False Coin or True?

Front matter

SEVENTH EDITION. INTO THE HIGHWAYS and HEDGES In crown 8vo., cloth gilt 6/-. A FEW PRESS OPINIONS. Academy. "This book is so admirably conceived and written that Mr. Mon trSsor's next venture must excite unusual interest." Speaker. " This book will undoubtedly rank high amongst the notable novels of 1 895." Athenæum. "Whoever wrote 'Into the Highways and Hedges,' wrote no common novel. A touch of idealism, of nobility of thought and purpose, mingled with an air of reality and well-chosen expression, are the most notable features of a book that has not the ordinary defects of such qualities. With all its elevation of utterance and spirituality of outlook and insight it is wonderfully free from overstrained or exaggerated matter, and it has glimpses of humour. Most of the characters are vivid, yet there is restraint and sobriety in their treatment."

Daily Telegraph. "This exceptionally noble and stirring book. Recounted with un flagging verve and vigour, we unhesitatingly say that it has hardly a dull or superfluous page." New Age. "A remarkably strong novel. I often thought of George Eliot when reading this book, which I advise every one to read." {Katherine Tynan.) Manchester Courier. "Mr. Montr£sor's next book will be eagerly awaited by all those who make the acquaintance of his first, for a more strikingly original or a stronger novel has not appeared for some time." World. "'Into the Highways and Hedges' would have been a remarkable work of fiction at any time; it is phenomenal at this, for it is neither trivial, eccentric, coarse, nor pretentious, but the opposite of all these, and a very fine and lofty conception. The man is wonderfully drawn, realised with a masterly completeness, and the woman is worthy of him.

The whole of the story is admirably conceived and sustained. A wonderful book." Glasgow Herald. "'This is a remarkable and powerful book, which is likely to leave a strong impression of itself upon every intelligent reader. One of the most interesting novels that one has seen for some time." Manchester Guardian. "The characters are conceived strongly. Since the days of Dinah Morris there has not, perhaps, been quite so successful a portrait of a man or woman consumed by the passion of humanity. The dialogue throughout the book is excellent." London: HUTCHINSON & CO., 34, Paternoster Row. FOURTH EDITION. THE ONE WHO LOOKED ON. In crown 8vo., cloth gilt 3/6. A FEW PRESS OPINIONS. World. "The author of 'Into the Highways and Hedges' does more than fulfil the promise and sustain the reputation of that work by the story she gives us in 'The One Who Looked On'.

Chapter I. Linda

(she did not possess a surname) was born in a workhouse. When she had attained fourteen years she was sent as " general," which means maid-of-all-work, to Mrs. Swainson, who kept a second-rate lodging-house in a back street in Bristol. Linda was undersized for her age, and rather childish, and Mrs. Swainson pronounced her a simpleton. Her small thin face acquired a very hunted look after a month's service; and she was overworked and underfed to a degree that no other " general " had ever stood. Mrs. Swainson averred that she kept the child out of charity; but, possibly, economy had also something to say in the matter. It never occurred to Linda to complain, or to try to get a better place. On the contrary, she was terribly afraid of being given notice to quit, and was sure that no one else would ever I Urue? 2 take her.

She had no spirit of adventure or independence; her undeveloped virtues were all of the submissive kind. She was meant to be gentle and affectionate; she was low-spirited and timid. From morning till night Linda lived in an atmosphere of hurry and dirt and scolding; and, she supposed, if she ever consciously reflected on the subject, that life must be " like that" for girls who had no father to speak of, and " who hadn't ought to have been born at all. " Nevertheless she had her own consolations. Dame Nature, at least, is no stepmother; she manages to provide all her children with toys somehow: clean ones if she can; if she can't, why then, whatever she can find. She has been vilified by some for this very practice; she has been called very odd names; but she is too strong for us; we get little by abusing her.

By the time we have learnt all her lessons perhaps the millennium will have come. Whenever Linda could scrape together a few coppers she bought a cheap novelette and a candle. She lighted her candle when the other lights were out, and so long as it and the story lasted, she was happy. The novels were trashy jfalse Coin or Urue? 3 and melodramatic, mainly about transcendently lovely countesses, and exceedingly villainous villains ! The little maid, sitting up in her bare garret, gloated over them. I can see her while I write, with her eyes growing brighter, and her thin shoulders shaking with cold and excitement, while her flame burns lower. Her knob of hair is screwed up with a hairpin, which she presently pulls out, in order to poke the candle up to a last effort. She will suffer for her dissipations.

She will come down to her work, at five o'clock to-morrow, with blue patches under her eyes, and a bad headache. She is a very silly little girl, but then — what can you expect? She was born with a taste for sugar, like the rest of us, and the only form she can get it in is cheap and nasty. Of course there were weeks when she could by no possibility afford either light or literature ; and then she missed the excitement, much as her more fortunate sisters miss balls when the London season is over. It was during one of these times of dearth that Monsieur Moreze visited Bristol. Monsieur Moreze was a public character. His placards, in huge red type, wound in serffalse Cofn or Œrue ? 4 pentine coils up the lamp posts, and blazed in the shop windows at least three days before he arrived. "The Great Wizard is coming!"

"The Mighty Magician of the West is expected! Secure your seats at once, lest you be too late ! " There was actually an evangelical flavour about the wording of the last advertisement. It reminded Linda of a religious tract that had once been given to her in the street. Mrs. Swainson's lodgers were uninteresting as a rule; but life became decidedly more exciting when the conjuror took the first-floor rooms. Linda could not hope to admire him in his glory at the Town Hall. I doubt whether, during her sixteen years, it had ever struck any one that she could want a treat; but, at least, she might see him off the boards. A conjuror at home would hardly cause a thrill to the majority of us, but to Linda the best parlour became an abode of mystery at this time. Monsieur Moreze reached Bristol in the after noon; he had an hour or two to spare before he was due at the hall.

In spite of his magic, he did not guess that he was being observed with awe and reverence through the keyhole. 3false Coin or Œrue? 5 Linda knelt on the landing with her forehead pressed hard against the door of his room. I fear she was not in the least ashamed of her position! Mrs. Swainson frequently made use of that convenient aperture, and Linda did not consider that there was any harm in spying. The conjuror sat in front of the coke fire in the one comfortable chair that the house possessed. He was a spare, olive-complexioned Frenchman, no longer in his first youth. His hair and moustache were black ; his eyelids were very full and drooped slightly, giving the impression that his watchful eyes were half-shut. He was lithe and deft in all his movements and very restless. His stillness, like that of a cat before it springs, seemed to denote concentration of energy rather than repose.

He took up some letters that had awaited his arrival, and glanced through them carelessly till he came to the last, which he read with evident anger and surprise. The man was dramatic even when he supposed himself to be alone. " Sacr6 ! Cannot do without you ! / cannot do without you? But it makes me laugh, this impertinence," he muttered. " Absolutely refuse Urue? to appear, unless adequately remunerated ! Ah ! but you never spelt those long words yourself, my angel. Good, good! You shall be paid what you deserve for this, but yes, to the last farthing ! " He crumpled the letter viciously in his slender brown fingers, and tossed it into the fire. The diamond ring on his hand glittered. Not all the jewellers' shops in the High Street had impressed Linda so much. She could not understand what he said, for he spoke in his own language.

She did not even wish to understand ; she had no vulgar curiosity as to why he was so angry. She was attracted by mystery pure and simple. The glamour of the supernatural fascinated her, as it does most women; as, no doubt, it fascinated Mother Eve in the garden long ago. Monsieur Moreze sprang to his feet, and walked up and down, still giving vent to angry ejaculations. " The mean trick ! To disappoint the public ! And she is advertised for the day after to-morrow. There is not time to get another. She thinks she can force me to give way to her. But no ! Not for a night ! not even for a minute. We will see who can stand Œrue? 7 alone best, my dear. You shall have leisure to repent in." " Linda ! Linda ! Wherever has that girl got to? What are you about up there? Oh, you bad, idle, little good-for-nothing !

Peeping through the gentleman's keyhole, and me work ing my legs off. You sly workhouse brat ! You " The angry voice, which had burst out suddenly on the landing, died away in the distance, to the sound of hurrying footsteps. The con juror opened the door, and looked down the passage; then picked up the key and put it in the lock, with a short laugh. " Evidently one must beware of this Mademoiselle Linda," he said. His anger cooled after this interruption, and, presently, he put on his dress clothes, and sent for his supper. He had seldom seen a more draggled and untidy lodging-house slave than the girl who brought it to him. At eight o'clock he left the house for the Town Hall, and Linda was sent up again to clear away. Mrs. Swainson had gone to the conjuring — Monsieur Moreze having presented her with tickets — and the " general " was left XCrue? 8 single-handed.

She was anxious to get through arrears of work, and to wipe out the remem brance of her late delinquencies. She piled up the plates and dishes and beer-jug on the tray, topped them with the candle, and made a valiant, if somewhat rash, effort to lift everything at once. The tray was too heavy for her. She might, however, have carried it as far as the landing had she not unluckily trodden on a bit of orange-peel. Her foot slipped and, in the instinctive effort to save herself, her grasp relaxed, the tray went down with a crash, knocking over the insecure little lodging-house table in its fall. Linda stood aghast in the middle of broken crockery, and a mingled stream of beer, coffee, and gravy. She was absolutely overcome with horror at the amount of mischief she had done. She pinched herself, in the futile hope that this might turn out to be a bad dream ; then shivered and sobbed helplessly ; suffering far more from dread of the disclosure that must be made on the morrow at latest, than she had ever suffered from any scolding in course of administration.

She had never before broken so much as a cup or a plate; but that only made matters worse, Tftue? 9 for it left the consequences entirely dependent on her over vivid imagination. What would her mistress do? If she were sent away where could she possibly go ? How terrible it would be to wander about starving and lost all day and all night! She would never dare to go back to the "House." The Committee had found a place for her, had given her good advice, and had done with her. She could not face it again. The very porter would " look so " at her ; besides, she never could ring the high bell. She sat down on the floor and cried. Her head had been aching all day and she had a sharp pain between her shoulders and through her chest. Perhaps it was partly ill-health that made her so helpless and forlorn.

It is so very much easier to be brave when one has habitually enough to eat. Linda sobbed till the clock, striking nine, roused her. Then she got up slowly, and gathering the broken china together, carried it upstairs, and hid it under her bed. The evidences of her mishap thus disposed of, she went about the rest of her work with as deep a feeling of guilt and depression as if she had committed a murder, and had concealed the victim's body. Zvne ? 10 It was ten o'clock before she had finished all the " washing up " that had to be got through ; but she could not sleep even when she, at last, lay down. She was hot and restless, and she became possessed with a feverish desire to go and look at the scene of her misfortune. Had she picked up that overturned table? She could not remember doing so.

What would happen if the conjuror came back to find all his pos sessions on the floor? He would ring for Mrs. Swainson, and Mrs. Swainson would call " Linda." It would all come out ! Oh, she could not bear to be sent away to-night! She must put that table straight at once. She got up, dressed quickly, and went down again. It was later than she thought, and the conjuror was at that moment ascending the stairs. Monsieur Moreze had had a success that evening. He was elated and triumphant. The audience had been spell-bound, and the hall had been crammed. " Helene" would see that he could do very well without her ! He smiled when he thought of her. His passion had evaporated, though not his malice. He paused when he reached the door of his room; his quick ear caught the sound of some one moving ffalse Coin or Œrue? 11 stealthily.

He entered without noise, and stood unseen in the room, which was in darkness, save for the glimpses of light from Linda's candle — watching. Linda had picked up the overturned table, and, with shaking hands, was replacing the things that had fallen. Monsieur Moreze's narrow black eyes — eyes that noticed a good deal from between their half-closed lids — saw that the girl had been crying, and that she was trembling and white. A loosely tied parcel lay on the floor; the string that held it gave way when Linda took hold of it. The glittering contents of the paper fell out in a golden shower ! The little drudge stood transfixed with surprise. Sovereigns! Sovereigns by the hundred ! The conjuror, standing in his corner, laughed under his breath (a better man might have sighed) when he saw her slip a coin into her pocket after a moment's evident hesitation.

Of course, they were sham sovereigns — palpably sham ! — with a portrait of the magician stamped on one side ! Monsieur Moreze had in tended to distribute them among the children at the Town Hall, but had left them behind by accident. Gruel 12 They were not worth so much as a penny, much less a stain on the girl's conscience. Linda silenced that inconvenient monitor with the plea, which was true enough, that she would not have stolen from a poor man. Monsieur Moreze had so many pounds to spare ; Monsieur Moreze could coin gold out of blank space. Was there not a picture of him doing so ? So surely he would not grudge her this one little bit out of all his wealth, even were he to know that she had taken it. It meant so much to her, so easy a way out of the terrors that beset her. To him it could not matter at all.

She could buy a new pie-dish and beer-jug before the breakage should be discovered, and She felt a hand on her shoulder, turned suddenly with a gasp of fright, and saw Monsieur Moreze close at her elbow! There was a mocking smile on his lips, and his curious eyes were looking through and through her. All the little fallacies about the innocence of stealing from a rich man melted. Linda tried to speak, and could not. The room seemed to be spinning round and round, the TErue? 13 floor gave way under her, and she fell at the conjuror's feet in a dead faint. It is not too much to say that for once Monsieur Moreze was considerably dismayed at his success. He had meant to startle the child ; he had felt amused at the situation, while he stood an unsuspected spectator of her temptation and defeat, but he had not meant the shock to be so serious as all this !

He had had no idea that she would actually swoon with fear; he had even some feeling of compunction. He carried the girl to the window, and flung up the sash. When Linda came to herself the cool night wind was blowing through the room, making her candle gutter wildly ; and her face and hands were wet with the water the conjuror had dashed over her. " Mon Dieu ! but you were a little imbecile," said he. "See now, I do not eat girls. Not even when dey steal my properties and peep trou my keyhole. Get up ! You are quite well now, without doubt, and you had better go quickly to your bed, where you ought to have been dese many hours ago. Come, we will not remember what has happened. Ah, c'est 9a, c'est tres bien," giving her his hand. jfalse Coin or Grue? 14 Linda stood up, looking rather dazed still.

Never before in her life had she fainted, so that she was not quite sure what had occurred to her. " You are not in de least e'll now, hein ? " said the Frenchman, with cheerful decision. " Run up quick before ainy one else catches you ! " And she obeyed him. Monsieur Moreze watched her mount the stairs safely; then turned back to his room with an expressive shrug of his shoulders. "That child will end in the river," he said to himself. " She is just the kind that despairs. She would make a good medium. It is a pity I startled her so." And then his mind reverted to more interesting affairs, and he thought no more of that episode. But Linda shivered and burnt by turns in her attic, and whenever she shut her eyes, she felt as if some one were standing close by her; and when she crept down to her work in the morning, she looked so ill that even Mrs. Swainson was anxious, and began to wonder whether she had not better get rid of the girl before she was " laid up on her hands.

" jfalse Coin or Grue? 15 Of course the broken china was discovered during the day, and I think — though Linda was far too simple to guess it — that a hacking cough and white cheeks had quite as much to do with Mrs. Swainson's moral indignation as anything else. Linda made no attempt to defend her self, and when her mistress further accused her of "having been up to no good last evening," she looked so terribly guilty that the woman's suspicions were really aroused. It had been quite a chance shot, but it had evidently hit the mark ! Mrs. Swainson never rested till she had first got a confession out of Linda and then put her own construction on it. Her own construction was startling. Linda had had no idea how wicked she had been! The girl was absolutely crushed, and what self-respect she possessed was torn to shreds.

She did not venture to remonstrate when she was told to pack out of the house at once. She just rolled her few clothes into a bundle and made ready to go — anywhere. Monsieur Moreze, who was putting his things into his portmanteau, heard the landlady storm ing, and, albeit he was not particularly soft hearted, was rather sorry for the victim. He Urue? was just about to ring for his bill and depart when he heard some one touch the handle of his door. "Enter, enter," he cried impatiently. An uncertain or " fidgety " movement always irri tated him. He flung the door wide open with a jerk. The maid-of-all-work was standing out side. She did not start this time. Her big soft eyes met his with a tragic look in them. The reflection that the fast fading sunset threw on her face was the only colour she had.

She stretched out her palm with the sovereign on it without a word. " Ah ! you has found it will not pass, eh ! " he said, with a laugh, but she did not understand him, and the moment he had spoken he saw she did not. "I do not want it! It ees worth not half a farthing, and I have bags full. Why did you bring it back?" " Sir, " she stammered, " you knew I took it last night, but you did not tell, and the money doesn't matter no more ; it wouldn't keep me long anyhow, and I shan't get another place with no character, and I shan't try. I don't care what becomes of me." The despair in the high young voice was the despair of a child rather than of a woman. Urue? 17 The man wondered for a moment whether she had the faintest idea of what in all proba bility she roould become. It was not his affair but yet " Have you any money in your pocket?" he asked, sharply.

Linda shook her head. " Why for does Madame turn you out? Hein?" But she made no answer. "Where will you go now — for dis night?" "I don't know," said Linda, "and it doesn't matter to no one." She turned away, and left him without another word. It did not occur to her to ask his help ; there was even a touch of childish dignity in her last words. His sharp curiosity had made her draw back. Monsieur Moreze considered for a second, then he followed the girl to the end of the passage and checked her. " Stop, " he said. " Leesen a minute to me. Look now, you are not clever enough to make it pay to be bad. You would alwayes sell your soul for sham coin, I tink. But" (interrupting himself) " she does not know in the least what I mean. Mon Dieu ! how greatly ees Monsieur le Diable in debt to de respectable Christian who sends such children into the streets !

See ! time? 18 you do not know where to go. I will tell you. Come with me to London ; we will try ees you do not make a vary good medium. Ah, you comprehend not what dat will mean? N'importe. It ees I who has to understand. For you, I will pay you — Mais non! I will see what you are worth first, and afterwards I will tink what I will pay. In any case I will not starve you ; and you will sleep to-night under a roof. Ees it yes or no? Vite! Dere ees no more time to lose. My train does not wait. Come, I am not so bad a master. It ees yes?" His rapid speech and quick gestures bewild ered Linda. She was silent for a minute. Then she looked straight at him with candid eyes that had still the innocence of childhood in them. "Had I better say 'Yes'?" she said. "If you think I had better, then I will, sir. There ain't nobody else to advise me.

I'll go by what you say. Had I better?" The conjuror pulled his moustache thoughtfully ; his eager flow of words ceased. " Eh bien," he said at last, " But yes. Upon my soul, mon enfant, I do tink you had better." He went downstairs, and Linda followed him. Œtue? 19 Mrs. Swainson stood in the hall flushed and belligerent, for Monsieur Moreze had not yet paid his bill, and she foresaw a fight over it. It was a preposterous bill, but, as she volubly explained, she respected the "Lord's day," and a lodger who smoked and slept all the Sabbath morning, and who insisted on a hot supper (which kept her from chapel) must expect to pay for such " goings-on. " It was a matter of conscience. " She couldn't feel it right not to charge extra for Sunday service." Monsieur Moreze smiled politely and shrugged his shoulders up to his ears, "Ah, pour cela — when we do get to conscience, den you are beyond me."

He turned and looked at the little general, who was close at his heels, and again at the landlady, " You see, Madame, I do mean to take dis girl with me; go on, get into de cab, Linda." The girl did as she was bid at once. Obe dience came naturally to her. Mrs. Swainson drew herself up, and sniffed contemptuously. " How old is she ? " he asked. "I'm a respectable woman, sir," cried the landlady, " and always 'ave been. I don't wish Œrue? 20 to demean myself by conversation about such as her. Nor to 'ave it said as /countenanced your doings." "Ah — ah. You do know very Ieetle about me, except dat I am a foreigner and do not keep de Sabbath, and de child ees vary simple and you has a conscience, hein? You feel responsible for her? Dere ees yet time. You may has her back ees you will? You will take care of her and let her rest for a few days.

She wants feeding and " " Responsible ! I ain't responsible. She's nothing to me. I took her out of charity," cried the woman. " I don't want to hear nothing about it — but as to that extra 'alf crown, sir — seeing I was kept from chapel and " "I will gif you a shilling," said the con juror. "I do tink dat your conscience charges too high! For de chapel — I has a Ieetle superstition left. It seems perhaps safer outside. Le bon Dieu may be alive — after all. You do call Him de father for de fatherless, n'est-ce pas? Ah, and suppose He leestens and de roof falls? So you'll let de girl go, hein?" The woman stared blankly at him. She saw no connection whatever between " chapel services" Grue? 21 and the child she had cast off, but she had a vague idea that the Frenchman was blaspheming. "As bad a man as ever I saw," she said afterwards.

"He made my flesh creep with his wickedness. Like to like! It shows what that sly baggage really was, that she 'ave took up with 'im. Fancy now, his being afeard to go inside a chapel. Depend on it, he's done something awful ! " And she talked over her lodger's possible iniquities till bedtime — when she slept the sleep of the just.

Chapter II. It

was seven o'clock when Monsieur Moreze reached London. There was little time to spare. He had made up his mind while the train dashed along; he would play to win, and he would play boldly. He got into a hansom at Charing Cross. Linda sat by his side, speechless and very pale. It is difficult to say of what she had been thinking during that unpremeditated journey; for, like a child, she felt rather than consciously reflected, and could not have translated her sensations into words. They stopped at the entrance to a narrow street, connecting two thoroughfares. There was barely room to drive along this alley — for it was little more — so the conjuror took the girl's hand in his, and walked. The tall houses, with their uncurtained windows, towered on each side of the way, grimed Œrue? 23 with the smoke of years, full, from garret to cellar.

The gas jets flared cheerfully over piles of second-hand furniture, and dog-eared prints, and beflowered crockery, all massed together, in a manner tempting to the seeker of second hand bargains, who hopes always to find a pearl of price in the oyster heap. Those queer old shops drove a fast trade, and Aaron Schonenwetter, at whose door Monsieur Moreze paused, had handed ready money over the counter for many a fine lady's diamonds. To Aaron's house one had to descend two steps from the footway, and a tall man would have had to stoop in order to pass through the doorway; once inside, however, a stranger would be surprised at the size of the shop, which took in the whole depth of the house. A huge old fashioned chandelier, dusty and unused, hung from the ceiling, but the room was lighted by a flaring gas jet.