CHAPTER V
A CONSPIRACY OF SCIENTISTS
Sir William Gouldesbrough had been up very late the night before. Hecame down from his room on a grey morning a fortnight after the day onwhich he had told Marjorie something of his hopes. It was nearly twelveo'clock. He had not retired to rest until four upon the same morning.And when he had at last left the great laboratories built out of theback of the house, he had stumbled up to his room, a man drunk with analmost incredible success--a success of detail so perfect and completethat his intelligence staggered before the supreme triumph of his hopes.
But the remaining portion of the night, or rather during the beginningof the chill wintry dawn, he had lain alone in his great Georgianbedroom, watching the grey light filtering into the room, flood byflood, until the dark became something more terrible, something filledwith vast moving shadows, with monstrous creatures which lurked in thecorners of the room, with strange half lights that went and came, andgave the wan mirrors of the wardrobe, of the mantel-shelf, a ghost-likelife only to withdraw, and then once more increase it.
And as this great and famous man lay in this vast lonely room withoutpower of sleep, two terrible emotions surged and throbbed withinhim,--two emotions in their intensity too great for one mind to hold.
One was the final and detailed triumph of all he held dear in the worldof science and in the department of his life's work. The other was theimminent and coming ruin of his heart's hope, and the love which hadcome to him, and which had seemed the most wonderful thing that lifecould give.
Yes, there he lay, a king of intellect, a veritable prince of the powersof the air, and all his triumph was but as dust and ashes andbitterness, because he knew that he was losing a smaller principalityperhaps, but one he held dearer than all his other possessions.
Emperor of the great grey continent of science, he must now resign hislordship of the little rosy principality of Love.
So, as he came down-stairs close upon mid-day of the winter's morning--atall distinguished figure in the long camel's-hair dressing-gown, withits suggestion of a monk's robe--the butler who was crossing the hallat the time was startled by the fixed pallor of his face.
The man went up to him.
"Excuse me, Sir William," he said, "but you're working too hard. You'renot well, sir. You mustn't overdo it. I have got you a sole andmushrooms for breakfast, sir, but I should not advise you to touch it,now I've seen you. If you'll allow me to offer my advice, I shouldsuggest a bowl of soup."
"Thank you, Delaine," Sir William answered. "But I don't think I couldeven take anything at present. Will you send my letters into the study?"
"Yes, Sir William," the man replied, "and I shall make so bold as tobring you a bowl of soup in half-an-hour, as well."
Gouldesbrough crossed the great gloomy hall and entered the study.
A bright fire was glowing on the hearth, the place was all dusted, tidyand cheerful, even though the world outside was a blank wall of fog.
He stood up in the middle of the room. Tall, columnar, with a greatdignity about him, had there been any one there to see. It was a dualdignity, the dignity of supreme success and the dignity of irremediablepain.
The butler came in with the letters upon a copper tray. There was agreat pile of them, and as the man closed the door after he put the trayupon the writing-table, Sir William began to deal the letters like apack of cards, throwing this and that one on the floor, with a shufflingmovement of the wrist, and as he did so his eyes were horrid in theirsearching and their intensity. At last he came to the one he sought. Aletter addressed to him in a bold but feminine handwriting. As hisfingers touched it a loud sob burst out into the silence of the room.With shaking fingers he tore it open, standing among the litter of theunopened letters, and began to read.
He read the letter right through, then walked to the mantel-piece,leaning his right arm upon it as if for support. But the tension was nowa little relaxed. He had come down to find the worst, to meet theinevitable. He had met it, and there was now neither premonition of themoment of realization nor the last and torturing flicker of despairinghope.
This was the letter. It began without preface or address--
"You must have known this was coming. Everything in your manner has shown me that you knew it was coming. And for that, unhappy as I am, I am glad. I have a terrible confession to make to you. But you who are so great, you who know the human mind from your great height, as a conquering general surveys a country from a mountain-top, you will understand. When you asked me to marry you and I said 'Yes,' I was pleased and flattered, and I had a tremendous admiration and respect for you and for all you have done. Then when we came to know each other, I began to see the human side of you, and I had, and if you will let me say so, still have, a real affection for you. And had it not been that something more powerful than affection has come into my life, I would have been a true and faithful wife and companion to you.
"But you have seen, and you must know, that things are changed. Are we not all subject to the laws of destiny, the laws of chance? Is it not true that none of us on our way through the world can say by whom or how we shall be caught up out of ourselves and changed into what we could not be before? Oh, you know it all. You of all men know it!
"I need not here speak in detailed words, because from things you have seen you know well enough what I am about to say, of whom I would speak if I could. But it is enough, William, to tell you what you already know. That I love some one else, and that if I am true to myself, which is after all the first _duty_ of all of us, I could never marry you. I can never be to you what you wish or what I would like to be as your wife. I am stricken down with the knowledge of the pain all this will give you, though, thank God, it is not a pain for which you are unprepared. I dare not ask your forgiveness, I can say nothing to console you. I have acted wickedly and wrongly, but I cannot do anything else but what I am doing.
"Forgive, if you can. Think kindly, if you can, of Marjorie."
Now he knew. He folded the letter gently, kissed it--an odd action for aman so strong--and put it in the inside pocket of his coat, whichpressed next his heart.
Then he rang the bell.
"Ask Mr. Guest to come," he said.
"Very well, Sir William," the butler answered, "but Mr. Charliewood hasjust arrived."
"Then ask him in," Gouldesbrough answered.
Charliewood came into the room.
"By Jove!" he said, "you look about as seedy as I've ever seen youlook!"
Sir William went up to him and put his hand upon his shoulder.
"Look here," he said, "I've had a smack in the face this morning,Charliewood. You know what it is, I need not tell you. And look here,too, I'm going to ask you to help me as you've never helped me before.I'm afraid, old fellow, I've often been a nuisance to you, and oftenrather rubbed in the fact that you owe me money, and that you've had todo things for me. Forgive me now, if you will. I'm going to call uponyou for active friendship."
"Oh," Charliewood answered, "we won't talk about friendship between youand me. I've done what I had to do and there's enough."
Sir William still held him by the shoulder. "You don't really feel that,Charliewood?" he said in a quiet voice, and as he did so the magnetismof his personality began to flow and flood upon the weaker man andinfluence him to kindliness.
"Well, well," he said, "what is it now? I suppose we've been runninground a vicious circle and we've come to the last lap?"
"That's just about it," Sir William answered. "Just let me say that thisis the last service I shall ever ask from you. I'll give you back allthe I.O.U.'s and things, and I'll give you enough money to put yourselfabsolutely right with the world, then we'll say good-bye."
Charliewood started. "That's awfully good of you," he said. "I don'tthink that I want to say good-bye. But still, what is it?"
"Rat
hbone," Sir William answered, pronouncing the name with markeddifficulty.
"It's all over then?" Charliewood answered.
"Yes."
"I thought it would be. I have told you all that has been going on, andI knew it would be."
"She's written to me this morning," Gouldesbrough said. "A kind letter,but a letter finishing it all."
Then the weaker, smaller man became, as so often happens in life, thetempter--the instrument which moves the lever of a man's career towardsthe dark sinister side of the dial.
Charliewood was touched and moved by the unexpected kindness in hispatron's voice.
"Don't say it's finished," he said; "nothing is finished for a man likeyou, with a man like me to help him. Of course it's not finished. Youhave not always been all you might to me, William, but I'll help younow. I'll do anything you want me to do. Buck up, old boy! You will passthe post first by a couple of lengths yet."
"How?"
"Well, what were you going to ask me to do?"
They looked each other in the face with glowing eyes and palecountenances, while a horrible excitement shone out upon them both.
At that moment the door opened very quietly, and an extraordinary personcame into the room.
He was a short, fat, youthful-looking man, with a large, pink, and quitehairless face. The face was extremely intelligent, noticeably so, but itwas streaked and furrowed with dissipation. It told the story not of theman who enjoyed the sensuous things of life in company, and as part of amerry progress towards the grave, but it betrayed the secret sot, thecunning sensualist private and at home.
This man was Mr. Guest, Sir William's faithful assistant in science, aman who had no initiative power, who could rarely invent a project ordiscover a scientific fact, but a man who, when once he was put upon thelines he ought to go, could follow them as the most intelligentsleuth-hound in the scientific world.
Wilson Guest was perhaps the greatest living physicist in Europe. He wasof inestimable value to his chief, and he was content to remain betweenthe high red-brick walls of the old house in Regent's Park, providedwith all he needed for his own amusements, and instigated to furthertriumphs under the aegis of his master.
"Well, what is it?" said this fat, youthful and rather horrible-lookingperson.
"We've come to grips of the great fact, Guest," Sir William answered,still with his hand upon Charliewood's shoulder.
The pink creature laughed a hollow and merciless laugh.
"I knew it would come to this," he said, "since you have added anotherinterest to your scientific interests, Gouldesbrough. Why have youcalled me in to a consultation?"
Gouldesbrough's whole face changed; it became malignant, the face of adevil.
"I'm going to win," he said. "I've had a knock-down blow, but I'm goingto get up and win still! Mr. Rathbone must disappear. That can be easilyarranged with the resources at our command."
Guest gave a horrible chuckle.
"And when we've got him?" he said.
"He must disappear for always," Gouldesbrough answered.
"Quite easy," Guest replied. "Quite easy, William. But, _not until we'vedone with him, shall he_?"
"What do you mean?"
"Why, isn't it the last condition of our experiments that we should havesome one a slave, a dead man to the world, to use as we shall think fit?Here's your man. Do what you like to him afterwards. Let's make yourrival a stepping-stone to your final success."
Then the three men looked at each other in fear.
Charliewood and Sir William Gouldesbrough were pale as linen, but theshort, fat man was pink still, and laughed and chuckled nervously.