After the Seance.-- Daddy, the "Accommodation Husband."-- The two fascinating Swindlers in Council.-- Miss Evalena"s European Career.-- How the Millionaire Brewer was baited and played with.-- A Bit of Criminal History.-- A choice Pair.-- Mrs. Winslow"s Aspirations and Resolves.
It appeared that Miss Evalena Gray and Mlle. Leveraux, and their male companions, or affinities, did not reside at No. 19 West Twenty-first street, but in more modest quarters farther down-town; and after the a.s.semblage had dispersed, the two Misses, an attendant or two, a tall, gaunt, meek-looking fellow, whom the no longer angelical Evalena called "Daddy," and a very fascinating young man called in the advertis.e.m.e.nts W. Sterling Bischoff, manager, were gathered in the front parlor previous to being driven home, when W. Sterling said quickly, and as if suddenly recollecting something which it would not be profitable for him to forget:
"See here, Gray; "most forgot. Here"s a note sent over from the Fifth Avenue. None of your larks now!"
The person addressed so familiarly as Gray was none other than the interesting Evalena, who, putting her languor aside, and s.n.a.t.c.hing the note from the "manager," said:
"Give it here, now! I"ll lark if I like, and _you_ won"t hinder."
"But there"s Mr. Gray," persisted the manager, nodding towards the meek, gaunt man, whose lips seemed to move, though he ventured no remark.
"Oh, Daddy don"t mind, do you, Daddy?"
[Ill.u.s.tration: _"Oh daddy don"t mind:--do you daddy?"--_]
"Daddy" was Miss Evalena Gray"s husband, but was under such peculiarly good spiritual "control" that he merely smiled a sickly smile and murmured that he believed not.
Miss Gray proceeded to examine the note without waiting for the timid Mr. Gray"s opinion, and suddenly exclaimed:
"Gracious! I"m going right over there!"
"What for?" inquired Bischoff anxiously, while Mr. Gray"s lips pursed into the form of an unspoken inquiry; "man or woman, eh?"
"None of your business!" she answered promptly. "Here, Leveraux, help me on with my wrappings. You drive home. A friend of mine that I haven"t seen for all the last three years is stopping over there, and wants to see me. I may stay all night. If I shouldn"t want to, I"ll order a carriage and come down in an hour or two."
The three, who were elegantly supported by this woman"s juggleries, seemed to realize that there was no use of opposing her; and without knowing whether it was a man or woman she intended visiting at that hour of the night, went gloomily home, while a few minutes later Miss Gray, unannounced, and at the unseasonable hour of eleven o"clock, was knocking at the door of Mrs. Winslow"s room.
In a moment more, though Mrs. Winslow was on the point of retiring, and was in that easy _deshabille_ in which women love to wander about, doing a hundred unmentionable and unimportant things before getting into bed for good, Miss Gray was pushing her lithe form through the cautiously opened door, and at once unlimbered her tongue and her reserve; the result of which, as noted by my operative, showed the eminent vulgarity of the two female frauds, and ill.u.s.trated the fact that whatever pretensions they might make, their conversation alone would serve to discover the inherent and low vileness of their character.
"Oh, you dear old fraud!" said Evalena, entering, after Mrs. Winslow had virtuously given herself sufficient time to ascertain that there was no evil-minded man at the door, and had gladly admitted her visitor; "if you"ve got any other company, of course I won"t come!"
Mrs. Winslow laughed knowingly, and then told her visitor how really glad she was to see her. She was sincere in this, and sincerity, even in a bad cause, is a redeeming feature.
"Well, well, you rascal," continued Miss Gray in a jolly, rollicking sort of a way, "couldn"t wait until to-morrow. Where _have_ you been, what _have_ you been doing, and how _are_ you, anyhow? Come, now, tell me all about yourself!"
Saying this in a kind of a rush of excitement, Miss Gray settled herself in a corner of the luxurious sofa, pulled her feet under her to get a more comfortable position, and like an interested philosopher, waited for and listened to the narrative which comprised many of the facts I have given; but instead of telling the whole truth, only gave that part of it which made her appear to have been eminently successful in her swindling operations, and showed life with her to have been floating calmly upon one continuous, peaceful stream.
"And now, Evalena," said Mrs. Winslow, rounding off her story with a great flourish over what she was to make out of Lyon, whom she described as still madly in love with her, "where have _you_ been, and what have _you_ been doing since I saw you at Chardon?"
The glib tongue of the marvellous Physical Spiritual Medium began at once, and she rattled away at a terrible rate.
"Well, I"ve got the same husband----"
"Oh, pshaw!" interrupted Mrs. Winslow half contemptuously.
"But he"s such a dear, good old fool that I can"t throw him over. Why, I can make him shrink from six feet two to two feet six by just looking at him! Money couldn"t hire such a devoted servant anywhere. He"ll do just anything I tell him; and if I want him out of the way for a few days,"
she continued with a comical wink, "I just give him a fifty-dollar bill and say: "Daddy, you don"t look well; take a run into the country, and I"ll write for you when I want you!" He goes away then with his face about a yard long. But he goes; and he never made a rumpus in his life!"
"Oh, that"s quite another thing," said Mrs. Winslow, evidently relieved to know that Miss Gray had had so good a reason for living so long a time as three years with the same man.
"Yes, he"s what I call an "accommodation husband." He accommodates me, and I--" here Miss Gray sighed piously--"accommodate myself!"
"Exactly," remarked Mrs. Winslow, beginning to appreciate the pleasant nature of such an arrangement.
"Well," resumed the marvellous medium, "we went all through the Ohio towns giving _exposes_; went out through Chicago, and then down to St.
Louis. But the _expose_ business didn"t pay. We found that people would pay more money to be humbugged than to learn how some other person might be deluded!"
"Every time!" tersely observed Mrs. Winslow.
"So at St. Louis we resolved to become Spiritualists."
"The very best thing you could have done!" said Mrs. Winslow approvingly.
"And at Quincy," resumed Evalena, "we blossomed out. Oh, but didn"t the papers go for us, though!--called us everything."
"D----n the newspapers, anyhow!" exclaimed Mrs. Winslow in a burst of indignation over her own wrongs.
"Oh, no, no, no! _that_ won"t do. Make huge advertising bills. That"s better--much better. That"s what _we_ did, and we made big money too. By and by we came on here to New York, made a huge show, took in a vast pile, and then went to Europe. Oh, that"s the only way to do it!"
"Yes," said Mrs. Winslow with a deep sigh. "I have often felt the want of that peculiar tone which going to Europe gives one."
"Well, we did have a gay time, though," said Miss Gray in a dreamy way, as if ruminating over her conquests; "and at Venice--oh, that delicious, ravishing, dreamful Venice!--I bilked a swarthy n.o.bleman from the mountains out of five thousand dollars. At Rome I did a swell American out of everything he had. At Vienna, a Hungarian wine-grower fell, and I trampled upon him as his brutes of peasants beat out the grapes in vintage-time. At Berlin a German student killed himself for me; and at St. Petersburg I fooled the Czar himself. But when I got back to London I got better game than him."
"Bigger game than the Czar? Oh, my!" exclaimed Mrs. Winslow, thinking how she had wasted her sweetness on two detectives like Bristol and Fox.
"Well, bigger game this way," pursued little Miss Gray, reasoning it out slowly. "This Spiritualistic business can only be played on low, ignorant people ordinarily. Get the recognition of so big a man as one of the wealthiest brewers in Great Britain, and then, if Miss Gray has money and can open sumptuous parlors in so fashionable a vicinity as Madison Square, and can own a quarter of a column of the New York papers every day, Miss Evalena Gray"s fortune is made. Do you see?"
Mrs. Winslow did see, but wanted to know how she had secured such approval.
Her companion looked at her a moment in blank astonishment; then drawing down the corners of her mouth as if protesting against such verdancy on the part of so old a Spiritualistic soldier as Mrs. Winslow, gave a very expressive series of winks, broke into loud laughter, and then suggested that if she wanted anything like _that_ explained it would be no more than fair to order either Krug or Monopole to help her through so dreary a recital; whereupon the latter did as requested, and after the two had washed down a ribald toast with wine, the angelic Miss Gray continued:
"Well, you see, we came directly from St. Petersburg to London, and got up a big excitement there right off. The _Times_ denounced us, and we replied savagely through the _Telegraph_ at a half-crown a line. We kept this up until all London was engaged in the controversy, and our rooms were constantly thronged."
"What luck!" sighed Mrs. Winslow, sipping her wine.
"By and by the "n.o.bbies" got discussing the matter at the clubs. We challenged examination by committees everywhere, of course, and one day a batch of M.P.s, clergymen, merchants, and all that, came down upon us.
I picked out one man named Perkins--a brewer from the Surrey side, and one of the wealthiest men in all England, and a man of education and standing, too--for game right off."
"Must be lots of fools over in London," remarked Mrs. Winslow, as if she would like to help pluck them.
"Yes," answered Miss Gray, "and millions in this country. We"re going to take a run over to Washington this winter."
"I would if I had your talent," replied her companion.
"Well," resumed the medium, "I saw Perkins was an easy-going fellow, and I wrote him, saying it was something unusual for me to do, but as the "spirits""--here Miss Gray winked very hard at Mrs. Winslow, who snickered--"had revealed to me that he was an arrant unbeliever, but at the same time a fair, honorable man, magnanimous enough to be just--I wished him to make a private investigation."
""Private investigation"s" good!" said Mrs. Winslow, laughing heartily.