CHAPTER XVII
ON THE PONT ROYAL
It would appear that John Turner had business south of the Seine, though his clients were few in the Faubourg St. Germain. For this placid British banker was known to be a good hater. His father before him, it was said, had had dealings with the Bourbons, while many a great family of the Emigration would have lost more than the esteem of their fellows in their panic-stricken flight, had it not been that one cool-headed and calm man of business stayed at his post through the topsy-turvy days of the Terror, and did his duty by the clients whom he despised.
On quitting the Louvre, by the door facing the Palais Royal, Turner moved to the left. To say that he walked would be to overstate the action of his little stout legs, which took so short a stride that his progress suggested wheels and some one pushing behind. He turned to the left again, and ambled under the great arch, to take the path pa.s.sing behind the Tuileries.
His stoutness was, in a sense, a safeguard in streets where the travelling Englishman, easily recognised, has not always found a welcome.
His clothes and his walk were studiously French. Indeed, no one, pa.s.sing by with a casual glance, would have turned to look a second time at a figure so typical of the Paris streets.
Mr. Turner quitted the enclosure of the Tuileries gardens and crossed the quay toward the Pont Royal. But he stopped short under the trees by the river wall, with a low whistle of surprise. Crossing the bridge, toward him, and carrying a carpet-bag of early Victorian design, was Mr.
Septimus Marvin, rector of Farlingford, in Suffolk.
After a moment"s thought, John Turner went toward the bridge, and stationed himself on the pavement at the corner. The pavement is narrow, and Turner was wide. In order to pa.s.s him, Septimus Marvin would need to step into the road. This he did, without resentment; with, indeed, a courtly and vague inclination of the head toward the human obstruction.
"Look here, Sep," said Turner, "you are not going to pa.s.s an old schoolfellow like that."
Septimus Marvin lurched onward one or two steps, with long loose strides.
Then he clutched his carpet-bag with both hands and looked back at his interlocutor, with the scared eyes of a detected criminal. This gave place to the habitual gentle smile when, at last, the recognition was complete.
"What have you got there?" asked Turner, pointing with his stick at the carpet-bag. "A kitten?"
"No--no," replied Marvin, looking this way and that, to make sure that none could overhear.
"A Nanteuil--engraved from his own drawing, Jack--a real Nanteuil. I have just been to a man I know--the print-shop opposite the statue on the Quai Voltaire--to have my own opinion verified. I was sure of it. He says that I am undoubtedly right. It is a genuine Nanteuil--a proof before letters."
"Ah! And you have just picked it up cheap? Picked it up, eh?"
"No, no, quite the contrary," Marvin replied, in a confidential whisper.
"Stolen--dear, dear! I am sorry to hear that, Septimus."
And Septimus Marvin broke into the jerky, spasmodic laugh of one who has not laughed for long--perhaps for years.
"Ah, Jack," he said; "you are still up to a joke."
"Well, I should hope so. We are quite close to my club. Come, and have luncheon, and tell me all about it."
So the Social and Sporting Club, renowned at that day for its matchless cuisine and for nothing else of good repute at all, entertained an angel unawares, and was much amused at Septimus Marvin"s appearance, although the amus.e.m.e.nt was not apparent. The members, it would appear, were gentlemen of that good school of old France which, like many good things both French and English, is fast disappearing. And with all those faults, which we are so ready to perceive in any Frenchman, there is none on earth who will conceal from you so effectually the fact that in his heart he is vastly amused.
It was with some difficulty that Septimus was persuaded to consign his carpet-bag to the custody of the hall-porter.
"If it wasn"t a Nanteuil," he explained in a whisper to his friend, "I should have no hesitation; for I am sure the man is honest and in every way to be relied upon. But a Nanteuil--_ad vivum_--Jack. There are none like him. It is priceless."
"You used not to be a miser," said Turner, panting on the stairs, when at last the bag was concealed in a safe place. "What matter what the value may be, so long as you like it?"
"Oh! but the value is of great importance," answered Septimus, rather sheepishly.
"Then you have changed a good deal since you and I were at Ipswich school together. There, sit down at this table. I suppose you are hungry. I hope you are. Try and think--there"s a good fellow--and remember that they have the best cook in Paris here. Their morals ain"t of the first water, but their cook is without match. Yes, you have changed a good deal, if you think of money."
Septimus Marvin had changed colour, at all events, in the last few minutes.
"I have to, Jack, I have to. That is the truth of it. I have come to Paris to sell that Nanteuil. To realise, I suppose you would call it in the financial world. _Pro aris et focis_, old friend. I want money for the altar and the hearth. It has come to that. I cannot ask them in Farlingford for more money, for I know they have none. And the church is falling about our ears. The house wants painting. It is going the way of the church, indeed."
"Ah!" said Turner, glancing at him over the bill of fare. "So you have to sell an engraving. It goes to the heart, I suppose?"
Marvin laughed and rubbed his spare hands together, with an a.s.sumption of cheerfulness in which some one less stout and well-to-do than his companion might have perceived that dim minor note of pathos, which always rings somewhere in a forced laugh.
"One has to face it," he replied. "_Ne cedas malis_, you know. I suddenly found it was necessary. It was forced upon me, in fact. I found that my niece was secretly helping to make both ends meet. A generous action, made doubly generous by the manner in which it was performed."
"Miriam?" put in John Turner, who appeared to be absorbed in the all-important doc.u.ment before him.
"Yes, Miriam. Do you know her? Ah! I forgot. You are her guardian and trustee. I sometimes think my memory is failing. I found her out quite by accident. It must have been going on for quite a long time. Heaven will reward her, Turner! One cannot doubt it."
He absent-mindedly seized two pieces of bread from the basket offered to him by a waiter, and began to eat as if famished.
"Steady, man, steady," exclaimed Turner, leaning forward with a horror-stricken face to restrain him. "Don"t spoil a grand appet.i.te on bread. Gad! I wish I could fall on my food like that. You seem to be starving."
"I think I forgot to have any breakfast," said Marvin, apologetically.
"I dare say you did!" was the angry retort. "You always were a bit of an a.s.s, you know, Sep. But I have ordered a tiptop luncheon, and I"ll trouble you not to wolf like that."
"Well--well, I"m sorry," said the other, who, even in the far-off days at Ipswich school, had always been in the clouds, while John Turner moved essentially on the earth.
"And do not sell that Nanteuil to the first bidder," went on Turner, with a glance, of which the keenness was entirely disarmed by the good-natured roundness of his huge cheeks. "I know a man who will buy it--at a good price, too. Where did you get it?"
"Ah! that is a long story," replied Marvin, looking dreamily out of the window. "I bought it, years ago, at Farlingford. But it is a long story."
"Then tell it, slowly. While I eat this _sole a la Normande_. I see you"ve nearly finished yours, and I have scarcely begun."
It was a vague and disjointed enough story, as related by Septimus Marvin. And it was the story of Loo Barebone"s father. As it progressed John Turner grew redder and redder in the face, while he drank gla.s.s after gla.s.s of Burgundy.
"A queer story," he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, breathlessly. "Go on. And you bought this engraving from the man himself, before he died? Did he tell you where he got it? It is the portrait of a woman, you say."
"Portrait of a woman--yes, yes. But he did not know who she was. And I do not know whether I gave him enough for it. Do you think I did, Jack?"
"I do not know how much you gave him, but I have no doubt that it was too much. Where did he get it?"
"He thinks it was brought from France by his mother, or the woman who was supposed in Farlingford to be his mother--together with other papers, which he burnt, I believe."
"And then he died?"
"Yes--yes. He died--but he left a son."
"The devil he did! Why did you not mention that before? Where is the son?
Tell me all about him, while I see how they"ve served this _langue fourree_, which should be eaten slowly; though it is too late to remind you of that now. Go on. Tell me all about the son."