"That'll make us right to this week end, Mrs. Flitwick," he said. "Put the receipt in my room."
"And greatly obliged I am to you, Mr. Lauriston," answered the landlady. "And sorry, indeed, you should have had to put yourself to the trouble, but"
"All right, all rightno troubleno trouble at all," exclaimed Lauriston. "Quite easy, I assure you!"
He ran out of the house again and back to where he knew there was food. He was only one-and-twenty, a well-built lad, with a healthy appetite, which, until very recently, had always been satisfied, and just then he was feeling that unless he ate and drank, somethinghe knew not whatwould happen. He was even conscious that his voice was weakening, when, having entered the eating-house and dropped into a seat in one of the little boxes into which the place was divided, he asked the waitress for the food and drink which he was now positively aching for. And he had eaten a plateful of fish and two boiled eggs and several thick slices of bread and butter, and drunk the entire contents of a pot of tea before he even lifted his eyes to look round him. But by that time he was conscious of satisfaction, and he sat up and inspected the place to which he had hurried so eagerly. And in the same moment he once more saw Melky.
Melky had evidently just entered the little eating-house. Evidently, too, he was in no hurry for food or drink. He had paused, just within the entrance, at a desk which stood there, whereat sat Mrs. Goldmark, the proprietress, a plump, pretty young woman, whose dark, flashing eyes turned alternately from watching her waitresses to smiling on her customers as they came to the desk to pay their bills. Melky, his smart billy-cock hat cocked to one side, his sporting-looking overcoat adorned with a flower, was evidently paying compliments to Mrs. Goldmark as he leaned over her desk: she gave him a playful push and called to a waitress to order Mr. Rubinstein a nice steak. And Melky, turning from her with a well satisfied smile, caught sight of Lauriston, and sauntered down to the table at which he sat.
"Get your bit of business done all right?" he asked, confidentially, as he took a seat opposite his fellow-lodger and bent towards him. "Find the old gent accommodating?"
"I didn't see him," answered Lauriston. "I saw a young lady."
"My cousin Zillah," said Melky. "Smart girl, that, misterworth a pile o' money to the old manshe knows as much about the business as what he does! You wouldn't think, mister," he went on in his soft, lisping tones, "but that girl's had a college educationfact! Old Daniel, he took her to live with him when her father and mother died, she being a little 'un then, and he give herah, such an education as I wish I'd hadsee? She's quite the ladyis Zillahbut sticks to the old shopnot half, neither!"
"She seems very business-like," remarked Lauriston, secretly pleased that he had now learned the pretty pawnbroker's name. "She soon did what I wanted."
"In the blood," said Melky, laconically. "We're all of us in that sort o' business, one way or another. Now, between you and me, mister, what did she lend you on that bit o' stuff?"
"Three pounds fifteen," replied Lauriston.
"That's about it," assented Melky, with a nod. He leaned a little nearer. "You don't want to sell the ticket?" he suggested. "Give you a couple o' quid for it, if you do."
"You seem very anxious to buy that watch," said Lauriston, laughing. "NoI don't want to sell the ticketnot I! I wouldn't part with that watch for worlds."
"Well, if you don't, you don't," remarked Melky. "And as to wanting to buythat's my trade. I ain't no reg'lar businessI buy and sell, anything that comes handy, in the gold and silver line. And as you ain't going to part with that ticket on no consideration, I'll tell you what it's worth, old as it is. Fifteen quid!"
"That's worth knowing, any way," said Lauriston. "I shall always have something by me then, while I have that. You'd have made a profit of a nice bit, then, if I'd sold it to you?"
"It 'ud be a poor world, mister, if you didn't get no profit, wouldn't it?" assented Melky calmly. "We're all of us out to make profit. Look here!between you and meyou're a lit'ry gent, ain't you? Write a bit, what? Do you want to earn a fivercomfortable?"
"I should be very glad," replied Lauriston.
"There's a friend o' mine," continued Melky, "wholesale jeweller, down Shoreditch way, wants to get out a catalogue. He ain't no lit'ry powers, d'you see? Now, he'd run to a fivercash downif some writing feller 'ud touch things up a bit for him, like. Lor' bless you!it wouldn't take you more'n a day's work! What d'ye say to it?"
"I wouldn't mind earning five pounds at that," answered Lauriston.
"Right-oh!" said Melky. "Then some day next week, I'll take you down to see himhe's away till then. Andyou'll pay me ten per cent. on the bit o' business, won't you, mister? Business is business, ain't it?"
"All right!" agreed Lauriston. "That's a bargain, of course."
Melky nodded and turned to his steak, and Lauriston presently left him and went away. The plump lady at the desk gave him a smile as she handed him his change.
"Hope to see you again, sir," she said.
Lauriston went back to his room, feeling that the world had changed. He had paid his landlady, he had silver and copper in his pocket, he had the chance of earning five pounds during the coming weekand he expected a cheque for his two stories by every post. And if John Purdie made him the loan he had asked for, he would be able to devote a whole month to finishing his noveland then, perhaps, there would be fame and riches. The dismal November evening disappeared in a dream of hope.
But by the end of the week hope was dropping to zero again with Lauriston. No letters had arrivedeither from John Purdie or the editor. On the Sunday morning he was again face to face with the last half-crown. He laid out his money very cautiously that day, but when he had paid for a frugal dinner at a cheap coffee-shop, he had only a shilling left. He wandered into Kensington Gardens that Sunday afternoon, wondering what he had best do next. And as he stood by the railings of the ornamental water, watching the water-fowls' doings, somebody bade him good-day, and he turned to find the pretty girl of the pawnshop standing at his side and smiling shyly at him.
CHAPTER THREE
THE DEAD MAN
Lauriston was thinking about Zillah at the very moment in which she spoke to him: the memory of her dark eyes and the friendly smile that she had given him as he left the pawnshop had come as a relief in the midst of his speculations as to his immediate future. And now, as he saw her real self, close to him, evidently disposed to be friendly, he blushed like any girl, being yet at that age when shyness was still a part of his character. Zillah blushed toobut she was more self-possessed than Lauriston.
"I've been talking to my Cousin Melky about you," she said quickly. "Or, rather, he's been talking to me. He says he's going to introduce you to a man who wants his catalogue put in shapefor five pounds. Don't you do it for five pounds! I know that mancharge him ten!" Lauriston moved away with her down the walk.
"Oh, but I couldn't do that, now!" he said eagerly. "You see I promised I'd do it for five."
Zillah gave him a quick glance.
"Don't you be silly!" she said. "When anybody like Melky offers you five pounds for anything, ask them double. They'll give it. You don't know much about money matters, do you?"
Lauriston laughed, and gaining confidence, gave the girl a knowing look.
"Not much," he admitted, "else I wouldn't have had to do that bit of business with you the other day."
Lauriston laughed, and gaining confidence, gave the girl a knowing look.
"Not much," he admitted, "else I wouldn't have had to do that bit of business with you the other day."
"Ohthat!" she said indifferently. "That's nothing. You'd be astonished if you knew what sort of people just have to run round to us, now and thenI could tell you some secrets! ButI guessed you weren't very well up in money matters, all the same. Writing people seldom are."
"I suppose you are?" suggested Lauriston.
"I've been mixed up in them all my life, more or less," she answered. "Couldn't help being, with my surroundings. You won't think me inquisitive if I ask you something? Were youhard upwhen you came round the other night?"
"Hard up's a mild term," replied Lauriston, frankly. "I hadn't a penny!"
"Excepting a gold watch worth twelve or fifteen pounds," remarked Zillah, drily. "And how long had you been like that?"
"Two or three daysmore or less," answered Lauriston. "You see, I've been expecting money for more than a weekthat was it."
"Has it come?" she asked.
"Noit hasn't," he replied, with a candid blush. "That's a fact!"
"Will it comesoon?" she demanded.
"By George!I hope so!" he exclaimed. "I'll be hard up again, if it doesn't."
"And then you offer to do for five what you might easily get ten for!" she said, almost reproachfully. "Let me give you a bit of advicenever accept a first offer. Stand out for a bit moreespecially from anybody like my cousin Melky."
"Is Melky a keen one, then?" enquired Lauriston.
"Melky's a young Jew," said Zillah, calmly. "I'm notI'm half-and-halfa mixture. My mother was Jewmy father wasn't. Wellif you want money to be going on with, and you've got any more gold watches, you know where to come. Don't you ever go with empty pockets in London while you've got a bit of property to pledge! You're not a Londoner, of course?"
"I'm a Scotsman!" said Lauriston.
"To be sureI knew it by your tongue," asserted Zillah. "And trying to make a living by writing! Well, you'll want courageand money. Have you had any luck?"
"I've sold two stories," answered Lauriston, who by that time was feeling as if the girl was an old friend. "They come to twenty pounds for the two, at the rate that magazine pays, and I've asked for a chequeit's that I'm waiting for. It ought to comeany time."
"Oh, but I know that game!" said Zillah. "I've two friendsgirlswho write. I know how they have to waittill publication, or till next pay-day. What a pity that some of you writers don't follow some other profession that would bring in a good incomethen you could do your writing to please yourselves, and not be dependent on it. Haven't you thought of that?"
"Often!" answered Lauriston. "And it wouldn't dofor me, anyway. I've made my choice. I'll stick to my penand swim or sink with it. And I'm not going to sink!"
"That's the way to talkto be sure!" said the girl. "Butkeep yourself in money, if you can. Don't go without money for three days when you've anything you can raise money on. You see how practical I am! But you've got to be in this world. Will you tell me something?"
"It strikes me," answered Lauriston, looking at her narrowly and bringing the colour to her cheeks, "that I'm just about getting to thisthat I'd tell you anything! And sowhat is it?"
"How much money have you left?" she asked softly.
"Precisely a shillingand a copper or two," he answered.
"Andif that cheque doesn't arrive?" she suggested.
"Maybe I'll be walking round to Praed Street again," he said, laughing.
"I've a bit of what you call property, yet."
The girl nodded, and turned towards a side-walk that led across the Gardens.
"All right," she said. "Don't think me inquisitiveI don't like to think ofof people like you being hard up: I'm not wrapped up in business as much as all that. Let's talk of something elsetell me what you write about."
Lauriston spent the rest of that afternoon with Zillah, strolling about Kensington Gardens. He had lived a very lonely life since coming to London, and it was a new and pleasant experience to him to have an intelligent companion to talk to. There was a decided sense of exhilaration within him when he finally left her; as for Zillah, she went homewards in a very thoughtful mood, already conscious that she was more than half in love with this good-looking lad who had come so strangely into her life. And at the corner of Praed Street she ran up against Mr. Melky Rubinstein, and button-holed him, and for ten minutes talked seriously to him. Melky, who had good reasons of his own for keeping in his cousin's favour, listened like a lamb to all she had to say, and went off promising implicit obedience to her commandments.
"Zillah ain't half gone on that chap!" mused Melky, as he pursued his way. "Now, ain't it extraordinary that a girl who'll come into a perfect fortune should go and fall head over ears in love with a red-headed young feller what ain't got a penny to bless hisself with! Not but what he ain't got good looksand brains. And brains is brains, when all's said!"
That night, as Lauriston sat writing in his shabby little room, a knock came at his doorthe door opened, and Melky slid in, laying his finger to the side of his large nose in token of confidence.
"Hope I ain't interrupting," said Melky. "I say, mister, I been thinking about that catalogue business. Now I come to sort of reflect on it, I think my friend'll go to ten pound. So we'll say ten poundwhat? And I'll take you to see him next Friday. And I say, misterif a pound or two on account 'ud be of any servicesay the word, d'ye see?"
With this friendly assurance, Melky plunged his hand into a hip-pocket, and drew out some gold, which he held towards Lauriston on his open palm.
"Two or three pound on account, now, mister?" he said, ingratiatingly.
"You're welcome as the flowers in May!"
But Lauriston shook his head; he had already decided on a plan of his own, if the expected remittance did not arrive next morning.
"No, thank you," he answered. "It's uncommonly good of youbut I can manage very well indeedI can, really! Next Friday, thenI'll go with you. I'm very much obliged to you."
Melky slipped his money into his pocketconscious of having done his part. "Just as you like, mister," he said. "But you was welcome, you know. Next Friday, thenand you can reckon on cash down for this job."
The Monday morning brought neither of the expected letters to Lauriston. But he had not spoken without reason when he said to Zillah that he had a bit of property to fall back uponnow that he knew how ready money could easily be raised. He had some pledgeable property in his trunkand when the remittances failed to arrive, he determined to avail himself of it. Deep down in a corner of the trunk he had two valuable ringsall that his mother had left him, with the exception of two hundred pounds, with which he had ventured to London, and on which he had lived up to then. He got the rings out towards the end of Monday afternoon, determining to take them round to Daniel Multenius and raise sufficient funds on them to last him for, at any rate, another month or two. He had little idea of the real value of such articles, and he had reasons of his own for not showing the rings to Melky Rubinstein; his notion was to wait until evening, when he would go to the pawnshop at about the same time as on his previous visit, in the hope of finding Zillah in charge again. After their meeting and talk of the afternoon before, he felt that she would do business with him in a sympathetic spiritand if he could raise twenty pounds on the rings he would be free of all monetary anxiety for many a long week to come.