There was a shout of applause from all.
Dora drew back with a sigh of relief.
"I never saw anything like that," said the landlord of the Hanover to Oscar Leigh, with the Negro in his mind.
"Nor I," said Oscar Leigh, "anything like it," having the girl opposite in his mind. "Pray excuse me!" He crossed the road, and placed himself on the curb within a couple of paces of where she stood, and stared at her furtively with unbelieving eyes.
CHAPTER VIII
THE JUGGLER'S LAST FEAT
After the shout of applause this time fell a little shower of coppers. The Negro, with as much rapidity as he had before shown deliberateness, placed the heavier stone on the piece of board and shot it still further behind him by the force of the mere muscles of his jaws.
"He's about done now," said the landlord of the Hanover to the air. Leigh was no longer near, and no one else within hail seemed worthy of a prosperous licensed victualler's speech outside his own bar and house. Inside the portals he was a publican, outside he was a private being with individual existence, rights and tastes, an impressively large waistcoat and watch-chain to match, and an opinion of himself out of all proportion with even his waistcoat or watch-chain. When half a man is concealed from you behind a counter, his individuality can never impress you nearly so much as when he stands forth disenthralled from sole to crown. The ordinary man glides into his most private aspect when he slips behind the door of his own home; the publican when he emerges from his house.
The Negro now took up the two stones and placing the less on the greater and the greater on the white ledge of wood jerked them both together over his head, as easily as he had thrown the light one by itself.
Then he made a gesture for silence. All the spectators were more than attentive, all except Oscar Leigh, who with the air of one in a trance of perplexity and wonder stole glances at the exquisite line of the girl's cheek and forehead; no more of her face could be seen from his position. She was bent forward and breathless with excitement. She had often seen feats of strength and dexterity before, many more wonderful than Sam's; but she had never until now stood in the arena with the performer. The propinquity was fascinating, the presence horrible, the situation novel, exciting, confounding.
Black Sam drew the two stones towards him with his huge unhandsome feet, and stooped down, holding the piece of wood still in his mouth. He moved his feet a little this way, a little that, selecting their final resting place with care. He passed the cubes back between his legs and, setting one on the other, sat on the upper of the two, looked up and expanding his chest drew a full breath. The people could not now take their gaze off him if they tried. Still Oscar Leigh had no eyes for him. He watched the girl as though his life, the fate of his soul, depended on not losing sight of her for an instant. "She must have seen me, and yet she does not notice me! Are her presence here and her indifference to my presence the result of magic-of real magic, not charlatan tricks?" he thought.
Black Sam lifted his body a couple of inches, resting his entire weight on his feet then passing his hands back he slid them under the lower cube, and raised both hands from the ground, the lower cube resting on the palms. With back bent like a bow he thrust out his head, holding the piece of board in his mouth parallel to the horizon, then he swung his body, first forward, then backward, and with a prodigious effort and violent thrust of his arms and head between his legs, threw the two cubes up into the air, straightened himself like a flash, stepped back a pace and, still holding the piece of white board in his enormous mouth parallel to the horizon, caught the two cubes on it as they fell.
There was a loud cry of exultation. Hanbury forgot the girl by his side, forgot everything but the black man and his feat and shouted:
"Well done by-, Nigger!"
Dora started as though she had been stung. She had more horror of an oath than of a serpent or a blow. She had never heard one so near her before. The words men utter with no thought behind them beyond the desire for emphasis had to her a meaning, not only a meaning through the reason but through the imagination. When she heard the oath her imagination became filled with the spectacle of an august and outraged Presence. Profanity was more horrible to her than almost any other crime. It was a deliberate impiety, a daring and blasphemous insolence.
Hanbury became conscious of the girl's presence by her abrupt withdrawal of her hand from his arm. He turned his eyes, flashing with admiration of the Negro's dexterity and strength. "Wasn't that good?" he asked Dora joyously.
She looked bewildered, and glanced hastily round as though seeking a way of escape. She opened her mouth to speak, but no word came.
"What is it?" he asked in alarm. "Are you not well, Dora?"
"Oh, Jack, how dreadful! You terrify me!"
"I-I-I," he cried swiftly, and in sore and sudden perplexity and dismay. He had shouted out the oath without consciousness that he spoke. In a moment his words came back upon his ears and he recollected her dread. He flushed with confusion and remorse. "Oh, Dora, I beg your pardon, I am miserably ashamed of myself. There is no excuse for me; it was the act of a blackguard-worse still, Dora, of a cad. Pray, pray forgive me."
"I-I am frightened now," she said turning pale and swaying slightly to and fro. She looked at the entrance to Welbeck Place; it was by this time choked up with a dense crowd of people watching the performance.
"Would you like to go away dear? You look ill. Oh, pray forgive me! What I said was forced from me by the excitement of the moment. It was only the result of a bad habit. There was no meaning in my words."
She began to recover her equanimity. To force a way through that crowd would be very disagreeable to her. She replaced her hand on Hanbury's arm saying: "No. Let us stay and see this out. I am all right again. I am very foolish, Jack. Try to forgive me, Jack."
"Forgive you, my darling! Forgive you for what? The only thing I can't forgive you for is tolerating a beast like me."
"Hush, Jack! Don't speak of it again. I am quite well now, and you are the dearest Jack in the world, only don't say that dreadful thing any more, it makes me quite ill. It may be silly, but I cannot help myself. What is the Negro going to do now? Look!"
"I don't know. I don't care. I only care for you, about you, and here I have distressed you, shocked you. It is horrible. You feared to stay lest the Nigger should use strong language, and now it is I, your protector, who offends against good manners and good morals, and outrages your ears!" He had drawn her close to him by the hand that lay on his arm and was pouring his words in a low voice into her ears, his eyes blazing with earnestness, his face working with solicitude and remorse.
"There, Jack, it is all over and forgiven long ago. If you want to please me, let the matter rest. I am much interested in the performance. I never saw anything like it before. Tell me what he is doing now? I cannot make out. What does he mean by throwing himself down in that way and lying still? What are the people laughing at? Is he ill? Is he hurt? Why doesn't someone go to him? What do these foolish people mean by laughing? The man is hurt? Look, look! They cannot see. They are all in front of him. Look there! What is that oozing under his face? Go, see, help him, Jack. Look under his face on the ground! That is Blood!"
John Hanbury did not move. He too had seen something was wrong. He too saw the swelling pool of bright scarlet blood under the black face of the Negro now lying at full length. Still, he did not move. He had grown deadly pale and cold and limp. His head felt light, the colour faded out of objects, and everything became a white and watery blue. The light shivered and then grew faint and far away. Sounds waxed thin, attenuated, confused.
"I can't go, Dora. I am not well. I always faint at the sight of blood," and he staggered back, dragging her with him until he leaned against the blank wall of Forbes's bakery. She disengaged her arm from his, and sought to support him with both her hands. His legs suddenly bent under him, and he slipped from her grasp and fell with legs thrust out across the flagway, and back drooping sideway and forward partly supported by the wall.
At that moment Oscar Leigh stepped back from his post on the curb, and uncovering his head, bowed lowly to Dora, and said: "I beg your pardon. Will you allow me to assist you?"
In her haste, confusion, anxiety, Dora glanced but casually at the speaker, saying: "It is not I who want assistance, but he."
"I would assist even my rival for your sake," he said humbly, bowing low and remaining bent before her. "I did not hope to meet you again so soon. I did not think it would be my good luck to meet you once more to-day until I called at Grimsby Street."
The girl looked at Hanbury's recumbent form with anxiety and dread, and then in dire perplexity at the hunchback who had just raised his uncovered head: "If you will be so good as to help me I shall be very much obliged. Oh! I am terrified. But I do not know what you mean by saying you met me to-day. I have, I think, never seen you until now. What shall I do? Is there a doctor here?"
"He has only fainted. Never seen me before! Never at Eltham yesterday! Not to-day! Not this morning, Miss Grace, am I mad."
"You are mistaken. I never saw you before. My name is not Grace. My name is Ashton, and this is Mr. John Hanbury. Oh! will no one help me?"
The crowd had by this time gathered closely round the prostrate Negro. No one but Leigh was near Miss Ashton and Hanbury.
Leigh seized Hanbury and drew him away from the wall. "The best thing we can do is to lay him flat. So! The others are too busy with the Nigger, and we are better off without a crowd, they would only keep the air away. Pray, forgive and forget what I said, Miss Ashton. I was sure you were Miss Grace, a lady I know, whom I met yesterday and this morning. Such a likeness never was before, but I can see a little difference now; a difference now that you look at me and speak." He had placed the young man flat on his back, and was gazing up into the face of the girl with a look half of worship, half of fear.
She could not see or hear clearly. "Oh! can nothing be done for him?" she cried pitiously. She fell upon her knees beside the prostrate man, and raised his head in her arms.
"Don't do that. Do not raise his head. Have no fear. I will fetch some brandy. Here, bathe his forehead with this. I will be back in a moment." He handed her a small silver flask of eau-de-cologne from which he had screwed the top, and then hastened away.
He skirted the crowd and rushed into the Hanover, crying out "Brandy!" The place was deserted. No one in front of the counter. No one in the bar. With strength and agility, for which none would give him credit, he seized the top of the counter in his long arms, and drew himself up on it, and jumped into the bar, clutched a bottle of brandy from a shelf, and with a glass in his other hand was back over the counter again in a minute, and hurrying to where Dora knelt beside the insensible Hanbury. Leigh knocked the head off the bottle with a blow of his stick, shook out half the brandy to carry away the splinters, and poured some of what was left into the glass.
"Can you open his mouth? Let me try. Raise his head now." He knelt down and endeavoured to force the spirit into Hanbury's mouth. "Now, please, stand up. Leave him to me. You are not strong." She hesitated to rise. "Oh, pray get up! You will only make yourself ill. He will be quite well in a few minutes."
The girl rose. She was trembling violently. She placed one hand against the wall to steady herself. Her breath came short and sharp.
Leigh forced the mouth open and moistened them with brandy and moistened the temples also. Dora, weak and pale and terrified, with lips apart, looked out of dilated eyes down on the swooning man.
In a few seconds he showed signs of life. His eyelids flickered, his chest heaved, his colour began to return, he sighed and raised his hand. Leigh lifted his head higher and forced more of the brandy into his mouth. Then he got up, and stood waiting the result. Gradually Hanbury came to himself, and with the joint aid of Leigh and Dora tottered to his feet.
"There, take some more of this," said Leigh holding out the glass to Hanbury. The latter passed his hand across his eyes to collect his faculties and clear his vision.
"I must have fainted," he whispered. "Is the man dead? I fainted twice before when I saw blood. Once at the gymnasium. Is he dead?"
"Swallow the stuff," said Leigh. "It will put you right." He looked around. The crowd bearing in its core the form of the Negro, was moving through the archway at the bottom of Welbeck Place into the Mews. "I don't know whether he is really dead or not. It looks like it. Do you feel better?"
"Thank you, I feel quite well again. Would you mind fetching a cab. Dora, I am very sorry for my miserable weakness. I could not help it. I am everlastingly disgraced. Would you be kind enough to fetch a cab?"
The request was addressed to Leigh, who glanced with pity and worship at Dora, and said, without looking away:
"Yes; I'll go for a cab. You are not able to walk yet. Stay here till I come back. Will you have more?" He turned and held out the neckless bottle to Hanbury.
"No, thank you."
Leigh threw the bottle and glass into the road and hastened off on his errand. He had no thought of serving Hanbury. If the young man had been alone Leigh would have left him where he stood until the convalescent was strong enough to shift for himself. But he was under a double spell, the spell of the extraordinary likeness between this girl, Miss Ashton, and that other girl, Miss Grace, and the spell of Miss Ashton's beauty. As a rule his thought was clear, and sharp, and particular; now it was misty, dim, glorious, vague. Edith Grace had, at first sight, wrought a charm upon him such as he had never known' before; Dora Ashton renewed and heightened the charm and carried it to an intolerable yearning and rapture. He was beside himself.
"Dora," said Hanbury, after a little while and much thought, "Will you promise me one thing?" He looked around. They were quite alone. The crowd had followed the bearers of the Negro into the mews, through which there was a short cut to an hospital.
"Yes, if I can do what you ask, Jack."
"Say nothing to a soul about my fainting. You will not tell your father or mother, or my mother? I was able to keep the other occasions quiet. If this got about I should have to clear out of London. I'd be the laughing stock of the clubs. That man need not know more than he has seen."
"But he will return with the cab. You can ask him not to say anything about it."
"Come, Dora," he said, with sudden and feverish energy, "let us go. I feel a horrible repugnance to this place."
"But the man with the cab? He will be here in a minute," she said, looking at him in pain and surprise. Surely he was selfish.
"No, no. Not a second. I feel as if I should faint again. There isn't a cab-rank within a mile, and he cannot be back for half-an-hour. Come, Dora."
She took his proffered arm with a view to giving, not receiving, aid, and he hurried her along Chetwynd Street until he met the first cross road leading north; into this he hastened, casting a quick glance behind, and finding to his great relief that he was not followed. After a couple of hundred yards he reduced the pace, and said: "I am afraid, Dora, I have been going too fast for you; but I would not wish for anything that my name should get into the newspapers in connection with this miserable affair and place. It would be bad enough to have a fellow's name connected with such a place as Chetwynd Street; but to have it published that a fellow fainted there because he saw a Nigger drop dead, would be against a fellow for life. It would be worse than an accusation of crime-it would make a man ridiculous."
"And I wonder," said the girl, looking up quietly at him, "how my name would look in print connected with this miserable affair and place, and that Negro and you?"
He stopped short, dropped her arm, and looked at her with an expression of alarm and apology. "Dora, Dora. I beg your pardon. I most sincerely beg your pardon. There is something wrong with me to-day. I never thought of that. You would not, Dora, be very much put out if you saw your name connected with mine in print? Our engagement is not public, but there is no reason it should not."
"Under these circumstances? I should most surely not like the publicity of the papers. But I did not think of that until you spoke of your own name."
He looked at her as she walked now slowly by his side. He felt cut to the quick, and the worst of it was he experienced no resentment, was not cheered and sustained by anger. He had allowed consideration for his own personal risk to swallow up all consideration for everyone else, Dora Ashton included. If a line of soldiers were drawn across this wretched street with levelled rifles, and his moving towards them would draw their fire into his breast, he would there and then have marched up to them rather than that harm should touch Dora.
It was in accordance with Dora's wishes the engagement between them had not been announced. She had views which in the main he shared and admired. She was intensely independent. Why should the world know they were pledged to one another? It was no affair of the world's. But to have her name bracketed with his in newspapers and then their engagement announced, would be hideous, unbearable to her.
He would freely give his life to save her from hurt, but to be laughed at-Oh! Any man who was half a man would rather die heroically than be laughed at. To be the subject of amusing paragraphs in the sly evening papers! To be ironically complimented on his nerve-Oh! To become a by-word! To hear men at the clubs chuckle and whisper "Nigger!" and then chuckle again and say louder some word that had nothing to do with the matter! To be asked significantly if he felt better, and recommended tonics and a bracing climate! Oh! To see the hall-porter smile! To be asked by the waiter if he wished his coffee black! Oh! Oh! Oh!
"There's a cab at the end of the street," she said.
"So there is-a four-wheeler, too." He started at her voice, and then called the cab. "I cannot tell you how much I am ashamed of myself, for the third time to-day," he said to her.
"Of fainting?" she asked coldly, chillily.
"I could not help that. No! Not-not of fainting. I was ashamed of the fainting a few minutes ago. I was not thinking of that now. It was wrong of me to faint, no doubt."
"You could not help it, you know," she said coldly still.
"I could not help it then, but I should have taken precautions against anything of the kind by familiarizing myself with unpleasant and trying sights. No man ought to be a-"
"Woman," she said, finishing the sentence for him with an icy laugh. His want of consideration had exasperated her.
"Yes," he said gravely, "no man ought to be a woman."
"But which is it more like a woman, to faint at a hideous sight or run away from a paltry unpleasantness?"
His face grew very dark. He did not answer.
At this moment, the four-wheeler he had called drew up. Hanbury opened the door, and handed her in. He was about to follow when she stopped him with a gesture. "It now occurs to me that you had better go back and see that man who was so good to me, and whom you sent for the cab for yourself." Her eyes were flashing angrily now.
"Why?" he asked with the door in his hand.
"Well, I just recollect that I gave him your name and my own. You had better see him if you want to keep our names out of the papers. Drive on."