...
II
I climbed the three dilapidated
flights of stairs, which I had so often climbed before, and knocked at
a small door at the end of the corridor. Mr. Wilde opened the door and
I walked in.
When he had double-locked the door
and pushed a heavy chest against it, he came and sat down beside me, peering
up into my face with his little light-colored eyes. Half a dozen new scratches
covered his nose and cheeks, and the silver wires which supported his artificial
ears had become displaced. I thought I had never seen him so hideously
fascinating. He had no ears. The artificial ones, which now stood out at
an angle from the fine wire, were his one weakness. They were made of wax
and painted a shell pink, but the rest of his face was yellow. He might
better have revelled in the luxury of some artificial fingers for his left
hand, which was absolutely fingerless, but it seemed to cause him no inconvenience,
and he was satisfied with his wax ears. He was very small, scarcely higher
than a child of ten, but his arms were magnificently developed, and his
thighs as thick as an athlete's. Still, the most remarkable thing about
Mr. Wilde was that a man of his marvellous intelligence and knowledge should
have such a head. It was flat and pointed, like the heads of many of those
unfortunates whom people imprison in asylums for the weak-minded. Many
called him insane but I knew him to be as sane as I was.
I do not deny that he was eccentric;
the mania he had for keeping that cat and teasing her until she flew at
his face like a demon, was certainly eccentric. I never could understand
why he kept the creature, nor what pleasure he found in shutting himself
up in his room with the surly, vicious beast. I remember once, glancing
up from the manuscript I was studying by the light of some tallow dips,
and seeing Mr. Wilde squatting motionless on his high chair, his eyes fairly
blazing with excitement, while the cat, which had risen from her place
before the stove, came creeping across the floor right at him. Before I
could move she flattened her belly to the ground, crouched, trembled, and
sprang into his face. Howling and foaming they rolled over and over on
the floor, scratching and clawing, until the cat screamed and fled under
the cabinet, and Mr. Wilde turned over on his back, his limbs contracting
and curling up like the legs of a dying spider. He was eccentric.
Mr. Wilde had climbed into his high
chair, and, after studying my face, picked up a dog's-eared ledger and
opened it.
"Henry B. Matthews," he read, "book-keeper
with Whysot Whysot and Company, dealers in church ornaments. Called April
3d. Reputation damaged on the race-track. Known as a welcher. Reputation
to be repaired by August 1st. Retainer Five Dollars." He turned the page
and ran his fingerless knuckles down the closely-written columns.
"P. Greene Dusenberry, Minister
of the Gospel, Fairbeach, New Jersey. Reputation damaged in the Bowery.
To be repaired as soon as possible. Retainer $100."
He coughed and added, "Called, April
6th."
"Then you are not in need of money,
Mr. Wilde," I inquired.
"Listen," he coughed again.
"Mrs. C. Hamilton Chester, of Chester
Park, New York City. Called April 7th. Reputation damaged at Dieppe, France.
To be repaired by October 1st. Retainer $500.
"Note.C. Hamilton Chester, Captain
U.S.S. 'Avalanche,' ordered home from South Seas Squadron October 1st."
"Well," I said, "the profession
of a Repairer of Reputations is lucrative."
His colorless eyes sought mine.
"I only wanted to demonstrate that I was correct. You said it was impossible
to succeed as a Repairer of Reputations; that even if I did succeed in
certain cases it would cost me more than I would gain by it. To-day I have
five hundred men in my employ, who are poorly paid, but who pursue the
work with an enthusiasm which possibly may be born of fear. These men enter
every shade and grade of society; some even are pillars of the most exclusive
social temples; others are the prop and pride of the financial world; still
others, hold undisputed sway among the 'Fancy and the Talent.' I choose
them at my leisure from those who reply to my advertisements. It is easy
enough, they are all cowards. I could treble the number in twenty days
if I wished. So you see, those who have in their keeping the reputations
of their fellow-citizens,
I have in my pay."
"They may turn on you," I suggested.
He rubbed his thumb over his cropped
ears, and adjusted the wax substitutes. "I think not," he murmured thoughtfully,
"I seldom have to apply the whip, and then only once. Besides they like
their wages."
"How do you apply the whip?" I demanded.
His face for a moment was awful
to look upon. His eyes dwindled to a pair of green sparks.
"I invite them to come and have
a little chat with me," he said in a soft voice.
A knock at the door interrupted
him, and his face resumed its amiable expression.
"Who is it?" he inquired.
"Mr. Steylette," was the answer.
"Come to-morrow," replied Mr. Wilde.
"Impossible," began the other, but
was silenced by a sort of bark from Mr. Wilde.
"Come to-morrow," he repeated.
We heard somebody move away from
the door and turn the corner by the stairway.
"Who is that?" I asked.
"Arnold Steylette, Owner and Editor
in Chief of the great New York daily."
He drummed on the ledger with his
fingerless hand adding: "I pay him very badly, but he thinks it a good
bargain."
"Arnold Steylette!" I repeated amazed.
"Yes," said Mr. Wilde with a self-satisfied
cough.
The cat, which had entered the room
as he spoke, hesitated, looked up at him and snarled. He climbed down from
the chair and squatting on the floor, took the creature into his arms and
caressed her. The cat ceased snarling and presently began a loud purring
which seemed to increase in timber as he stroked her.
"Where are the notes?" I asked.
He pointed to the table, and for the hundredth time I picked up the bundle
of manuscript entitled
"THE IMPERIAL DYNASTY OF AMERICA."
One by one I studied the well-worn
pages, worn only by my own handling, and although I knew all by heart,
from the beginning, "When from Carcosa, the Hyades, Hastur, and Aldebaran,"
to "Castaigne, Louis de Calvados, born December 19th, 1877," I read it
with an eager rapt attention, pausing to repeat parts of it aloud, and
dwelling especially on "Hildred de Calvados, first in succession," etc.,
etc.
When I finished, Mr. Wilde nodded
and coughed.
"Speaking of your legitimate ambition,"
he said, "how do Constance and Louis get along?"
"She loves him," I replied simply.
The cat on his knee suddenly turned
and struck at his eyes, and he flung her off and climbed on to the chair
opposite me.
"And Doctor Archer! But that's a
matter you can settle any time you wish," he added.
"Yes," I replied, "Doctor Archer
can wait, but it is time I saw my cousin Louis."
"It is time," he repeated. Then
he took another ledger from the table and ran over the leaves rapidly.
"We are now in communication with
ten thousand men," he muttered. "We can count on one hundred thousand within
the first twenty-eight hours, and in forty-eight hours the state will rise
en
masse. The country follows the state, and the portion that will not,
I mean California and the Northwest, might better never have been inhabited.
I shall not send them the Yellow Sign."
The blood rushed to my head, but
I only answered, "A new broom sweeps clean."
"The ambition of Cæsar and
of Napoleon pales before that which could not rest until it had seized
the minds of men and controlled even their unborn thoughts," said Mr. Wilde.
"You are speaking of the King in
Yellow," I groaned with a shudder.
"He is a king whom Emperors have
served."
"I am content to serve him," I replied.
Mr. Wilde sat rubbing his ears with
his crippled hand. "Perhaps Constance does not love him," he suggested.
I started to reply, but a sudden
burst of military music from the street below drowned my voice. The twentieth
dragoon regiment, formerly in garrison at Mount St. Vincent, was returning
from the manoeuvres in Westchester County, to its new barracks on East
Washington Square. It was my cousin's regiment. They were a fine lot of
fellows, in their pale-blue, tight-fitting jackets, jaunty busbys and white
riding breeches with the double yellow stripe, into which their limbs seemed
molded. Every other squadron was armed with lances, from the metal points
of which fluttered yellow and white pennons. The band passed, playing the
regimental march, then came the colonel and staff, the horses crowding
and trampling, while their heads bobbed in unison, and the pennons fluttered
from their lance points. The troopers, who rode with the beautiful English
seat, looked brown as berries from their bloodless campaign among the farms
of Westchester, and the music of their sabres against the stirrups, and
the jingle of spurs and carbines was delightful to me. I saw Louis riding
with his squadron. He was as handsome an officer as I have ever seen. Mr.
Wilde, who had mounted a chair by the window, saw him too, but said nothing.
Louis turned and looked straight at Hawberk's shop as he passed, and I
could see the flush on his brown cheeks. I think Constance must have been
at the window. When the troopers had clattered by, and the last pennons
vanished into South 5th Avenue, Mr. Wilde clambered out of his chair and
dragged the chest away from the door.
"Yes," he said, "it is time that
you saw your cousin Louis."
He unlocked the door and I picked
up my hat and stick and stepped into the corridor. The stairs were dark.
Groping about, I set my foot on something soft, which snarled and spit,
and I aimed a murderous blow at the cat, but my cane shivered to splinters
against the balustrade, and the beast scurried back into Mr. Wilde's room.
Passing Hawberk's door again I saw
him still at work on the armor, but I did not stop, and stepping out into
Bleecker Street, I followed it to Wooster, skirted the grounds of the Lethal
Chamber, and crossing Washington Park went straight to my rooms in the
Benedick. Here I lunched comfortably, read the Herald and the Meteor,
and finally went to the steel safe in my bedroom and set the time combination.
The three and three-quarter minutes which it is necessary to wait, while
the time lock is opening, are to me golden moments. From the instant I
set the combinations to the moment when I grasp the knobs and swing back
the solid steel doors, I live in an ecstacy of expectation. Those moments
must be like moments passed in Paradise. I know what I am to find at the
end of the time limit. I know what the massive safe holds secure for me,
for me alone, and the exquisite pleasure of waiting is hardly enhanced
when the safe opens and I lift, from its velvet crown, a diadem of purest
gold, blazing with diamonds. I do this every day, and yet the joy of waiting
and at last touching again the diadem, only seems to increase as the days
pass. It is a diadem fit for a King among kings, an Emperor among emperors.
The King in Yellow might scorn it, but it shall be worn by his royal servant.
I held it in my arms until the alarm
on the safe rang harshly, and then tenderly, proudly, I replaced it and
shut the steel doors. I walked slowly back into my study, which faces Washington
Square, and leaned on the window-sill. The afternoon sun poured into my
windows, and a gentle breeze stirred the branches of the elms and maples
in the park, now covered with buds and tender foliage. A flock of pigeons
circled about the tower of the Memorial Church; sometimes alighting on
the purple tiled roof, sometimes wheeling downward to the lotos fountain
in front of the marble arch. The gardeners were busy with the flower beds
around the fountain, and the freshly-turned earth smelled sweet and spicy.
A lawn mower, drawn by a fat white horse, clinked across the green sward,
and watering carts poured showers of spray over the asphalt drives. Around
the statue of Peter Stuyvesant, which in 1897 had replaced the monstrosity
supposed to represent Garibaldi, children played in the spring sunshine,
and nurse girls wheeled elaborate baby-carriages with a reckless disregard
for the pasty-faced occupants, which could probably be explained by the
presence of half a dozen trim dragoon troopers languidly lolling on the
benches. Through the trees, the Washington Memorial Arch glistened like
silver in the sunshine, and beyond, on the eastern extremity of the square
the gray stone barracks of the dragoons, and the white granite artillery
stables were alive with color and motion.
I looked at the Lethal Chamber on
the corner of the square opposite. A few curious people still lingered
about the gilded iron railing, but inside the grounds the paths were deserted.
I watched the fountains ripple and sparkle; the sparrows had already found
this new bathing nook, and the basins were crowded with the dusty-feathered
little things. Two or three peacocks picked their way across the lawns,
and a drab-colored pigeon sat so motionless on the arm of one of the Fates,
that it seemed to be a part of the sculptured stone.
As I was turning carelessly away,
a slight commotion in the group of curious loiters around the gates attracted
my attention. A young man had entered, and was advancing with nervous strides
along the gravel path which leads to the bronze doors of the Lethal Chamber.
He paused a moment before the Fates, and as he raised his head to those
three mysterious faces, the pigeon rose from its sculptured perch, circled
about for a few moments and flew to the east. The young man pressed his
hands to his face, and then with an undefinable gesture sprang up the marble
steps, the bronze doors closed behind him, and half an hour later the loiterers
slouched away, and the frightened pigeon returned to its perch in the arms
of Fate.
I put on my hat and went out into
the park for a little walk before dinner. As I crossed the central driveway
a group of officers passed, and one of them called out, "Hello, Hildred,"
and came back to shake hands with me. It was my Cousin Louis, who stood
smiling and tapping his spurred heels with his riding-whip.
"Just back from Westchester," he
said; "been doing the bucolic; milk and curds, you know, dairy-maids in
sunbonnets, who say 'haeow' and 'I don't think' when you tell them they
are pretty. I'm nearly dead for a square meal at Delmonico's. What's the
news?"
"There is none," I replied pleasantly.
"I saw you regiment coming in this morning."
"Did you? I didn't see you. Where
were you?"
"In Mr. Wilde's window."
"Oh, hell!" he began impatiently,
"that man is stark mad! I don't understand why you"
He saw how annoyed I felt by this
outburst, and begged my pardon.
"Really, old chap," he said, "I
don't mean to run down a man you like, but for the life of me I can't see
what the deuce you find in common with Mr. Wilde. He's not well-bred, to
put it generously; he's hideously deformed; his head is the head of a criminally
insane person. You know yourself he's been in an asylum"
"So have I," I interrupted calmly.
Louis looked startled and confused
for a moment, but recovered and slapped me heartily on the shoulder.
"You were completely cured," he
began, but I stopped him again.
"I suppose you mean that I was simply
acknowledged never to have been insane."
"Of course thatthat's what I meant,"
he laughed.
I disliked his laugh because I knew
it was forced, but I nodded gaily and asked him where he was going. Louis
looked after his brother officers who had now almost reached Broadway.
"We had intended to sample a Brunswick
cocktail, but to tell you the truth I was anxious for an excuse to go and
see Hawberk instead. Come along, I'll make you my excuse."
We found Hawberk, neatly attired
in a fresh spring suit, standing at the door of his shop and sniffing the
air.
"I had just decided to take Constance
for a little stroll before dinner," he replied to the impetuous volley
of questions from Louis. "We thought of walking on the park terrace along
the North River."
At that moment Constance appeared
and grew pale and rosy by turns as Louis bent over her small gloved fingers.
I tried to excuse myself, alleging an engagement up-town, but Louis and
Constance would not listen, and I saw I was expected to remain and engage
old Hawberk's attention. After all it would be just as well if I kept my
eye on Louis, I thought, and when they hailed a Spring Street horsecar,
I got in after them and took my seat beside the armorer.
The beautiful line of parks and
granite terraces overlooking the wharves along the North River, which were
built in 1910 and finished in the autumn of 1917, had become one of the
most popular promenades in the metropolis. They extended from the battery
to 190th Street, overlooking the noble river and affording a fine view
of the Jersey shore and the Highlands opposite. Cafés and restaurants
were scattered here and there among the trees, and twice a week military
bands from the garrison played in the kiosques on the parapets.
We sat down in the sunshine on the
bench at the foot of the equestrian statue of General Sheridan. Constance
tipped her sunshade to shield her eyes, and she and Louis began to murmuring
conversation which was impossible to catch. Old Hawberk, leaning on his
ivory-headed cane, lighted an excellent cigar, the mate to which I politely
refused, and smiled at vacancy. The sun hung low above the Staten Island
woods, and the bay was dyed with golden hues reflected from the sun-warmed
sails of the shipping in the harbor.
Brigs, schooners, yachts, clumsy
ferry-boats, their decks swarming with people, railroad transports carrying
lines of brown, blue and white freight cars, stately sound steamers, declassé
tramp steamers, coasters, dredgers, scows, and everywhere pervading the
entire bay impudent little tugs puffing and whistling officiously;these
were the crafts which churned the sunlit waters as far as the eye could
reach. In calm contrast to the hurry of sailing vessel and steamer a silent
fleet of white warships lay motionless in midstream.
Constance's merry laugh aroused
me from my reverie.
"What are you staring at?"
she inquired.
"Nothingthe fleet," I smiled.
Then Louis told us what the vessels
were, pointing out each by its relative position to the old Red Fort on
Governor's Island.
"That little cigar-shaped thing
is a torpedo boat," he explained; "there are four more lying close together.
They are the 'Tarpon,' the 'Falcon,' and 'Sea Fox' and the 'Octopus.' The
gun-boats just above are the 'Princeton,' the 'Champlain,' the 'Still Water'
and the 'Erie.' Next to them lie the cruiser "Farragut' and 'Los Angeles,'
and above them the battle-ships 'California' and 'Dakota,' and the 'Washington'
which is the flag-ship. Those two squatty-looking chunks of metal which
are anchored there off Castle William are the double-turreted monitors
'Terrible' and 'Magnificent'; behind them lies the ram, 'Osceola.'"
Constance looked at him with deep
approval in her beautiful eyes. "What loads of things you know for a soldier,"
she said, and we all joined in the laugh which followed.
Presently, Louis rose with a nod
to us and offered his arm to Constance, and they strolled away along the
river wall. Hawberk watched them for a moment and then turned to me.
"Mr. Wilde was right," he said.
"I have found the missing tassets and left cuissard of the 'Prince's Emblazoned,'
in a vile old junk garret in Pell Street."
"998?" I inquired, with a smile.
"Yes."
"Mr. Wilde is a very intelligent
man," I observed.
"I want to give him the credit of
this most important discovery," continued Hawberk. "And I intend it shall
be known that his is entitled to the fame for it."
"He won't thank you for that," I
answered sharply; "please say nothing about it."
"Do you what it is worth?" said
Hawberk.
"No, fifty dollars. perhaps."
"It is valued at five hundred, but
the owner of the 'Prince's Emblazoned' will give two thousand dollars to
the person who completes his suit; that reward also belongs to Mr. Wilde."
"He doesn't want it! He refuses
it!" I answered angrily. "What do you know about Mr. Wilde? He doesn't
need the money. He is richor will bericher than any living man except myself.
What will we care for money thenwhat will we care, he and I, whenwhen"
"When what?" demanded Hawberk, astonished.
"You will see," I replied, on my
guard again.
He looked at me narrowly, much as
Doctor Archer used to, and I knew he thought I was mentally unsound. Perhaps
it was fortunate for him that he did not use the word lunatic just them.
"No," I replied to his unspoken
thought, "I am not mentally weak; my mind is as healthy as Mr. Wilde's.
I do not care to explain just yet what I have on hand, but it is an investment
which will pay more than mere gold, silver and precious stones. It will
secure the happiness and prosperity of a continentyes, a hemisphere!"
"Oh," said Hawberk.
"And eventually," I continued more
quietly, "it will secure the happiness of the whole world."
"And incidentally your own happiness
and prosperity as well as Mr. Wilde's?"
"Exactly," I smiled. But I could
have throttled him for taking that tone.
He looked at me in silence for a
while and then said very gently, "Why don't you give up your books and
studies, Mr. Castaigne, and take a tramp among the mountains somewhere
or other? You used to be fond of fishing. Take a cast or two at the trout
in the Rangelys."
"I don't care for fishing any more,"
I answered, without a shade of annoyance in my voice.
"You used to be fond of everything,"
he continued; "athletics, yachting, shooting, riding"
"I have never cared to ride since
my fall," I said quietly.
"Ah, yes, your fall," he repeated,
looking away from me.
I thought this nonsense had gone
far enough, so I turned the conversation back to Mr. Wilde; but he was
scanning my face again in a manner highly offensive to me.
"Mr. Wilde," he repeated, "do you
know what he did this afternoon? He came downstairs and nailed a sign over
the hall door next to mine; it read:
MR. WILDE
REPAIRER OF REPUTATIONS.
3d Bell,
Do you know what a Repairer of Reputations
can be?"
"I do," I replied, suppressing the
rage within.
"Oh," he said again.
Louis and Constance came strolling
by and stopped to ask if we would join them. Hawberk looked at his watch.
At the same moment a puff of smoke shot from the casemates of Castle William,
and the boom of the sunset gun rolled across the water and was re-echoed
from the Highlands opposite. The flag came running down from the flag-pole,
the bugles sounded on the white decks of the warships, and the first electric
light sparkled out from the Jersey shore.
As I turned into the city with Hawberk
I heard Constance murmur something to Louis which I did not understand;
but Louis whispered "My darling," in reply; and again, walking ahead with
Hawberk through the square I heard a murmur of "sweetheart," and "my own
Constance," and I knew the time had nearly arrived when i should speak
of important matters with my Cousin Louis.
End of PART TWO..... GO TO PART
THREE..... 
