Lady Méchante

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LADY MÉCHANTE

BEING CERTAIN PRECIOUS PHASES IN THE CAREER OF A NAUGHTY NONPAREILLE— A FARCE

By Gelett Burgess

II

It was not long before Mrs. Florizelle Gaillarde's prestige had flooded the crepuscular sub-world of extra-ritualistic functions; for, among that Submerged Tenth, her skill and daring, combined with the compulsion of her ardent nature and lambent temperament, would have insured her leadership even if she had not had the handicap of Leopold's connection with the profession. She had no need, then, to begin with Shoreditch or the Newington Causeway, and, though she was known and feared at the "Elephant and Castle," her fame jumped boldly into the secret councils of Soho. In the empire of Crime and Adventure women have larger rights and lesser privileges, so she threw off the insistence of chivalry; she was no longer over-sexed, she had become an Economic Factor, taking her place as an equal.

London, indeed, soon began to hear of Lady Méchante, as she had predicted. She fitted modern methods to modern needs, and, not content with harassing the better known districts of Society, she became an explorer, and laid her tribute upon new territories. Her ablest accomplice in this work was Guy Bounder, who, though a child compared with her, in the field of invention, was familiar with the machinery of the profession, having kept in touch with affairs while she was rusting in the aristocracy.

But, though it is not of these industries that our tale is concerned, let us mention some of her more important departures. First among these came her innovations in the scandal market; she replaced the private detective in important divorce proceedings, and became a purveyor of sensation to the more lurid journals. Her skill in breaking and entering gave her marvelous proficiency and usefulness to her clients, but by reason of her intimate familiarity with the classes, she was enabled to select and obtain what ordinary thieves would hardly have noticed. She did, it is true, pick up a rare first edition here and a particularly attractive etching there, but this was mere by-play.

Prominent in her mind, too, was always the possibility of a literary career when she should settle down to a demure old age. She began to keep a journal, descriptions of famous persons she had met, hints of place and environment. These sketches, to be sure, had to be done by half light, but she linked herself to the Impressionists and the Symbolistic School, and found ample material for such nuances. From these hints of Memoir and Reminiscence her fancy flew to more picturesque heights. Now she visited the habitations of the literati, and "lifted" manuscript in bulk. Before long her private writing-room was stored with all that was best of the literature, not of to-day, but of to-morrow, carefully classified and indexed, gauged, too, for publication at the right moment, so as to forestall charges of plagiarism. For a time she dallied with these tasks herself, but the work became too strenuous, and a corps of writers was installed in the little house on Mayfair street, and nearly every day saw a book of poems, essays, a novel, biography or what-not sent to the publisher, to appear shortly with the name of Florizelle Gaillarde upon the back. What she could not use was disposed of at absurd prices to the tertiary authors, and the Bureau of Plagiarism thrived and increased. Reputation was, in this way, divided more equally; like Robin Hood, she took only from those who had fame to spare, and conferred it upon the poor but deserving.

Yet, in spite of these activities, and too many more to describe, she lacked Adventure of proper quality to satisfy her multiplex necessities. Guy Bounder and her lesser associates she saw as through the wrong end of the opera glass—small, sharply set in a wonder-world of insignificant emotions, delicately colored, but cold and unreal. After all, they were no more worth while than her five o'clock frock-coats. They were indurated; the crust of their professionalism could be broken into by no pang of novelty, nor by the stabs with which the mad-hearted little Florizelle sought to pierce their calm.

Still, she knew that there were men worth while knowing, and if they attended neither the ordeals of Belgravia nor the occult processes in Soho, she must find them out at home. What use was her marvelous capacity if she must be balked of such glorious booty as the acquaintance with an Entertaining Man? A lively appetite for originality grew into a hunger unbearable, and from that to an intellectual starvation. Such was her London. It has been many another's.

She was lunching at Dieudonné's one day, saucing her duck with such reflections, when a gentleman entered who probed her curiosity to the quick. Here, she thought, is one of the three interesting men in London. The unknown seated himself near her table and proceeded to give evidences of taste and originality. His judgment of the menu was of a hair-trigger accuracy and swiftness; his order was sharp without being hurried, and his treatment of the waiter and the waiter's treatment of him exhibited patently the importance of the guest, both to the community and to himself. Lady Méchante could not help contrasting such individuality with Guy Bounder's nonentical rule-of-thumb savoir faire. Guy, too, had a rabbit lip, with the chin of a lizard; he had a rush of teeth to the mouth, and yet she spent her time with him and his commonplaces when she might have been collecting such patrons as this genius for her clientèle. Surely she had lost much time!

She gave the word to her groom, then, upon leaving, and an hour later received the information that the man was a Mr. Saul Edam, living at No. 67 Knightsbridge, and that he carried on business as an East India warehouseman in the city. The last item was a shock to her, yet the attraction of his personality drew her, and she persuaded herself of his worth by many feminine excuses. That very night, indeed, she set out; she was not one to linger long while her egg cooled.

"I will do him the honor of robbing him with my own hands," she said to herself, "and, incidentally, I will find out what manner of man it is who has hands like that and who wears a brown that is at least six weeks in advance of the mode!"

Lady Méchante, like Love, laughed at locksmiths, but, unlike Love, she was by no means blind. Yet, for the first time in her life, she bungled. She entered and threaded her way through the house with dexterity, giving a quick glance here and there as to the importance or value of the mental furnishings of the place. Try as she might, however, there was little trace of any secret that could be made worth her time or trouble. The man's life was absurdly blameless, she estimated—there was hardly ten shillings' worth of blackmail from cellar to garret. It was, after all, a house for the rank and file of sneak-thieves, surely no place for a lady. Still, she dared not go till she had taken a look through the secretary in the library.

A few old love letters, yes; and she smiled at their uncompromising character. The man's life must, she thought, have been singularly dull. It would be a charity to write a note and leave it here for him, perhaps, and she was feeling for a pen when a noise behind her turned her head. Mr. Edam had entered, and his face wore an unaccustomed look of surprise. It was evident that he was unused to entertaining ladies in his rooms; he was even ungallant enough to exhibit his displeasure.

"What, in heaven's name, does this mean, madam? And by what right are you ransacking my desk at this hour of the night?"

"Pray don't disturb yourself; I have just finished," said Lady Méchante, drawing on her gloves. "I was just picking up a few trifles, but I assure you that I have found nothing of value. I won't trouble you longer—really, I must be moving. But that old scarab seal there, yes, I might take that. Thank you, good-night!" She turned as she passed him: "Poor, dear man! You are bored, aren't you? Now, I know of a lady who is so good at that sort of thing. Really, she does it very well indeed!"

"Who and what are you?" Mr. Edam insisted. "Am I to take you for a common burglar? How did you enter my house?"

"Pat-à-'tie, pat-à-ta!" mocked Florizelle. "In a moment I shall be annoyed, and then I shall never, never come again! I came in by the window—we modern Englishwomen are agile. A burglar, yes—a common burglar, no! My word, sir, do I look it?" And she ran up to the mirror.

"You are young for this business, my dear," said Edam, who could not help but be charmed by the lady's manners. "But think what this means—at your age, too!" Lady Méchante blew him a kiss. "You a thief! God help me! I can hardly believe my eyes!"

"Oh, I beg you not to inflict your Nonconformist morality upon me at this hour," she answered. "What, then, is your honesty—you, a city merchant? You buy, it is true, but you sell for more than you gave, cheating your victim out of one or two hundred per cent. What more do I? I take, here and there, what I can find, and I sell it again at an insignificant advance; think of the risks, too, should I fall in with those who are not gentlemen!" She gave him a searching glance, which embarrassed him visibly. "No, no, I believe you honorable, Mr. Edam; I do not accuse you. You believe in competition. You know that honesty is an outworn policy in your business. It has as little place in mine. I know, too, that you play the stock market; you are, in short, a gambler. Well, then, you prefer chance, and I, skill. Yet I had fancied you might understand—that you might appreciate the compliment I paid you. Never mind. You may yet regret your treatment of Lady Méchante. And now, sir, though I am far from angry, there is nothing I desire so much as a way to the door. I have a shattered ideal to nurse. It is very late. Yes, the tips of my fingers only. Well, perhaps we may yet be friends. Good-night!" She ran down stairs lightly and was into her brougham before Saul Edam could pursue.

Disastrous as was this sentimental experiment, she could not help confessing, whimsically, to Guy Bounder, who heard the tale with a lowering brow. "Oh, I say!" he interrupted. "You'd better steer clear of Johnnies like that, you know! It was all right when you were in the swim, but business is business, now, and I don't like it." The vital point of the episode had, as usual, utterly failed him, and Florizelle sighed.

Yet she was only twenty-three, youth was still bubbling in the glass of life, and she coaxed her illusion back to convalescence. From many pleasing hints and anecdotes the name of Sir Seton Maldivers, Q.C., became known to her as an advocate of unusual astuteness. In all her life she had not met a barrister. A few phrases of his lodged in her mind. He had a way with men and children. He was a woman-hater, to boot, and this alone was enough to pay for the trip to St. John's Wood. Up she went, then, and in she got by way of a parlor casement. She hoped he would be at home, for she was minded to steal a glimpse of his profile. There was an odor of good tobacco in the house as she tripped up stairs. She laid hand upon the door whence it proceeded most plainly, and walked in boldly. She was bound, this time, to put the matter to the touch without preliminary skirmish.

Sir Seton Maldivers was reading, but he rose hurriedly as she entered. "I beg pardon, "he exclaimed; "really, I had not heard you announced; you know, you quite surprised me!"

"It is close upon three in the morning," Florizelle returned, "and I had not thought it worth while to disturb the servants."

"But I don't quite understand—" began the baronet.

"I shall try to make it easier for you," said the lady. "Fancy, for the instant, that you are back in the days of Romance. Your book, yes, as I thought—Anthony Hope—that simplifies matters. Let us proceed, then, en règle. I come in the guise of a highwayman, by burglarious entry; I ask you to stand and deliver. Your ideas, then, or your life! I need not say I am desperate. Thank your stars that I am also beautiful. You are indeed fortunate, and this relief should be a pleasure. But I am in haste. What ideas, thoughts, fancies, quips, jests, conceits, inventions, judgments, theories, speculations, notions, opinions, beliefs, sentiments, or what not you have, you must make over, for I must fill my head before morning breaks. I prefer a marketable commodity, surely, yet I shall not stick for commerce. Speak, then, if you dare answer a hot-headed woman! I am in no mood to wait while you consult the encyclopedia! Understand, my dear sir, if you please, you are being bullied. I am prepared to use force!"

"My dear Miss Rigmarole," cried the barrister, "I pray that you attempt to calm yourself. I will ring for attendance; surely you are distraught! Just a minute, and my maid2"

The little lady whipped out a revolver and presented it at his head. "Must I be more explicit?" she said. "Do you imagine that because I can gossip I shall not face death if necessary? I have not touched your property, as yet, but pray do not found too high a conception of my scruples upon that restraint. I am of the criminal class, I assure you, and though I have neither a low, receding forehead nor the unsymmetrical stigmata of the mattoid, yet I am bad enough, in a way, as the world judges. Are you a man, then, or a mouse?"

"Are you a woman or a devil?" retorted the barrister.

Lady Méchante dropped the end of her weapon. "The retort courteous," she mused. "He may do."

In an instant she was disembarrassed of the pistol, and found herself violently seated upon a lounge. The tête-à-tête had become intense.

"By your eye, you are mad!" said Sir Seton, "and I shall take immediate steps for your apprehension."

The lady forced a laugh. "Oh, no; never mind. My apprehension is satisfactory to me." She opened her chatelaine and displayed several instruments, the use of which is unmistakably illegal. "Here; I may convince you, at least, of my sanity."

"Heavens! How came you to this pitch of corruption?" said the other.

"Mere enthusiasm," asserted the lady, lightly. "Much as you have attained your own eminence in the law. I mean, however, I have been misinformed as to your conversational brilliancy. Yet I object to your substantive. Corruption is an unpleasant term; it is horridly suggestive of physical decay."

"Yet you acknowledge that you have chosen a career cf vice," the baronet said, still feeling her with his two eyes. "Have you no conscience, then, madam, that you so prostitute your intellect in such an infamous pursuit?"

"Enough of such Philistinism. I am sick of such conventional minded obloquy! You dare speak to me of conscience, of infamous pursuits—you, who trade in professional hypocrisy? You, sir, are a criminal advocate; it is your business to defend or to prosecute, as your retainer bids; to shut your eyes to the verities and attempt to close others' vision. What are you but a licensed liar? It is the same to you whether you are keeping a criminal from his just deserts or stretching the neck of an innocent father whose little ones shall cast his blood upon your head! Sac-à-papier!My trade is open and holy beside yours. I pit my craft against organized society, and take all chances. Even you know me by name and by fame. I am Lady Méchante, the heroine of ten thousand actionable works of art and genius!"

With that she turned and left him. At the door she stopped and turned to him, as an actress pauses at the wings before the customary stage exit. "I shall not come again," she said; "I shall not come again!" Her veil was tied, her gloves buttoned; she ducked her head and threw her- self out of the doorway, leaving the baronet wiping his eyeglasses nervously.

"My word, you surprise me," said Guy Bounder, when he heard of the exploit. "But I say, you know, you don't want to go and make gyme of a toff like Sir Seton, blimy, or I'm fair to split! Why, he's the larst charnst, he is. Some day we'll be needing him, maybe. What's the use of being so cocky? Why, Sir Seton is by way of being the best criminal advocate in the city, and we're like to need him any time, s'help me! My word, it'll take a bit of doing to get you off, Florrie, when you're pulled!" Guy's fortunes had fallen to a low ebb, and his manners usually kept them company.

Such remonstrances, however, failed to dampen Mrs. Gaillarde's enthusiasm. Nor, indeed, did a series of unsuccessful attempts at nocturnal adventure during the ensuing season. She flitted here and there, breaking and entering, and now and again, as her moods grew more reckless, she hazarded interviews with her patrons. She confined her attentions to gentlemen whose birth and repute promised the greatest intellectual satisfaction, and she became a polite register of the town's bachelordom and . Many a youth awakened at two in the morning to find a beautiful woman, masked, but attired in tune with the latest cry, sitting in his favorite armchair, smoking a perfumed cigarette, waiting for him to compose his wits for the colloquy. She ranged wide with such as were fit opponents, touching religion, conduct, art, fashion and sport, working delicately along the lines of least resistance.

How few there were, however, worth her while! From Mayfair to St. John's Wood, from St. James's to Chelsea and Bayswater, she followed every clue, and the legend of Lady Méchante arose and flew from club to club and from pub to pub. Last night she had visited young Barnegat, the Australian millionaire, at his rooms in Duke street; last week she had fascinated Lord George Cobhouse, and he had chased her half-way across Kensington Gardens in his pajamas before her grooms had caught him and beaten him blue. To-night wagers had been laid on Blankinsop, the American plunger, and men walked the streets about Cavendish Square, hoping for a sight of the green brougham. Gentlemen of fashion began to leave their house doors unlocked and their watches prominently displayed to net this butterfly. Her mots were retailed at afternoon functions; the women of the innermost circles conspired together to put a stop to the innovator. The man who had last received Lady Méchante was the popular hero until the next was chosen; and before long it came to pass that there were false witnesses enough for a dozen duels. No one, as yet, had seen her face; no one had touched her lips. With all her prominence in the arena of gossip, scandal had not wounded her; there were too many men-about-town infatuated with Lady Méchante to make that safe.

III

There was a time when Guy Bounder had kept up a dummy residence in Jermyn street and built from that a flimsy fabric of fashionable prestige. It was at Madame Qui-Vive's, indeed, that Mrs. Gaillarde first encountered him after her re-entrance into Society, but Mr. Bounder's presence there would hardly bear investigation. There are paid, as well as paying guests, at the functions of the beau monde. That had been Guy Bounder's unique appearance at the Hotel Qui-Vive.

For a while the magnificent successes of Lady Méchante enabled her partner to keep up the Jermyn street apartments upon a still more solid basis than before, and Guy found his professional connections with Society by day gave him many advantages, which he was not slow to use by night. The partnership flourished for a while, but my Lady Méchante's fantastic taste for originality and the spicery of genius led her steadily away from those industries Guy himself considered most remunerative. The weekly accountings grew smaller and smaller, and, not to put too fine a point to his sufferings, four months later found Guy Bounder installed permanently in rooms on the Queen's Road, Chelsea, opposite the Royal Hospital, a seedy, plucked thing of questionable antecedents and suspicious habits. He at his perihelion was no Adonis, but in this phase of disrespectability his weakness betrayed itself in face, form and gesture as he sat at his tiny window and thought of the recidivation of his associate.

At the rare intervals when he was permitted to see Mrs. Gaillarde, he was, of course, unable to give voice to his reproaches. Florizelle was too gay and irresponsible for that; she had but to crook a little finger and he melted into a canine submission and sentimentality. She twittered and laughed away his disappointment, and yet he lacked the stamina to break with her directly—to plunge alone into manly enterprises of his own and reinstate himself in the profession and at the secret councils of the Fraternity. Lady Méchante had long since begun to neglect the conspiracies of Soho, and was in open revolt, playing her own part in the town as a free lance, and reporting to no central authority, claiming no vote in the tribunal. Guy feared for her. She was already suspected, but he had defended her as well as his standing permitted; he had no suspicion yet of any cardinal lapse from the primitive morality of the clique. If such a mouse can love, he loved Florizelle, and love can accomplish marvels. His passion was in a fair way soon to make a man of him. A drop of jealousy in that sweet solution would at any moment turn it to a mordant acid.

He was sitting indolently at his window one day, watching the daily pavement quarrel, whose actors were usually recruited from Paradise Alley across the street, when a green brougham came into the road from Tite street and drew up at the curb. From this alighted something in veil and lace and fashionable frippery—woman or angel, he guessed—and, as the crowd made way for her, she pushed open the iron gate of the tiny garden and rapped at the knocker with a gusto that rattled the windows. It was not two minutes before a flutter outside his door told him the honor was to be his, and, after a summons to the door, Mrs. Gaillarde entered to him, borne up from below on a wave of curiosity visible and audible from his landlady, her father, daughter and the slavey who whispered and peeped on the second landing. Mr. Bounder welcomed his caller with surprise, stuffed a wad of paper into the key-hole and showed the lady a seat.

"Oh, Guy!" she commenced, casting a lively eye over the dingy chamber, "what a dear, funny little room!"

"It's all o' that," said Guy, "at eight-and-six a week in advance, and sixpence a scuttle for coals. It's beastly funny, ain't it? Want to tyke a room here?"

"Poor old Guy," the visitor murmured. "Are you strapped again, boy?"

"Strapped ain't wot it is—I'm bust, Florry! I've winked me jerry, I've popped me topper, and I've hung up me waistcoats, and I've done in every last flash at Uncle Jacob's. I ain't got chalk fer a 'arf-pint o' bitter at the Six Bells. I'm a vag, I am."

"My word!" cried the little lady, drawing out her handkerchief, a lace bit, a two-guinea affair from New Bond street, and wiping a tear from her lid. "Aren't you doing any jobs now?"

"I ain't got the nerve without you, Florry, blimy if I have! I ain't bust a 'ouse since you give me the sneak. Strike me blue if I won't be carryin' the flag in another week! I've got down to w'istlin' up 'ansoms fer the toffs and cab-duckin', I have. An' you flashin' abart in brooms, s'help me! Christmas! I feel as mean as a dyin' duck in a thunderstorm, Florry. But I ain't tried to touch you, old girl, 'ave I? Not for a half-crown, I ain't. I'll do time first!"

"Poor old Guy! Think of the good jobs we've been in together! How I have neglected you! But that's all right, Guy; I've been busy myself."

"Busy at wot, I'd like to arst? I've heard o' Lady Meshant's doin's abart town, Florry, an' I ain't winked. I kin trust you fer a pal, old girl, cos I know yer stryte, but wot's the little gyme? Ain't it time to let me in?"

"Never mind my affairs in the past," replied Mrs. Gaillarde, "but I've a 'pony' for you now, for the luck's turned. Yes, a 'monkey,' if you like, and you fit. See here: how much are you in for with your landlady?"

Bounder took out a roll of greasy sheets from an empty tobacco jar. "I don't do much eatin'," he mumbled. "I get sevenpence-ha'penny breakfasts, wich means tea like paynt, an' a 'orrid egg with two slabs o' toast to it, and mangy butter. There's fourteen bob four a week fer six weeks, is two pun six, an' I ain't give the slavey a tanner sinct I come. Oh, I'm a high Willy, I am!"

"Here, take this for the present," said Lady Méchante, handing over a pair of ten-pound notes. "There's more to come when you've got your clothes out of pawn. I hope you haven't forgotten how to speak English, though, Guy; you're no use to me on the 'other side of the water.' I don't do much business in Battersea or the New Cut nowadays."

"My dear Mrs. Gaillarde," protested Mr. Bounder, with emphasis, "you will find that when you leave cards like this with me, Guy Forsythe Bounder, Esquire, is always at home. I can learn more English from a Bank of England note in four minutes than from all the pawntickets on the Old King's Road, I assure you. I am by way of being a creature of environment. Contact with the purlieus of Paradise Alley gilds one, in a way, with a manner. I take on color. From this moment I am all West End. When I wear varnished boots I promise you that everything else shall correspond. I shall tub daily while this munificence lasts, and I forswear Shag for Egyptian Deities forthwith."

"Here, take one," cried Mrs. Gaillarde, merrily, producing an enameled cigarette case. "I confess your room reeks. Now you are rehabilitated, you surely must notice it. Matches?" she added, and she shook the box as she passed it. "And now to business, for I see my carriage is creating an excitement in the neighborhood, and there are goings and comings on the stair. You can still do my bidding without unnecessary curiosity as to my motives?"

"Madam, I am your champion again," Mr. Bounder protested. "In our profession the days of chivalry have never died."

"Let us call it nights of chivalry, to be more precise. I have need of you."

"Otherwise you would not be here," said Bounder, sadly.

"No, no; not that exactly," she replied. "But that is beside the mark You have mentioned my green brougham. I am sincerely sorry to find it has become so conspicuous. Yet I may as well use the advertisement. I propose to use it, then, henceforth as a decoy; that is, if you will be my duck." And Mrs. Gaillarde leaned toward him semi-affectionately.

Such demonstrations always made Mr. Bounder nervous. Like most men, he preferred to make his own advances, and grew embarrassed when forced to play up to such trumps. There was, indeed, more difficulty in Lady Méchante's leniency than in her reserve, so her demeanor sobered him. He rose awkwardly.

"What do you mean?" he stammered.

Mrs. Gaillarde laughed wickedly, knowing her hold over him was so sure. "This, if I must put it into words of one syllable," she said. "I propose to ransack the town while you play ducks and drakes with these silly men. You take my brougham and my mask and entertain my friends. I assure you I have a wide acquaintance, and your entries will be easy. Meanwhile, I have my part to play, which need not concern you."

"What shall I say?" cried Mr. Bounder, pitifully. "I've heard the talk on the Row, and I know you've been up to some game with the Johnnies; but, my word! I don't see myself sitting in men's chambers in an evening gown, prattling Ascot and Goodwood at three in the morning! I'm out for the oof, Florry. Business is business. I don't complain, mind you. I know you're straight, as I said, and I don't pretend to fathom your tricks. If I didn't trust you, you know I have only to put them on to you at Soho Square."

"Sac-à-papier!" cried Mrs. Gaillarde. "Do I understand you to threaten me? Do you know I am Lady Méchante? I could undo the Burglars' Central Committee in ten minutes. Man, I am in with the Privy Council, to the last Lord! I needn't mention the Prince—you may have heard."

"That's all gammon, Florry; but I said I was sure of you. Still, business is business, too," he repeated.

"Well, you won't complain. See here: that chatelaine I found on the dressing-table of—well, never mind whom. It was laid there for me. It's a Queen Anne, too. Charlie Northbrooke—you know Charley? Dear boy! It's a pity he hasn't brains! Why, he leaves ten-pound notes about, with poems on the back. No trick, either, for they cash all right. Why, you stupid, you have only to take a Gladstone bag and pick the swag everywhere you go. You'll find they're fond of me. I've been offered twenty guineas to drop my mask. The town's wild over me! You can make a thousand a week!"