"Yaas, I will take a bill,--a bill at tree months. When it is yours, I will tell you dat you are de luckiest man in all Europe. You have dere, in dat leetle volume, all man strive for, fight for, cheat for, die for!"

As he said this, he sat down again at his desk to write the acceptance Beecher was to sign; while the other, withdrawing into the window recess, peered eagerly into the pages of the precious book.

"Mind," said the Jew, "you no let any one see de 'Cabal.' If it be once get abroad, de bank will change de play. You just carry in your head de combinations, and you, go in, and win de millions dat you want at de time."

"Just so," said Beecher, in ecstasy, the very thought of the golden cataract sending a thrill of rapture through him. "I suppose, however, I may show it to Davis?"

"Ach, der Davis, yaas,--der Davis can see it," said the Jew, with a laugh whose significance it were very hard to interpret. "Dere now,"

said Stein, handing him the pen, "write de name dere as on de oder."

"Still Lackington, I suppose--eh?" asked Beecher.

"Yaas,--just de same," said Stein, gravely.

"'Just as good for a sheep as a lamb,' as the proverb says," muttered Beecher. And he dashed off the name with a reckless flourish. "I 'll tell you one thing, Master Stein," said he, as he buttoned up the magic volume in the breast of his coat, "if this turn out the good dodge you say it is, I 'll behave handsomely to you. I pledge you my word of honor, I'll stand to you for double--treble the sum you have got written there. _You_ don't know the fellow you're dealing with,--very few know him, for the matter of that,--but though he has got a smart lesson or two in life, he has good stuff in him still; and _if_--I say _if_, because, of course, all depends on _that_--_if_ I can give the bank at Hamburg a spring in the air with the aid of this, I 'll not forget _you_, old boy."

"You make dem all spring in de air!--Ems, Wiesbaden, Baden--all go up togeder!" And the Jew laughed with the glee of a demon.

"Not that I want to hurt any one,--not that I 'd like to squeeze a fellow too hard," broke in Beecher, suddenly, for a quick thrill of superstitious fear--the gambler's innate conscience--shot through him, and made him tremble to think that by a chance word or thought he might disgust the Fortune he would propitiate. "No, no; my motto is, 'Live and let live!' There's room for us all!" And with the utterance of a sentiment he believed so truly generous, he took leave of the Jew, and departed.

CHAPTER V. A VILLAGE NEAR THE RHINE

It was at a little village called Holbach, about fifteen miles from the right bank of the Rhine, Grog Davis had taken up his quarters while awaiting the arrival of his daughter. Near as it was to that great high-road of Europe, scarcely out of earshot of whizzing steamers and screaming trains, the spot was wonderfully secluded and unvisited.

A little trout-stream, known to a few, who treasured the secret like fishermen, made the inn resorted to in the months of May and June; but for the rest of the year the "Golden Hook" had few customers, and the landlord almost abdicated his functions till spring came round again.

The house, originally intended for a mill, was built over the river itself, so that the indolent angler might actually have fished from the very window. The pine-clad mountains of Nassau enclosed the narrow glen, which straggled irregularly along for miles, now narrowing to a mere strip, now expanding into little plains of fertile meadow-land, with neat cottages and speckled cattle scattered around them. A narrow belt of garden flanked the river, on whose edge a walk of trellised vines was fashioned,--a charming spot in the sultry heat of summer, with its luxuriant shade above and the rippling stream below. Davis had seen the place years before in some hurried Journey; but his retentive mind carried a full memory of the spot, and he soon found that it comprised all he was in search of,--it was easy of access, secret, and cheap.

Only too well pleased to meet with a guest at this dead season of the year, they gave up to him the choicest apartment, and treated him with every solicitude and attention.

His table was supplied well, almost luxuriously; the good wine of Ettleberg given in liberal profusion; the vine alley converted into a pistol gallery for his use; and all for such a sum _per diem_ as would not have satisfied a waiter at the Clarendon. But it was the calm seclusion, the perfect isolation that gratified him most. Let him stroll which way he would, he never chanced upon a traveller. It was marvellous, indeed, how such a place could have escaped that prying tribe of ramblers which England each year sends forth to wrangle, dispute, and disparage everything over Europe; and yet here were precisely the very objects they usually sought after,--beautiful scenery, a picturesque peasantry, and a land romantic in all its traits and traditions.

Not that Grog cared for these: rocks, waterfalls, ruins, leafy groves, or limpid streams made no appeal to _him_, He lived for the life of men, their passions and their ambitions. He knew some people admired this kind of thing, and there were some who were fond of literature; others liked pictures; others, again, fancied old coins. He had no objection.

They were, if not very profitable, at least, harmless tastes. All he asked was, not to be the companion of such dreamers. "Give me the fellow that knows life," would he say; and I am afraid that the definition of that same "life" would have included some things scarcely laudable.

If the spot were one to encourage indolence and ease, Davis did not yield to this indulgence. He arose early; walked for health; shot with the pistol for practice; studied his martingale for the play-table; took an hour with the small-sword with an old maitre d'armes whom he found in the village; and, without actually devoting himself to it as a task, practised himself in German by means of conversation; and, lastly, he thought deeply and intently over the future. For speculations of this kind he had no mean capacity. If he knew little of the human heart in its higher moods, he understood it well in its shortcomings and its weaknesses; to what temptations a man might yield, when to offer them, and how, were mysteries he had often brooded over. In forecastings of this order, therefore, Davis exercised himself. Strange eventualities, "cases of conscience," that I would fain believe never occurred to you, dear reader, nor to me, arose before him, and he met them manfully.

The world is generous in its admiration of the hard-worked minister, toiling night-long at his desk, receiving and answering his twenty despatches daily, and rising in the House to explain this, refute that, confirm the other, with all the clearness of an orator and all the calmness of a clerk; but, after all, he is but a fly-wheel in that machine of government of which there are some hundred other component parts, all well fitting and proportioned. _Precis_ writers and private secretaries cram, colleagues advise him. The routine of official life hedges him in his proper groove; and if not overcome by indolence or affected by zeal, he can scarcely blunder. Not so your man of straits and emergency, your fellow living by his wits, and wresting from the world, that fancies it does not want him, reward and recognition. It is no marvel if a proud three-decker sail round the globe; but very different is our astonishment if a cockboat come safely from the China Seas, or brave the stormy passage round the Cape. Such a craft as this was Grog, his own captain: himself the crew, he had neither owner nor underwriter; and yet, amidst the assembled navies of the world, he would have shown his bunting!

The unbroken calm of his present existence was most favorable to these musings, and left him to plan his campaign in perfect quiet Whether the people of the inn regarded him as a great minister in disgrace come, by hard study, to retrieve a lost position, a man of science deeply immersed in some abstruse problem, or a distinguished author seeking isolation for the free exercise of his imagination, they treated him not only with great respect, but a sort of deference was shown in their studious effort to maintain the silence and stillness around. When he was supposed to be at his studies, not a voice was heard, not a footfall on the stairs. There is no such flattery to your man of scapes and accidents, your thorough adventurer, as that respectful observance that implies he is a person of condition. It is like giving of free will to the highwayman the purse he expected to have a fight for. Davis delighted in these marks of deference, and day by day grew more eager in exacting them.

"I heard some noise outside there this morning, Carl," said he to the waiter; "what was the meaning of it?" For a moment or two the waiter hesitated to explain; but after a little went on to speak of a stranger who had been a resident of the inn for some months back without ever paying his bill; the law, singularly enough, not giving the landlord the power of turning him adrift, but simply of ceasing to afford him sustenance, and waiting for some opportunity of his leaving the house to forbid his re-entering it. Davis was much amused at this curious piece of legislation, by which a moneyless guest could be starved out but not expelled, and put many questions as to the stranger, his age, appearance, and nation. All the waiter knew was that he was a venerable-looking man, portly, advanced in life, with specious manners, a soft voice, and a benevolent smile; as to his country, he could n't guess. He spoke several languages, and his German was, though peculiar, good enough to be a native's.

"But how does he live?" said Davis; "he must eat."

"There's the puzzle of it!" exclaimed Carl; "for a while he used to watch while I was serving a breakfast or a dinner, and sallying out of his room, which is at the end of the corridor, he 'd make off, sometimes with a cutlet,--perhaps a chicken,--now a plate of spinach, now an omelette, till, at last, I never ventured upstairs with the tray without some one to protect it. Not that even this always sufficed, for he was occasionally desperate, and actually seized a dish by force."

"Even these chances, taken at the best, would scarcely keep a man alive," said Davis.

"Nor would they; but we suspect he must have means of getting out at night and making a 'raid' over the country. We constantly hear of fowls carried off; cheese and fruit stolen. There he is now, creeping along the gallery. Listen! I have left some apples outside."

With a gesture to enforce caution, Davis arose, and placed a percussion-cap on a pistol, a motion of his hand sufficing to show that the weapon was not loaded.

"Open the door gently," said he; and the waiter, stealing over noiselessly, turned the handle. Scarcely had the door been drawn back, when Grog saw the figure of a man, and snapped off the pistol. At the same moment he sprang from the spot, and rushed out to the corridor. The stranger, to all seeming, was not even startled by the report, but was gravely occupied in examining his sleeve to see if he had been struck.

He lifted up his head, and Davis, with a start, cried out,--

"What, Paul!--Paul Classon! Is this possible!"

"Davis--old fellow!--do I see you here?" exclaimed the other, in a deep and mellow voice, utterly devoid of irritation or even excitement.

"Come in,--come in here, Paul," said Davis, taking him by the arm; and he led him within the room. "Little I suspected on whom I was playing this scurvy trick."

"It was not loaded," said the other, coolly.

"Of course not"

"I thought so," said he, with an easy smile; "they 've had so many devices to frighten me."

"Come, Paul, old fellow, pour yourself out a tumbler of that red wine, while I cut you some of this ham; we 'll have plenty of time for talk afterwards."

The stranger accepted the invitation, but without the slightest show of eagerness or haste. Nay, he unfolded his napkin leisurely, and fastened a corner in one buttonhole, as some old-fashioned epicures have a trick of doing. He held his glass, too, up to the light, to enjoy the rich color of the wine, and smacked his lips, as he tasted it, with the air of a connoisseur.

"A Burgundy, Davis, eh?" asked he, sipping again.

"I believe so. In truth, I know little about these wines."

"Oh, yes, a 'Pomard,' and very good of its kind. Too loaded, of course, for the time of year, except for such palates as England rears."

Davis had now covered his friend's plate with ham and capon, and, at last, was pleased to see him begin his breakfast.

We are not about to impose upon our reader the burden of knowing more of Mr. Classon than is requisite for the interests of our story; but while he eats the first regular meal he has tasted for two months and more, let us say a word or so about him. He was a clergyman, whose life had been one continued history of mischances. Occasionally the sun of prosperity would seem disposed to shine genially on his head; but for the most part his lot was to walk with dark and lowering skies above him.

[Illustration: 068]

If he held any preferment, it was to quarrel with his rector, his dean, or his bishop; to be cited before commissions, tried by surrogates, pronounced contumacious, suspended, and Heaven knows what else. He was everlastingly in litigation with churchwardens and parish authorities, discovering rights of which he was defrauded, and privileges of which he was deprived. None like him to ferret out Acts of Edward or Henry, and obsolete bequests of long-buried founders of this, that, or t'other, of which the present guardians were little better than pickpockets. Adverse decisions and penalties pressing on him, he grew libellous, he spoke, wrote, and published all manner of defamatory things, accused every one of peculation, fraud, and falsehood, and, as the spirit of attack strengthened in him by exercise, menaced this man with prosecution, and that with open exposure. Trials by law, and costs accumulated against him, and he was only out of jail here, to enter it again there. From the Courts "above" he soon descended to those "below;" he became dissipated and dissolute, his hireling pen scrupled at nothing, and he assailed anything or any one, to order. Magistrates "had him up" as the author of threatening letters or begging epistles. To-day he was the mock secretary of an imaginary charity; tomorrow he 'd appear as a distressed missionary going out to some island in the Pacific. He was eternally before the world, until the paragraph that spoke of him grew to be headed by the words, "The Reverend Paul Classon again!" or, more briefly, "Paul Classon's last!" His pen, all this while, was his sole subsistence; and what a bold sweep it took!--impeachment of Ministers, accusation of theft, forgery, intimation of even worse crimes against the highest names in the realm, startling announcements of statesmen bribed, ambassadors corrupted, pasquinades against bishops and judges, libellous stories of people in private life, prize fights, prophetic almanacs, mock missionary journals, stanzas to celebrate quack remedies,--even street ballads were amongst his literary efforts; while, personally, he presided at low singing-establishments, and was the president of innumerable societies in localities only known to the police. It was difficult to take up a newspaper without finding him either reported drunk and disorderly in the police-sheet, obstructing the thoroughfare by a crowd assembled to hear him, having refused to pay for his dinner or his bed, assaulted the landlady, or, crime of crimes, used intemperate language to "G 493." At last they got actually tired of trying him for begging, and imprisoning him for battery; the law was wearied out; but the world also had its patience exhausted, and Paul saw that he must conquer a new hemisphere. He came abroad.

What a changeful life was it now that he led,--at one time a tutor, at another a commissionaire for an hotel, a railway porter, a travelling servant, a police spy, the doorkeeper of a circus company, editor of an English journal, veterinary, language master, agent for patent medicines, picture-dealer, and companion to a nervous invalid, which, as Paul said, meant a furious maniac. There is no telling what he went through of debt and difficulty, till the police actually preferred passing him quietly over the frontier to following up with penalty so incurable an offender. In this way had he wandered about Europe for years, the terror of legations, the pestilence of charitable committees.

Contributions to enable the Rev. Paul Classon to redeem his clothes, his watch, his divinity library, to send him to England, to the Andes, to Africa, figured everywhere. I dare not say how often he had been rescued out of the lowest pit of despondency, or snatched like a brand from the burning; in fact, he lived in a pit, and was always on fire.

"I am delighted," said Davis, as he replenished his friend's plate,--"I am delighted to see that you have the same good, hearty appetite as of old, Paul."

"Ay, Kit," said he, with a gentle sigh, "the appetite has been more faithful than the dinner; on the same principle, perhaps, that the last people who desert us are our creditors!"

"I suspect you 've had rather a hard time of it," said Davis, compassionately.

"Well, not much to complain of,--not anything that one would call hardships," said Classon, as he pushed his plate from him and proceeded to light a cigar; "we 're all stragglers, Kit, that's the fact of it."

"I suppose it is; but it ain't very disagreeable to be a straggler with ten thousand a year."