my father and myself a lesson inunselfishness. God grant that our dear Guy comes back to us safe andsound."
CHAPTER EIGHT.
A tall, lean man of about sixty years of age, of dignified appearance,came out of a house in Fitzjohn's Avenue, Hampstead, and walked slowlyin the direction of the station at Swiss Cottage.
He was a very aristocratic-looking person; you might have taken him fora retired ambassador, except for the fact that retired ambassadors donot live in the neighbourhood of Finchley Road. At the first glance youmight have thought he was an Englishman, with his clear complexion, hisshort, pointed beard. A closer inspection revealed the distinguishingtraits of the foreigner. But even then you would have been inclined toput him down as a Frenchman, rather than a Spaniard.
Ferdinand Contraras, such was his name, was one of the principal leadersof the world-wide anarchist movement. A man of learning and education,he had worked it out to his own satisfaction that anarchy was the curefor all social evils. A man of considerable wealth, he had devoted thegreater portion of his possessions to the spreading of this particularpropaganda. His zeal in the great cause burnt him with a consumingfire.
One is confronted with these anomalies in all countries--men of familyand refinement, reaching out sincere hands to the proletariat, andwelcoming them into a common brotherhood.
Mirabeau led the French Revolution in its first steps, an aristocrat ofthe first water. Tolstoi, equally an aristocrat, preached verysubversive doctrines.
Ferdinand Contraras, from conviction, sentimentality, or some otherequally compelling motives, hated his own order, and devoted himselfheart and soul to the service of the masses as against the classes. Hehad spent much more than half his very considerable fortune on thenecessary propaganda of his principles. From the house in Fitzjohn'sAvenue he, in conjunction with a few other enthusiastic spirits,controlled the policy which was directed to upset an old and effeteworld and construct a new and perfect one on the ruins of the old.
He waited outside the station for quite five minutes, tapping his stickimpatiently the while. He was, by temperament, a very impatient andautocratic person, like most people who aspire to sovereign power.
The burly and imposing figure of Lucue appeared through the gloom of thestation. The two men shook hands. Contraras grumbled a little.
"My friend, punctuality was never your very special virtue. You were tobe at my house by a quarter-past six. It is now a quarter to seven,half an hour late, and I am meeting you at the station. It would takeanother five minutes to get to my house."
"That would mean I should be quite thirty-five minutes late, eh?"queried Lucue in his usual easy, genial fashion. He had the greatestrespect for the great leader, Ferdinand Contraras; he fully recognisedhis single-mindedness, his devotion to the cause. But he was also awareof his little weaknesses of temper, his proneness to take offence attrifles. "I am honestly very sorry I have kept you waiting, but it wasimpossible to get away before."
Lucue surveyed the neighbourhood around him with some contempt, andadded: "Besides, if you will live in an out-of-the-way spot like this,you can't blame your friends if they find it a bit difficult to get toyou."
Lucue himself lived in lodgings in a mean street in Soho. In spite ofhis reverence for his chief, he did not quite relish the fact thatContraras was living in a lordly pleasure house, that he fared every dayon the daintiest food, and was very particular as to vintages.Contraras, in spite of his sacrifices to the great cause, was notexactly practising what he preached.
Lucue himself was poor. Hence, perhaps, these profound meditations. Itwould not be going too far to say that Lucue was already anticipatingthe day when Contraras would be required, under the new dispensation, tohand over the remainder of his wealth for the common benefit.
But things had not got so far as this at the moment. Law and order werestill in the ascendant, and anarchy had not yet got its foot into thestirrup, much less was it mounted in the saddle.
The two men walked up to the house in Fitzjohn's Avenue, where Contraraslived in some sort of state. A butler opened the door, a footmanhovered in the background. There would be a dinner of many courses,there would be wines of the first quality. For the leader of the greatanarchist movement did himself and his friends very well. PoorContraras! He often failed to notice the envious eyes of his friends,the humble friends who left his hospitable house to return to theirdingy lodgings in Soho, or the mean streets off Tottenham Court Road.
He took Lucue into his private sitting-room. A decanter of whiskey,soda-water, and glasses were ready on the table, placed there by thethoughtful butler. In the best of all possible worlds there would be nobutlers thought Lucue grimly, as he helped himself at his host'sinvitation.
"What of Guy Rossett?" asked Contraras abruptly, when the two men wereseated. "He knows a great deal. He knows too much."
"My section is dealing with his affair," replied Lucue smoothly."Violet Hargrave and Andres Moreno are over in Spain, as of course youknow."
Contraras grunted. He was not in a very good mood to-night; he had notyet forgiven Lucue for his lack of punctuality.
"Violet Hargrave I know, of course, a friend and protegee of our staunchold comrade Jaques. Moreno I know nothing about. Who is he, what ishe?"
Lucue explained. Moreno was a journalist, his father pure Spanish, hismother an Englishwoman. His principles were sound. He was arevolutionary heart and soul.
Contraras was still in the grunting stage. He helped himself to anotherwhiskey.
"You are a judge of men, Lucue; you seldom make mistakes," he said, inrather a grudging voice.
"I don't quite like the idea of the English mother. You have thoughtthat all out?"
"Quite," was the swift reply. "Moreno comes to us with settledconvictions. He is, like yourself, a philosophical anarchist."
It certainly said a good deal for Moreno's powers of persuasion that hehad succeeded in convincing the suspicious Lucue of his sincerity.
The gong sounded for dinner. Contraras kept to his gentlemanly habits;his house was ordered in orthodox fashion. His wife, a faded-lookingwoman, who had once been a beauty, sat at the head of the table. Hisdaughter, a comely, dark-eyed girl, his only child, faced the guest.Neither wife nor daughter had the slightest sympathy with the peculiarviews of the head of the household. As a matter of fact, they thoughthe was just a trifle insane on this one particular point.
They detested the strange-looking men, some of them in very shabbyraiment, who came to this well-appointed house in Fitzjohn's Avenue, topartake of their chief's hospitality and drink his choice wines. Theymarvelled between themselves at the blindness of Contraras. Could henot see that these shabby creatures hated him for his wealth, for thehospitality which they regarded as a form of ostentation?
Several times both mother and daughter had tried to point this out tohim.
"Live in a little forty-pound-a-year house, without a maid, with Inezand me to scrub and cook, and they might believe in you," his wife hadremarked bitterly on one occasion when her nerves had been more thanusually upset by the intrusion of some very shabby looking guests. "Ofcourse, now they reckon you up at your true value. You are making thebest of the present order of things, getting the best you can out of it.Bah! What do you expect if your dreams come to pass? They will notleave you a sixpence, these wretches whom you have put into power. Theywill strip you at once."
The visionary had smiled condescendingly. He had a poor opinion of themental capacity of women. They had no initiative, no foresight.
But he was very tolerant to the weaker vessel. He patted the fadedcheek of his once beautiful wife, a daughter of the old Spanishnobility. He was a kind husband, a fond father.
"You do not understand these difficult matters, my dear," he replied inhis loftiest tones. "The world will always be governed by brains,whether under a just or an unjust regime." He tapped his broad foreheadsignificantly. "When it comes to brains, Ferdinand Contraras w
ill notbe found wanting."
Madame shrugged her shoulders and glanced at her pretty daughter, whomade a signal of assent. Certainly, Contraras, great as was his powerin anarchist circles, was not held in high esteem in his own family.
Towards Lucue the two women did not exhibit the same signs of aversionwhich they usually displayed to the other guests. The reason wasobvious. He was a self-seeking, grasping fellow. He loved theflesh-pots, the good things of life. If he got into power with hischief, they would take the best for themselves and let their poor dupesfeed on the husks. The difference between the two men was thatContraras was troubled with an almost ridiculous sentimentality. Lucue,big, genial, and humorous, was as callous as any human being could be.And he, moreover, had no conscience.
The meal was finished. Although in a way Lucue despised his chief'sostentatious mode of living, he was very fond of