The Tinted Venus: A Farcical Romance, F. Anstey [best novels in english txt] 📗

"I know your wiles, O perfidious one," she said. "Having induced me to remove this token, you would seize it yourself, and take to flight! I will not remove this ring!"

"There's a thing to say!" said Leander; "there's a suspicion to throw against a man! If you think I'm likely to do that, I'll go right over here, where I can't even see it, and I won't stir out till it's all over. Will[Pg 276] that satisfy you? You know why I'm so anxious about that ring; and now, when the gentleman tells you he's almost sure it's gold——"

"It is gold!" said the goddess.

"If you're so sure about it," he retaliated, "why are you afraid to have it proved?"

"I am not afraid," she said; "but I require no proof!"

"I do," he retorted, "and what I told you before I stand to. If that ring is proved—in the only way it can be proved, I mean, by this gentleman testing it as he tells you he can—then there's no more to be said, and I'll go away with you like a lamb. But without that proof I won't stir a step, and so I tell you. It won't take a moment. You can see for yourself that I couldn't possibly catch up the ring from here!"

"Swear to me," she said, "that you will remain where you now stand; and remember," she added, with an accent of triumph, "our compact is that, should yonder man pronounce that the ring has passed through the test with honour, you will follow me whithersoever I bid you!"

"You have only to lead the way," he said, "and I promise you faithfully I'll follow."

Goddesses may be credited with some knowledge of the precious metals, and Aphrodite had no doubt of the result of the chemist's investigations. So it was with an air of serene anticipation that she left Leander upon this, and advanced to the chemist's counter.

"Prove it now," she said, "quickly, that I may go!"

The chemist, who had been waiting in considerable bewilderment, prepared himself to receive the ring, and Leander, keeping his distance, felt his heart beating fast[Pg 277] as Aphrodite slowly drew the token from her finger, and placed it in the chemist's outstretched hand.

Scarcely had she done so, as the chemist was retiring with the ring to one of his lamps, before the goddess seemed suddenly aware that she had committed a fatal error.

She made a stride forward to follow and recover it; but, as if some unseen force was restraining her, she stopped short, and a rush of whirling words, in some tongue unknown both to Leander and the chemist, forced its way through lips that smiled still, though they were freezing fast.

Then, with a strange hoarse cry of baffled desire and revenge, she succeeded, by a violent effort, in turning, and bore down with tremendous force upon the cowering hairdresser, who gave himself up at once for lost.

But the marble was already incapable of obeying her will. Within a few paces from him the statue stopped for the last time, with an abruptness that left it quivering and rocking. A greyish hue came over the face, causing the borrowed tints to stand forth, crude and glaring; the arms waved wildly and impotently once or twice, and then grew still for ever, in the attitude conceived long since by the Grecian sculptor!

Leander was free! His hazardous experiment had succeeded. As it was the ring which had brought the passionate, imperious goddess into her marble counterfeit, so—the ring once withdrawn—her power was instantly at an end, and the spell which had enabled her to assume a form of stone was broken.

He had hoped for this, had counted upon it, but even yet hardly dared to believe in his deliverance.

He had not done with it yet, however; for he would have to get the statue out of that shop, and abandon it in some manner which would not compromise himself,[Pg 278] and it is by no means an easy matter to mislay a life-size and invaluable antique without attracting an inconvenient amount of attention.

The chemist, who had been staring meanwhile in blank astonishment, now looked inquiringly at Leander, who looked helplessly at him.

At last the latter, unable to be silent any longer, said, "The lady seems unwell, sir."

"Why," Leander admitted, "she does appear a little out of sorts."

"Has she had these attacks before, do you happen to know?"

"She's more often like this than not," said Leander.

"Dear me, sir; but that's very serious. Is there nothing that gives relief?—a little sal volatile, now? Does the lady carry smelling salts? If not, I could——" And the chemist made an offer to come from behind his counter to examine the strange patient.

"No," said Leander, hastily. "Don't you trouble—you leave her to me. I know how to manage her. When she's rigid like this, she can't bear to be taken notice of."

He was wondering all the time how he was to get away with her, until the chemist, who seemed at least as anxious for her departure, suggested the answer: "I should imagine the poor lady would be best at home. Shall I send out for a cab?" he asked.

"Yes," said Leander, gratefully; "bring a hansom. She'll come round better in the open air;" for he had his doubts whether the statue could be stowed inside a four-wheeler.

"I'll go myself," said the obliging man; "my assistant's out. Perhaps the lady will sit down till the cab comes?"[Pg 279]

"Thanks," said Leander; "but when she's like this, she's been recommended to stand."

The chemist ran out bare-headed, to return presently with a cab and a small train of interested observers. He offered the statue his arm to the cab-door, an attention which was naturally ignored.

"We shall have to carry her there," said Leander.

"Why, bless me, sir," said the chemist, as he helped to lift her, "she—she's surprisingly heavy!"

"Yes," gasped Leander, over her unconscious shoulder; "when she goes off in one of these sleeps, she does sleep very heavy"—an explanation which, if obscure, was accepted by the other as part of the general strangeness of the case.

On the threshold the chemist stopped again. "I'd almost forgotten the ring," he said.

"I'll take that!" said Leander.

"Excuse me," was the objection, "but I was to give it back to the lady herself. Had I not better put it on her finger, don't you think?"

"Are you a married man?" asked Leander, grimly.

"Yes," said the chemist.

"Then, if you'll take my advice, I wouldn't if I was you—if you're at all anxious to keep out of trouble. You'd better give the ring to me, and I give you my word of honour as a gentleman that I'll give it back to her as soon as ever she's well enough to ask for it."

The other adopted the advice, and, amidst the sympathy of the bystanders, they got the statue into the cab.

"Where to?" asked the man through the trap.

"Charing Cross," said Leander, at random; he ought the drive would give him time for reflection.

"The 'orspital, eh?" said the cabman, and drove off,[Pg 280] leaving the mild chemist to stare open-mouthed on the pavement for a moment, and go back to his shop with a growing sense that he had had a very unusual experience.

Now that Leander was alone in the cab with the statue, whose attitude required space, and cramped him uncomfortably, he wondered more and more what he was to do with it. He could not afford to drive about London for ever with her; he dared not take her home; and he was afraid of being seen with her!

All at once he seemed to see a way out of his difficulty. His first step was to do what he could, in the constantly varying light, to reduce the statue to its normal state. He removed the curls which had disfigured her classical brow, and, with his pocket-handkerchief, rubbed most of the colour from her face; then the cloak had only to be torn off, and all that could betray him was gone.

Near Charing Cross, Leander told the driver to take him down Parliament Street, and stop at the entrance to Scotland Yard; there the cabman, at Leander's request, descended, and stared to find him huddled up under the gleaming pale arms of a statue.

"Guv'nor," he remarked, "that warn't the fare I took up, I'll take my dying oath!"

"It's all right," said Leander. "Now, I tell you what I want you to do: go straight in through the archway, find a policeman, and say there's a gentleman in your cab that's found a valuable article that's been missing, and wants assistance in bringing it in. I'll take care of the cab, and here's double fare for your trouble."

"And wuth it, too," was the cabman's comment, as he departed on his mission. "I thought it was the[Pg 281] devil I was a drivin', we was that down on the orfside!"

It was no part of Leander's programme to wait for his return; he threw the cloak over his arm, pocketed his beard, and slipped out of the cab and across the road to a spot whence he could watch unseen. And when he had seen the cabman come with two constables, he felt assured that his burden was in safe hands at last, and returned to Southampton Row as quickly as the next hansom he hailed could take him.

He entered his house by the back entrance: it was unguarded; and although he listened long at the foot of the stairs, he heard nothing. Had the Inspector not come yet, or was there a trap? As he went on, he fancied there were sounds in his sitting-room, and went up to the door and listened nervously before entering in.

"Oh, Miss Collum, my poor dear!" a tremulous voice, which he recognised as his aunt's, was saying, "for Mercy's sake, don't lie there like that! She's dying!—and it's my fault for letting her come here!—and what am I to say to her ma?"

Leander had heard enough; he burst in, with a white, horror-stricken face. Yes, it was too true! Matilda was lying back in his crazy armchair, her eyes fast closed, her lips parted.

"Aunt," he said with difficulty, "she's not—not dead?"

"If she is not," returned his aunt, "it's no thanks to you, Leandy Tweddle! Go away; you can do no good to her now!"

"Not till I've heard her speak," cried Tweddle. "Tillie, don't you hear?—it's me!"

To his immense relief, she opened her eyes at the[Pg 284][Pg 283][Pg 282] sound of his voice, and turned away with a feeble gesture of fear and avoidance. "You have come back!" she moaned, "and with her! Oh, keep her away!... I can't bear it all over again!... I can't!"

He threw himself down by her chair, and drew down the hands in which she had hidden her face. "Matilda, my poor, hardly-used darling!" he said, "I've come back alone! I've got rid of her, Tillie! I'm free; and there's no one to stand between us any more!"

HE THREW HIMSELF DOWN BY HER CHAIR, AND DREW DOWN THE HANDS IN WHICH SHE HAD HIDDEN HER FACE.

She pushed back her disordered fair hair, and looked at him with sweet, troubled eyes. "But you went away with her—for ever?" she said. "You said you didn't love me any longer. I heard you ... it was just before——" and she shuddered at the recollection.

"I know," said Leander, soothingly. "I was obligated to speak harsh, to deceive the—the other party, Tillie. I tried to tell you, quiet-like, that you wasn't to mind; but you wouldn't take no notice. But there, we won't talk about it any more, so long as you forgive me; and you do, don't you?"

She hid her face against his shoulder, in answer, from which he drew a favourable conclusion; but Miss Tweddle was not so easily pacified.

"And is this all the explanation you're going to give," she demanded, "for treating this poor child the way you've done, and neglecting her shameful like this? If she's satisfied, Leandy, I'm not."

"I can't help it, aunt," he said. "I've been true to Tillie all the way through, in spite of all appearances to the contrary—as she knows now. And the more I explained, the less you'd understand about it; so we'll leave things where they are. But I've got back the ring, and now you shall see me put it on her finger."

[Pg 285]

It seemed that Leander had