. He could have ten times the fun in London,
and cheaper; since he could sell the diamonds for more money, and
also conceal the true price. This was the Bohemian's whole mind in the
business. He had no designs whatever on Mrs. Staines, nor did he intend
to steal the diamonds, but to embezzle a portion of the purchase-money,
and enjoy the pleasures and vices of the capital for a few months;
then back to his milch cow, Phoebe, and lead a quiet life till the
next uncontrollable fit should come upon him along with the means of
satisfying it.

On the way, he read Staines's letter to Mrs. Falcon, very carefully. He
never broke the seal of the letter to Mrs. Staines. That was to be given
her when he had broken the good news to her; and this he determined to
do with such skill, as should make Dr. Staines very unwilling to look
suspiciously or ill-naturedly into money accounts.

He reached London; and being a thorough egotist, attended first to his
own interests; he never went near Mrs. Staines until he had visited
every diamond merchant and dealer in the metropolis; he showed the small
stones to them all but he showed no more than one large stone to each.

At last he got an offer of twelve hundred pounds for the small stones,
and the same for the large yellow stone, and nine hundred pounds for the
second largest stone. He took this nine hundred pounds, and instantly
wrote to Phoebe, telling her he had a sudden inspiration to bring the
diamonds to England, which he could not regret, since he had never done
a wiser thing. He had sold a single stone for eight hundred pounds, and
had sent the doctor's four hundred pounds to her account in Cape Town;
and as each sale was effected, the half would be so remitted. She would
see by that, he was wiser than in former days. He should only stay so
long as might be necessary to sell them all equally well. His own share
he would apply to paying off mortgages on the family estate, of which
he hoped some day to see her the mistress, or he would send it direct to
her, whichever she might prefer.

Now the main object of this artful letter was to keep Phoebe quiet, and
not have her coming after him, of which he felt she was very capable.

The money got safe to Cape Town, but the letter to Phoebe miscarried.
How this happened was never positively known; but the servant of the
lodging-house was afterwards detected cutting stamps off a letter; so
perhaps she had played that game on this occasion.

By this means, matters took a curious turn. Falcon, intending to lull
his wife into a false security, lulled himself into that state instead.

When he had taken care of himself, and got five hundred pounds to play
the fool with, then he condescended to remember his errand of mercy; and
he came down to Gravesend, to see Mrs. Staines.

On the road, he gave his mind seriously to the delicate and dangerous
task. It did not, however, disquiet him as it would you, sir, or you,
madam. He had a great advantage over you. He was a liar--a smooth,
ready, accomplished liar--and he knew it.

This was the outline he had traced in his mind: he should appear very
subdued and sad; should wear an air of condolence. But, after a while,
should say, "And yet men have been lost like that, and escaped. A man
was picked up on a raft in those very latitudes, and brought into Cape
Town. A friend of mine saw him, months after, at the hospital. His
memory was shaken--could not tell his name; but in other respects he was
all right again."

If Mrs. Staines took fire at this, he would say his friend knew all the
particulars, and he would ask him, and so leave that to rankle till next
visit. And having planted his germ of hope, he would grow it, and water
it, by visits and correspondence, till he could throw off the mask, and
say he was convinced Staines was alive: and from that, by other degrees,
till he could say, on his wife's authority, that the man picked up at
sea, and cured at her house, was the very physician who had saved her
brother's life: and so on to the overwhelming proof he carried in the
ruby ring and the letter.

I am afraid the cunning and dexterity, the subtlety and tact required,
interested him more in the commission than did the benevolence. He
called, sent up his card, and composed his countenance for his part,
like an actor at the Wing.

"Not at home."

He stared with amazement.

The history of a "Not at home" is not, in general, worth recording: but
this is an exception.

On receiving Falcon's card, Mrs. Staines gave a little start, and
colored faintly. She instantly resolved not to see him. What! the man
she had flirted with, almost jilted, and refused to marry--he dared to
be alive when her Christopher was dead, and had come there to show her
HE was alive!

She said "Not at home" with a tone of unusual sharpness and decision,
which left the servant in no doubt he must be equally decided at the
hall door.

Falcon received the sudden freezer with amazement. "Nonsense," said he.
"Not at home at this time of the morning--to an old friend!"

"Not at home," said the man doggedly.

"Oh, very well," said Falcon with a bitter sneer, and returned to
London.

He felt sure she was at home; and being a tremendous egotist, he said,
"Oh! all right. If she would rather not know her husband is alive, it
is all one to me;" and he actually took no more notice of her for a full
week, and never thought of her, except to chuckle over the penalty she
was paying for daring to affront his vanity.

However, Sunday came; he saw a dull day before him, and so he relented,
and thought he would give her another trial.

He went down to Gravesend by boat, and strolled towards the villa.

When he was about a hundred yards from the villa, a lady, all in black,
came out with a nurse and child.

Falcon knew her figure all that way off, and it gave him a curious
thrill that surprised him. He followed her, and was not very far behind
her when she reached the church. She turned at the porch, kissed the
child earnestly, and gave the nurse some directions; then entered the
church.

"Come," said Falcon, "I'll have a look at her, any way."

He went into the church, and walked up a side aisle to a pillar, from
which he thought he might be able to see the whole congregation; and,
sure enough, there she sat, a few yards from him. She was lovelier than
ever. Mind had grown on her face with trouble. An angelic expression
illuminated her beauty; he gazed on her, fascinated. He drank and drank
her beauty two mortal hours, and when the church broke up, and she went
home, he was half afraid to follow her, for he felt how hard it would
be to say anything to her but that the old love had returned on him with
double force.

However, having watched her home, he walked slowly to and fro composing
himself for the interview.

He now determined to make the process of informing her a very long one:
he would spin it out, and so secure many a sweet interview with her:
and, who knows? he might fascinate her as she had him, and ripen
gratitude into love, as he understood that word.

He called, he sent in his card. The man went in, and came back with a
sonorous "Not at home."

"Not at home? nonsense. Why, she is just come in from church."

"Not at home," said the man, evidently strong in his instructions.

Falcon turned white with rage at this second affront. "All the worse for
her," said he, and turned on his heel.

He went home, raging with disappointment and wounded vanity, and--since
such love as his is seldom very far from hate--he swore she should never
know from him that her husband was alive. He even moralized. "This comes
of being so unselfish," said he. "I'll give that game up forever."

By and by, a mere negative revenge was not enough for him, and he set
his wits to work to make her smart.

He wrote to her from his lodgings:--


DEAR MADAM,--What a pity you are never at home to me. I had something to
say about your husband, that I thought might interest you.

Yours truly,

R. FALCON.


Imagine the effect of this abominable note. It was like a rock flung
into a placid pool. It set Rosa trembling all over. What could he mean?

She ran with it to her father, and asked him what Mr. Falcon could mean.

"I have no idea," said he. "You had better ask him, not me."

"I am afraid it is only to get to see me. You know he admired me once.
Ah, how suspicious I am getting."

Rosa wrote to Falcon:--


DEAR SIR,--Since my bereavement I see scarcely anybody. My servant did
not know you; so I hope you will excuse me. If it is too much trouble to
call again, would you kindly explain your note to me?

Yours respectfully,

ROSA STAINES.


Falcon chuckled bitterly over this. "No, my lady," said he. "I'll serve
you out. You shall run after me like a little dog. I have got the bone
that will draw you."

He wrote back coldly to say that the matter he had wished to communicate
was too delicate and important to put on paper; that he would try and
get down to Gravesend again some day or other, but was much occupied,
and had already put himself to inconvenience. He added, in a postscript,
that he was always at home from four to five.

Next day he got hold of the servant, and gave her minute instructions,
and a guinea.

Then the wretch got some tools and bored a hole in the partition wall of
his sitting-room. The paper had large flowers. He was artist enough
to conceal the trick with water-colors. In his bed-room the hole came
behind the curtains.

That very afternoon, as he had foreseen, Mrs. Staines called on him. The
maid, duly instructed, said Mr. Falcon was out, but would soon return,
and could she wait his return? The maid being so very civil, Mrs.
Staines said she would wait a little while, and was immediately ushered
into Falcon's sitting-room. There she sat down; but was evidently ill at
ease, restless, flushed. She could not sit quiet, and at last began to
walk up and down the room, almost wildly. Her beautiful eyes glittered,
and the whole woman seemed on fire. The caitiff, who was watching her,
saw and gloated on all this, and enjoyed to the full her beauty and
agitation, and his revenge for her "Not at homes."

But after a long time, there was a reaction: she sat down and uttered
some plaintive sounds inarticulate, or nearly; and at last she began to
cry.

Then it cost Falcon an effort not to come in and comfort her; but he
controlled himself and kept quiet.

She rang the bell. She asked for writing paper, and she wrote her unseen
tormentor a humble note, begging him, for old acquaintance, to call on
her, and tell her what his mysterious words meant that had filled her
with agitation.

This done, she went away, with a deep sigh, and Falcon emerged, and
pounced upon her letter.

He kissed it; he read it a dozen times: he sat down where she had sat,
and his base passion overpowered him. Her beauty, her agitation, her
fear, her tears, all combined to madden him, and do the devil's work
in his false, selfish heart, so open to violent passions, so dead to
conscience.

For once in his life he was violently agitated, and torn by conflicting
feelings: he walked about the room more wildly than his victim had; and
if it be true that, in certain great temptations, good and bad angels
fight for a man, here you might have seen as fierce a battle of that
kind as ever was.

At last he rushed out into the air, and did not return till ten o'clock
at night. He came back pale and haggard, and with a look of crime upon
his face.

True Bohemian as he was, he sent for a pint of brandy.

So then the die was cast, and something was to be done that called for
brandy.

He bolted himself in, and drank a wine-glass of it neat; then another;
then another.

Now his pale cheek is flushed, and his eye glitters. Drink forever!
great ruin of English souls as well as bodies.

He put the poker in the fire, and heated it red hot.

He brought Staines's letter, and softened the sealing-wax with the hot
poker; then with his pen-knife made a neat incision in the wax, and
opened the letter. He took out the ring, and put it carefully away. Then
he lighted a cigar, and read the letter, and studied it. Many a man,
capable of murder in heat of passion, could not have resisted the pathos
of this letter. Many a Newgate thief, after reading it, would have felt
such pity for the loving husband who had suffered to the verge of death,
and then to the brink of madness, and for the poor bereaved wife, that
he would have taken the letter down to Gravesend that very night, though
he picked two fresh pockets to defray the expenses of the road.

But this was an egotist. Good nature had curbed his egotism a little
while; but now vanity and passion had swept away all unselfish feelings,
and the pure egotist alone remained.

Now, the pure egotist has been defined as a man who will burn down his
NEIGHBOR'S house to cook HIMSELF an egg. Murder is but egotism carried
out to its natural climax. What is murder to a pure egotist, especially
a brandied one?

I knew an egotist who met a female acquaintance in Newhaven village. She
had a one-pound note, and offered to treat him. She changed this note to
treat him. Fish she gave him, and much whiskey. Cost her four shillings.
He ate and drank with her, at her expense; and his aorta, or principal
blood-vessel, being warmed with her whiskey, he murdered her for the
change, the odd sixteen shillings.

I had the pleasure of seeing that egotist hung, with these eyes. It was
a slice of luck that, I grieve to say, has not occurred again to me.

So much for a whiskied egotist.

His less truculent but equally remorseless brother in villany, the
brandied egotist, Falcon, could read that poor husband's letter without
blenching; the love and the anticipations of rapture, these made him
writhe a little with jealousy, but they roused not a grain of pity. He
was a true egotist, blind, remorseless.

In this, his true character, he studied the letter profoundly, and
mastered all the facts, and digested them well.

All manner of diabolical artifices presented themselves to his brain,
barren of true intellect, yet fertile in fraud; in that, and all low
cunning and subtlety, far more than a match for Solomon or Bacon.

His sinister studies were pursued far into the night. Then he went to
bed, and his unbounded egotism gave him the sleep a grander criminal
would have courted in vain on the verge of a monstrous and deliberate
crime.

Next day he went to a fashionable tailor, and ordered a complete suit of
black. This was made in forty-eight hours; the interval was spent mainly
in concocting lies to be incorporated with the number of minute facts he
had gained from Staines's letter, and in making close imitations of his
handwriting.

Thus armed, and crammed with more lies than the "Menteur" of Corneille,
but not such innocent ones, he went down to Gravesend, all in deep
mourning, with crape round his hat.

He presented himself at the villa.

The servant was all obsequiousness. Yes, Mrs. Staines received few
visitors; but she was at home to HIM. He even began to falter excuses.
"Nonsense," said Falcon, and slipped a sovereign into his hand; "you are
a good servant, and obey orders."

The servant's respect doubled, and he ushered the visitor into the
drawing-room, as one whose name was a passport. "Mr. Reginald Falcon,
madam."

Mrs. Staines was alone. She rose to meet him. Her color came and went,
her full eye fell on him, and took in all at a glance--that he was all
in black, and that he had a beard, and looked pale, and ill at ease.

Little dreaming that this was the anxiety of a felon about to take the
actual plunge into a novel crime, she was rather prepossessed by it. The
beard gave him dignity, and hid his mean, cruel mouth. His black suit
seemed to say he, too, had lost some one dear to him; and that was a
ground of sympathy.

She received him kindly, and thanked him for taking the trouble to come
again. She begged him to be seated; and then, womanlike, she waited for
him to explain.

But he was in no hurry, and waited for her. He knew she would speak if
he was silent.

She could not keep him waiting long. "Mr. Falcon," said she, hesitating
a little, "you have something to say to me about him I have lost."

"Yes," said he softly. "I have something I could say, and I think I
ought to say it; but I am afraid: because I don't know what will be the
result. I fear to make you more unhappy."

"Me! more unhappy? Me, whose dear husband lies at the bottom of the
ocean. Other poor wounded creatures have the wretched comfort of knowing
where he lies--of carrying flowers to his tomb. But I--oh, Mr. Falcon, I
am bereaved of all: even his poor remains lost,--lost"--she could say no
more.

Then that craven heart began to quake at what he was doing; quaked, yet
persevered; but his own voice quivered, and his cheek grew ashy pale.
No wonder. If ever God condescended to pour lightning on a skunk, surely
now was the time.

Shaking and sweating with terror at his own act, he stammered out,
"Would it be the least comfort to you to know that you are not denied
that poor consolation? Suppose he died not so miserably as you think?
Suppose he was picked up at sea, in a dying state?"

"Ah!"

"Suppose he lingered, nursed by kind and sympathizing hands, that almost
saved him? Suppose he was laid in hallowed ground, and a great many
tears shed over his grave?"

"Ah, that would indeed be a comfort. And it was to say this you came. I
thank you. I bless you. But, my good, kind friend, you are deceived. You
don't know my husband. You never saw him. He perished at sea."

"Will it be kind or unkind, to tell you why I think he died as I tell
you, and not at sea?"

"Kind, but impossible. You deceive yourself. Ah, I see. You found some
poor sufferer, and were good to him; but it was not my poor Christie.
Oh, if it were, I should worship you. But I thank you as it is. It was
very kind to want to give me this little, little crumb of comfort; for
I know I did not behave well to you, sir: but you are generous, and have
forgiven a poor heart-broken creature, that never was very wise."

He gave her time to cry, and then said to her, "I only wanted to be sure
it WOULD be any comfort to you. Mrs. Staines, it is true I did not
even know his name; nor yours. When I met, in this very room, the great
disappointment that has saddened my own life, I left England directly. I
collected funds, went to Natal, and turned land-owner and farmer. I have
made a large fortune, but I need not tell you I am not happy. Well,
I had a yacht, and sailing from Cape Town to Algoa Bay, I picked up
a raft, with a dying man on it. He was perishing from exhaustion and
exposure. I got a little brandy between his lips, and kept him alive. I
landed with him at once: and we nursed him on shore. We had to be very
cautious. He improved. We got him to take egg-flip. He smiled on us at
first, and then he thanked us. I nursed him day and night for ten days.
He got much stronger. He spoke to me, thanked me again and again, and
told me his name was Christopher Staines. He told me that he should
never get well. I implored him to have courage. He said he did not want
for courage; but nature had been tried too hard. We got so fond of each
other. Oh!"--and the caitiff pretended to break down; and his feigned
grief mingled with Rosa's despairing sobs.

He made an apparent effort, and said, "He spoke to me of his wife, his
darling Rosa. The name made me start, but I could not know it was
you. At last he was strong enough to write a few lines, and he made me
promise to take them to his wife."

"Ah!" said Rosa. "Show them me."

"I will."

"This moment." And her hands began to work convulsively.

"I cannot," said Falcon. "I have not brought them with me."

Rosa cast a keen eye of suspicion and terror on him. His not bringing
the letter seemed monstrous; and so indeed it was. The fact is, the
letter was not written.

Falcon affected not to notice her keen look. He flowed on, "The address
he put on that letter astonished me. 'Kent Villa.' Of course I knew Kent
Villa: and he called you 'Rosa.'"

"How could you come to me without that letter?" cried Rosa, wringing her
hands. "How am I to know? It is all so strange, so incredible."

"Don't you believe me?" said Falcon sadly. "Why should I deceive you?
The first time I came down to tell you all this, I did not KNOW who Mrs.
Staines was. I suspected; but no more. The second time I saw you in the
church, and then I knew; and followed you to try and tell you all this;
and you were not at home to me."

"Forgive me," said Rosa carelessly: then earnestly, "The letter! when
can I see it?"

"I will send, or bring it."

"Bring it! I am in agony till I see it. Oh, my darling! my darling!
It can't be true. It was not my Christie. He lies in the depths of the
ocean. Lord Tadcaster was in the ship, and he says so; everybody says
so."

"And I say he sleeps in hallowed ground, and these hands laid him
there."

Rosa lifted her hands to heaven, and cried piteously, "I don't know what
to think. You would not willingly deceive me. But how can this be?
Oh, Uncle Philip, why are you away from me? Sir, you say he gave you a
letter?"

"Yes."

"Oh, why, why did you not bring it?"

"Because he told me the contents; and I thought he prized my poor
efforts too highly. It did not occur to me you would doubt my word."

"Oh, no: no more I do: but I fear it was not my Christie."

"I'll go for the letter at once, Mrs. Staines."

"Oh, thank you! Bless you! Yes, this minute!"

The artful rogue did not go; never intended.

He rose TO GO; but had a sudden inspiration; very sudden, of course.
"Had he nothing about him you could recognize him by?"

"Yes, he had a ring I gave him."

Falcon took a black-edged envelope out of his pocket.

"A ruby ring," said she, beginning to tremble at his quiet action.

"Is that it?" and he handed her a ruby ring.




CHAPTER XXVII.


Mrs. Staines uttered a sharp cry and seized the ring. Her eyes dilated
over it, and she began to tremble in every limb; and at last she sank
slowly back, and her head fell on one side like a broken lily. The
sudden sight of the ring overpowered her almost to fainting.

Falcon rose to call for assistance; but she made him a feeble motion not
to do so.

She got the better of her faintness, and then she fell to kissing the
ring, in an agony of love, and wept over it, and still held it, and
gazed at it through her blinding tears.

Falcon eyed her uneasily.

But he soon found he had nothing to fear. For a long time she seemed
scarcely aware of his presence; and when she noticed him, it was to
thank him, almost passionately.

"It was my Christie you were so good to: may Heaven bless you for it:
and you will bring me his letter, will you not?"

"Of course I will."

"Oh, do not go yet. It is all so strange: so sad. I seem to have lost
my poor Christie again, since he did not die at sea. But no, I am
ungrateful to God, and ungrateful to the kind friend that nursed him to
the last. Ah, I envy you that. Tell me all. Never mind my crying. I
have seen the time I could not cry. It was worse then than now. I shall
always cry when I speak of him, ay, to my dying day. Tell me, tell me
all."

Her passion frightened the egotist, but did not turn him. He had gone
too far. He told her that, after raising all their hopes, Dr. Staines
had suddenly changed for the worse, and sunk rapidly; that his last
words had been about her, and he had said, "My poor Rosa, who will
protect her?" That, to comfort him, he had said he would protect her.
Then the dying man had managed to write a line or two, and to address
it. Almost his last words had been, "Be a father to my child."

"That is strange."

"You have no child? Then it must have been you he meant. He spoke of you
as a child more than once."

"Mr. Falcon, I have a child; but born since I lost my poor child's
father."

"Then I think he knew it. They say that dying men can see all over
the world: and I remember, when he said it, his eyes seemed fixed very
strangely, as if on something distant. Oh, how wonderful all this is.
May I see his child, to whom I promised"--

The artist in lies left his sentence half completed.

Rosa rang, and sent for her little boy.

Mr. Falcon admired his beauty, and said quietly, "I shall keep my vow."

He then left her, with a promise to come back early next morning with
the letter.

She let him go only on those conditions.

As soon as her father came in, she ran to him with this strange story.

"I don't believe it," said he. "It is impossible."

She showed him the proof, the ruby ring.

Then he became very uneasy, and begged her not to tell a soul. He did
not tell her the reason, but he feared the insurance office would hear
of it, and require proofs of Christopher's decease, whereas they had
accepted it without a murmur, on the evidence of Captain Hamilton and
the Amphitrite's log-book.