 | CHAPTER XII.
BLUE BLOOD. Barriers burned away |  |
12. CHAPTER XII.
BLUE BLOOD.
Dennis's mind was a chaos of conflicting feelings. As
had the picture, so the beautiful girl, that it by strange coincidence
so strongly resembled, deeply interested him. It
could not be otherwise with one of his beauty-loving nature.
And yet the impression made by the face in the painting of
something wrong, discordant, was felt more decidedly in
respect to the living face.
But before he had time to realize what had just passed,
the lady and her father appeared at the door of the office
and he heard Mr. Ludolph say—
“I know you are right my dear. It's all wrong. The
arrangement of the store is as stiff and methodical as if we
were engaged in selling mathematical instruments. But
I have not time to attend to the matter, and there is not
one in the store that has the least idea of artistic combination,
unless it is Fleet. I have noticed some encouraging
symptoms in him.”
“What! he of the duster and mop? I fear our case is
desperate, then, if he is our best hope.”
Dennis's cheeks were burning again, but turning his
back he rubbed away harder than ever at a Greek god that
he was polishing. But they gave him no thought. Speaking
with sudden animation the young lady said,
“Father, I am a great mind to try it myself,—that is, if
you are willing.”
“But, my daughter, I could not permit you to be engaged
in any such employment before our customers.”
“Certainly not! I would come early in the morning,
before art-customers are stirring. I really would enjoy
the task greatly, if I had any one to help me who could in
some faint degree comprehend the effects I wished to produce.
The long Spring mornings soon to come, would be
just the time for it. To what better use could I put my
taste and knowledge of art, than in helping you and furthering
our plan for life?”
Mr. Ludolph hesitated between his pride and strong
desire to gain the advantages which this offer would secure.
Finally he said,
“We will think about it; I am expecting a great many
new and beautiful things early in the Spring, and no doubt
it would be well then to re-arrange the store completely,
and break up the rigid system into which we have fallen.
In the mean time I appreciate your offer, and thank you
warmly.”
Dennis's heart leaped up within him at the thought of
instruction from such a teacher, and longed to offer his
services. But he rightly judged that they would be regarded
as an impertinence at that time. The successor
of Pat Murphy was not expected to know anything of art,
or have any appreciation of it. So he bent his head lower,
but gave Jupiter Olympus such a rubbing down as the god
had deserved long ago. In a moment more Miss Ludolph
passed him on her way out of the store, noticing him no
more than his dust-brush.
The development of this narrative now requires a
more full and definite statement in regard to Mr. Ludolph
and his daughter. He was the younger son of a noble
of his patrician blood. His parents knowing that he
would have to make his own way in the world, had sent
him, while a mere boy, to this country, and placed him in
charge of an old friend and distant relative, who was engaged
in the picture-trade in New York. He had here
learned to speak English in his youth with the fluency and
accuracy of a native, but had never become Americanized,
so strongly had he inherited family pride and clung to the
traditions of his own land.
He showed great business ability in his chosen calling,
especially displaying remarkable judgment in the selection
of works of art. So unusual was his skill in this direction,
that when twenty-one he was sent abroad to purchase
pictures. For several years he travelled through
Europe. He became quite cosmopolitan in character,
and for a time enjoyed life abundantly. His very business
brought him in contact with artists and men of culture,
while his taste and love of beauty were daily gratified.
He had abundant means, and money could open many
doors of pleasure to one who, like him, was in vigorous
health and untroubled by a conscience. Moreover, he
was able to spend much time in his beloved Germany, and
while there the great ambition of his life entered his
heart. His elder brother, who was living in exclusive
pride and narrow economy on the ancient but diminished
ancestral estate, ever received him graciously. This brother
had married, but had not been blessed or cursed with
children, for the German baron, with his limited finances,
could never decide in what light to regard them. Too
poor to mingle with his equals, too proud to stoop to those
whom he regarded as inferiors, he had lived much
alone, and grown narrower and more bigoted in his family
pride day by day. Indeed, that he was Baron Ludolph,
was the one great fact of his life. He spent hours in conning
of his house, and would gloat over heroic deeds of ancestors
he never thought of imitating. In brief, he was like
a small barnacle on an old and water-logged ship, that
once had made many a gallant and prosperous voyage
richly freighted, but now had drifted into shallow water
and was falling to decay. He made a suggestion, however,
to his younger brother, that wakened the ambition
of his stronger nature, and set him about what became his
controlling purpose, his life-work.
“Make a fortune in America,” said his brother, “and
come back and restore the ancient wealth and glory of
your family.”
The seed fell into receptive soil, and from that day the
art and pleasure-loving citizen of the world became an
earnest man with a purpose. But as he chose his purpose
mainly from selfish motives, it did not become an ennobling
one. He now gave double attention to business and
practical economy. He at once formed the project of
starting in business for himself, and of putting the large
profits resulting from his judicious selection of pictures
into his own pocket.
He made the most careful arrangements, and secured
agencies that he could trust in the purchase of pictures
after he should return to the United States.
While in Paris, on his way back, an event occurred that
had a most untoward influence on his plans and hopes.
He fell desperately in love with a beautiful French woman.
Like himself, she was poor, but of patrician blood, and was
very fascinating. She attracted him by her extreme beauty
and brilliancy. She was very shrewd, and could seem
anything she chose, being a perfect actress in the false,
hollow life of the world. In accordance with Parisian
ideas, she wanted a husband to pay her bills, to be a sort
of protector and base of general operations. Here was
capable of making large sums of money.
She insinuated herself into his confidence, and appeared
to share his enthusiasm for the darling project of
his life. He felt that with such a beautiful and sympathetic
woman to spur him on and share his success, earth
would be a Paradise indeed; and she assured him, in
many delicate and bewitching ways, that it would. In
brief, he married her; and then learned, in bitterness,
anger, and disgust, that she had totally deceived him. To
his passionate love she returned indifference; to his desire
for economy, unbounded extravagance, contracting
debts which he must pay to avoid disgrace. She showed
an utter unwillingness to leave the gayety of Paris, laughing
to his face at his plan of life, and assuring him that
she would never live in so stupid a place as Germany.
His love died hard. He made every appeal to her that
affection could. He tried entreaty, tenderness, coldness,
anger, but all in vain. Selfish to the core, loving him not,
utterly unscrupulous, she trod upon his quivering heart as
recklessly as the stones of the street. Soon he saw that,
in spite of his vigilance, he was in danger of being betrayed
in all respects. Then he grew hard and fierce.
The whole of his strong German nature was aroused. In
a tone and manner that startled and frightened her, he
said:
“We sail for New York in three days. Be ready. If
you prove unfaithful to me—if you seek to desert me, I
will kill you. I swear it—not by God, for I don't believe
in Him. If he existed, such creatures as you would not.
But I swear it by my family pride and name, which are
dearer to me than life, if you leave a stain upon them you
shall die. You need not seek to escape me. I would follow
you through the world. I would kill you on the crowded
street—anywhere, even though I died myself the next
moment. And now look well to your steps.”
The glitter of his eye was as cold and remorseless as
the sheen of steel. She saw that he meant, and would do
just what he said.
This woman had one good point, at least it turned out
to be such in this case. She was a coward naturally, and
her bad life made her dread nothing so much as death.
Her former flippant indifference to his remonstrances now
changed into abject fear. He saw her weak side, learned
his power, and from that time forward kept her within
bounds by a judicious system of terrorism.
He took her to New York and commanded her to appear
the charming woman she could, if she chose. She
obeyed, and rather enjoyed the excitement and deceit.
His friends were delighted with her, but he received their
congratulations with a grim, quiet smile. At times, though,
when she was receiving them with all grace, beauty, and
sweetness, the thought of what she was, seemed only a
horrid dream. But he had merely to catch her eye with
its gleam of fear and hate, to know the truth.
He felt that he could not trust to the continuance of
her good behavior, and was anxious to get away among
strangers as soon as possible.
He therefore closed up his business relations in New
York. Though she had crippled him greatly by her extravagance,
he had been able to bring out a fair stock of
good pictures, and a large number of articles of virtu,
selected with his usual taste. The old firm finding that
they could not keep him, offered all the goods he wanted
on commission. So in a few weeks he started for Chicago,
the most promising city of the West, as he believed,
and established himself there in a modest way. Still
the chances were even against him, for he had involved
himself heavily, and drawn to the utmost on his credit in
starting. If he could not sell largely the first year, he
was a broken man. For months the balance wavered,
ruin on the other. But, with a heart of ice and nerves of
steel, he kept his hand on the helm.
His beautiful collection, though in an unpretentious
store, at last attracted attention, and after some little time
it became the thing in the fashionable world to go there,
and from that time forward his fortune was made.
When his wife became a mother, there was a faint hope
in Mr. Ludolph's heart that this event might awaken the
woman within her, if aught of the true woman existed.
He tried to treat her with more kindness, but found it
would not answer. She mistook it for weakness and giving
way on his part. From first to last she acted in the
most heartless manner, and treated the child with shameless
neglect. This banished from her husband even the
shadow of regard, and he cursed her to her face. Thence-forth
will and ambition controlled his life and hers, and
with an iron hand he held her in check. She saw that
she was in the power of a desperate man, who would sacrifice
her in a moment if she thwarted him.
Through cowardly fear she remained his reluctant but
abject slave, pricking him with the pins and needles of
petty annoyances, when she would have pierced him to
the heart had she dared. This monstrous state of affairs
could not last forever, and had not death terminated the
unnatural relation, some terrible catastrophe would no
doubt have occurred. Having contracted a Western fever,
she soon became delirious, and passed away in this
unconscious state, to the intense joy and relief of her
husband.
But the child lived, thrived, and developed into the
graceful girl whose beauty surpassed, as we have seen,
even the painter's ideal. Her father at first cared little
for the infant, but secured it every attention. But as it
developed into a pretty girl, with winning ways, and rich
plans, till at last she became an essential part of his ambition.
His plan now was briefly this: He would entangle
himself with no alliances or intimate associations in America,
nor would he permit his daughter to do so. His only
object in staying here was the accumulation of a large fortune,
and to this for a few years he would bend every energy
of mind and body. As soon as he felt that he had
sufficient means to live in such style as befitted the ancient
and honorable name of his family, he would return to
Germany, buy all that he could of the ancestral estate
that from time to time had been parted with, and restore
his house to its former grandeur. He himself would then
seek a marriage connection that would strengthen his social
position, while his daughter also should make a brilliant
alliance with some member of the nobility. Mr.
Ludolph was a handsome, well-preserved man; he had
been most successful in business, and was now more rapidly
than ever accumulating that which is truly a power
with Europeans of blue blood, as with democratic Americans
who are satisfied to have their vital fluid of the ordinary
red color. Moreover, his daughter's beauty promised
to be such, that, when enhanced by every worldly advantage,
it might well command attention in the highest circles.
He sought with scrupulous care to give her just
the education that would enable her to shine as a star
among the high-born. Art, music, and knowledge of literature,
especially the German, were the main things to
which her attention was directed, and in her father, with
his richly stored mind, faultless taste, and cultured voice,
she had an instructor such as rarely falls to the lot of the
most favored.
| CHAPTER XII.
BLUE BLOOD. Barriers burned away | |