University of Virginia Library

6. CHAPTER VI.
The Jewess.

On reaching the banking-house, Tudor Dauling leaped from the cab in
which he had rapidly been driven there, and entering the vestibule, drew from
his pocket-book as he passed in, the notes with which he was to take up the
forged paper. With a feeling of relief and satisfaction, he approached the
desk of the cashier with the five thousand pounds in his hand. His air was
confident and his manner easy and self-possessed, for he felt he had now his
reputation in his own hands once more.

`Your House holds a draft, I believe, against the Duke of —,' he said
addressing the banker, and displaying the money upon the desk.

`Do you speak of a draft dated at Portsmouth for five thousand pounds?'
asked the gentleman.

`Yes.'

`The Duke himself paid it yesterday.'

`The Duke?—paid? How do you mean, sir?' demanded Tudor with surprise,
hardly sure that he had rightly understood him.

`His Grace settled yesterday, and although the draft did not mature till today,
he preferred taking it up.'

`Are you positive that it was a draft drawn from Portsmouth?'

`Yes, sir! Drawn thirty days since by yourself, if, as I believe this is Captain
Dauling!'

`Oh—ah—very right—very well!' he stammered, now convinced that his
father had really paid the forged paper. He at once divined his motive in taking
it up, and remaining silent as to its true character. `Yes, yes. The Duke
then took it up himself. He told me day before yesterday as I was coming up
to London, I might call and pay it. But I perceive he has anticipated me by
coming up himself. Good morning, sir!'

The banker bowed respectfully and Dauling quitted the place and threw
himself into his cab.

`Vere shall I drive, sir?' asked the cabman.

He was silent a moment reflecting how to answer this question. His mind
was in a state of alarm and confusion at the startling discovery he had just
made, that his forgery was not only known to the Duke, but that he held in
his possession the forged testimony of his crime. In this perplexity he thought
of his yacht, and a vague idea suggested itself to him, of escaping in her instantly
from England; but at the same moment he reflected upon her crippled
condition, and bitterly condemned his folly in placing her in this condition;
for he felt convinced, the more he thought upon his act, that the Duke would
not have paid the five thousand pounds without some deep motive—deeper
than the fear of his exposure.

`Drive to Monmouth street,' he said abruptly, for he could think of no other
person than Moloch to advise with in this extremity.

`Vere I tooks yer honor up?'

`Yes—drive at full speed.'

`Yes, yer honor—double fare though.'

`Trible—only spare not your whip.'

He found Moloch in the room where he had his first interview with him.
The Jew looked up with surprise at his sudden entrance, for he had passed
through the shop, ascended the dark stair-way, and entered the chamber unannounced.

`Well, Moloch, the devil has me at vantage this time,' he said, throwing
himself upon one of the velvet chairs that graced the money-lender's private
room.

`Vat ish it now, mi lort? Haf you forgot te right day and ish it too late to
take him up?'

`No. To-day is the day it was due. But what do you think?'

`Vell, my lort, vat ish it?' asked Moloch with a look of curiosity.

`The Duke—my father—has been before me!'

`How, mi lort?'

`It seems, as my luck would have it, that yesterday was the Duke's setting
day. So he goes to the Bank for this purpose, and of course this draft was
spoken of as due to day. At any rate he found out that the Bank had such a
draft. Now what do you think he did?'

`Had a Bow shreet officer to lay in vait vhen you come to pay it and take you.'

`No—worse than that.'

`He, perhaps, told te pank it vos forge and te pank arrest you ant you escape
and come here—for you look as if you haf been in fright, my lort.'

`It was worse than this. The Duke quietly paid the draft, said nothing about
it being a forgery, so far as I could discover by the cashier's manner, and
took the accursed paper into his possession. There he has it and me, also, as
you perceive in his power! Now what is to be done?'

The Jew remained silent and seemed to be deeply meditating upon what he
had heard. There was, at the same time, perceptibly lurking in his dark Syrian
eyes a look of inward satisfaction—as if he was well pleased in his heart
at this turn of affairs.

`When dit te Duke pay dis monies?' he asked without raising his eyes, which
were fixed thoughtfully upon the carpet.

Yesterday.—He has had, since then, the damning proof of my guilt in his
hands. What use he has made or intends to make of it I dare not contemplate.
I am fully in his power. If my schooner was in a condition to sail, I
should be tempted at once to fly the country. Each moment I may be arrested
as a forger and thrown into Newgate!' Dauling, as he spoke, rose and
walked the room with a flushed brow and an agitated step.

`Tish a pad affair, my lort.'

`I must get possession of that draft. I am not safe a moment while it is in
my father's hands. He may see fit to arrest me upon it, and then behold me
swinging on a hangman's gallows! Good God! this idea is horrible. Moloch
you must aid me. You must help me to get possession of this forged paper!'

`Tish a fery pad affair, my lort, inteed,' repeated Moloch with a shake of the
head; `fery pad.'

`You need not aggravate me by repeating that. I know it is bad—bad
enough. Use your wits and help me with some advice. If you want money
you shall have it.”

`Vere ish te Duke now?' asked Moloch raising his eyes a moment to the
haggard visage of the forger.

`He must be at his house in Regent street if he is still in London. I dare
not go there! You, Moloch, must in some way manage to get this proof of my
crime.'

The money-lender's eyes sparkled. A singular expression passed slowly
across his countenance and then vanished, leaving his face perfectly calm and
serene, which was its natural aspect. Dauling stopped before him and eagerly
surveyed his face as if trying to read there his mind.

`Sit down, mi lort, ant ve vill talk it ofer! Now vot vill your lortship gift
me if I get 'tis forge paper from te Duke's hants?'

`Money—yes! Money is your only god!' said Dauling contemptuously.
`I will give you one thousand pounds!'

`My lort, one tousant pounts ish little monies to pay for your reputation and
safety!'

`Name then your wages!' answered Dauling indignantly.

`Your lortship vos to-day ready to pay fife tousant pounts for te draft!'

`Human leech! take the five thousand pounds then! I will give it you if
you will possess yourself of that paper!'

`It will be a difficult matter, my lort! Do you think the Duke would give
it to Moloch the Jew?' he asked scornfully.

`You must devise means. Your race are never at a loss for artifices in extremities
where gold is to be won!'

`I must haf one to aid me, my lort! There is one who has a ready wit, who
may be willing to serve us! You have already seen her tact!'

`Your daughter?'

`My NEICE, she is my lort!'

`Your neice, then. How can she effect this for me?'

`I will insure your lortship that if she will undertake it, she vill succeed in
it!'

`Then entrust it to her!' said Dauling impatiently.

`She must be paid too, my lort,' said Moloch quietly.

`Are you not paid? reward your own assistants!'

`I am paid this to place the draft in your hands. She is to be rewarded for
getting it from the Duke's!'

`What pay dost thou want, Jew, for thy neice's services?'

`Your lortship's hand!' replied Moloch, fixing his dark, piercing gaze full
or his face, and speaking in a tone of singular decision.

`My hand?'

`Your hand, my lort!'

`Explain yourself, Jew?' demanded the ignoble nobleman wholly at a loss
to comprehend the bold money-lender's meaning.

The condition on which Rachel serves in this affair, my lort, is dat if successful
your lortship make her your wife.'

`Make a Jew's daughter my wife? Do you know what you say and who I
am?'

`Both one and the other, my lort.'

Dauling looked at him a few seconds in silent surprise, and with a brow
black with anger. The insult stung him to the soul. He saw at a glance the
deep policy of the aspiring Jew; but he reflected that without his aid he was
lost should the Duke make use of the power he possessed. He saw that Moloch
was in earnest; and that the desire of giving his neice in alliance with a
duke's son, blinded him to the stain upon his birth, and the infamy of his character.

`Moloch, you jest,' he said forcing a laugh, while he felt like crushing him
for his insulting suggestion. `You know I am not a marrying man. Besides
your neice would gain little honor in wedding one like me.'

`I fear not that. The maiden loves you, my lort, and it is my vish she should
pecome your wife.'

`You forget I am a Christian. Jews and Christians never unite in wedlock.

`It has been done, my lort.'

`What motive, have you, in pressing this strange union? What can her
alliance with me profit her or you? By the rood! There is little in me to covet
an illegitimate scion of royal blood.'

`It is because the royal blood flows in your veins I covet this.'

`I am a forger! Would you wed your neice to a forger?'

`Your forgery is only known to the Duke and myself. To the world you
still are a man of honor.'

`I am poor, Moloch!'

`I have money!'

`Do you mean to say you will give a dowry with your neice?'

`I promise nothing, my lort,' answered Molock coldly. `I will not sell her
to you. If you choose to marry her for the service she will be to you, well.'

`Is this the only alternative, Jew?' asked Dauling after a short silence.

`It is, my lort. Wed her and I pledge you my word the draft you so much
desire to possess, shall be in your hands within four and twenty hours.'

`What shall I do with thy neice as my wife, should I consent, from force of
circumstances to make her such? I have no house but my schooner? Shall
I bring a Jewish wife into the cabin of the Queen's Yacht?'

`Thy wife, for the present, may remain with me,' answered the Jew.

The captain of the yacht stood for some minutes wrapped in gloomy meditation
upon his perplexing and even dangerous position. He reflected that
he made himself amenable to the outraged laws of his country by an act of
forgery, the testimonials of which were in the hands of the Duke, from whom,
(from this circumstance) he apprehended, he knew not what, severe manifestation
of his power over him which the possession of this instrument gave
him. Till he had this paper in his own hands he felt he should be in instant
fear of arrest and exposure. To live in this constant lear was impossible. To
purchase exemption from it by sacrificing himself to the Jews' neice he felt
would be paying too dear a price. That Moloch should make this a condition
astonished and perplexed him. The firmness of the Jew in insisting upon it
showed him that it was his only alternative, unless he secretly went himself to
the Duke's house and sought for the draft among his papers (if it were possible
to steal into his dwelling unseen!) or seek out the Duke and take it from
him by menacing him with death. The idea of casting himself upon his father's
clemency he did not dwell upon for a moment; for he well recollected
how he had repeatedly before abused it, and, as he believed, shut up his heart
against him. By force, subtlety, or treachery he only expected to attain his
object, and without the Jews' aid he felt he could do nothing effectually and
safely.

`Moloch, this is a hard condition you put upon me,' he said gloomily, `The
draft must be had at all sacrifices, and had at once! for, the more I reflect upon
the Duke's manner of taking it up before it was due, and paying the money
without a word to the banker, eagerly grasping at the draft, as it were, to anticipate
my getting possession of it, the more I am satisfied he means to make
some use of it to hold me in his power. `I will wed your neice! But has
she no voice?'

`I will ask her.' As he spoke he rose and crossed the room to what seemed
a window covered from the ceiling to the floor with drapery. Lifting this with
his hand, he exposed a recess of considerable dimensions and tastefully furnished.
Within it sat the Jewess Rachel at a writing desk. She looked up
and smiled at the surprise of Dauling on thus discovering that his interview
with the Jew had had a third party.

`He gazed upon her with surprise, yet not unmixed with admiration. The
lofty character of her oriental style of beauty, the Esther-like lovelines and
dignity of her air, the glorious beauty of her dark Arabian eyes as they beamed
on him, softly shaded by their curving fringes of long lashes, had an effect
upon him he could not resist. He felt, in his heart, that were she not a Jewess,
he would not be making so great a sacrifice after all his objections and
arguments against the union.

`There is the maiden, my lort, let her answer for herself.'

Rachel rose and entered the chamber, moving with a queenly grace that
was captivating and yet singularly imposing. A scarlet ribbon bound up her
black locks and a spencer of bright crimson velvet displayed the superb volume
of her bust. Her diminutive feet were encased in red slippers, and her small
olive tinted fingers were sparkling with rubies. Such was the favorite costume
of the handsome Jewess, and finely did it become her.

`My lord,' she said, `I have but one will, and that is my uncle's. He has
been my benefactor from infancy, and but for his care I should have perished.
He commands. I obey.'

`You then consent to this singular condition he proposes? For you, doubtless,
have heard all that has been said, and therefore know who and what you
are to wed?'

`I both know who and what, my lord;' she said, repeating his words with a
peculiar emphasis upon the two pronouns, which did not strike him then, but
which occurred to him afterwards.

`It is surprising you should be willing to sacrifice yourself.'

`You are not indifferent to me, my lord. I know circumstances have made
you criminal rather than evil principles. You feel yourself at feud with men
of noble acknowledged birth, and hence all your errors of conduct.'

`Errors of conduct! You are charitable, fair Jewess,' said Dauling with a
gratified tone in his voice. `You know me better than I dared to know myself.
I am, indeed less guilty,' he added with emotion, `than I seem! I was
honorable in feeling and noble in principle, till, as I grew up to manhood, I
learned the infamy that clung to my name! Then I little cared to keep up in
fair show before the world a counterfeit as if it were genuine! I could not pass
with men for what I would be and should have been, and therefore I became
indifferent how I passed! You have spoken truth, Jewess. I am not by nature
so depressed as I seem! For these words I thank you most kindly! You are
then willing to wed me?'

`Not against thy will, my lord,' said Rachel with a smile and glance that
penetrated his soul.

`It will be against my will, beauteous as thou art. But look ye, fair Rachel,
I am to wed thee only on conditidn you succeed in obtaining this draft. If
you succeed in getting it, I swear to make you my wife! But in marrying
me, mark you, you gain nothing and risk everything!'

`I gain thee, my lord!' she answered. `This duty enjoined upon me I will
undertake and success is to be the condition of our union. I undertake it that
I may save you.'

`Are you then so much interested in me?' he said, taking her hand.

`I desire to save you, my lord, from the danger your imprudence has placed
you in. After I have possessed myself of the instrument of your guilt, is it
not fair that I should possess what I am to risk so much to save?'

`Be it so. Yet I warn you, noble Jewess, that I have neither house nor
land, name nor honor to endorse them with! Nay, that thou must still remain
an inmate of thy uncle's abode.'

`That I know, my lord,'

`Be it as you will then. Bring me within twenty-four hours the forged
draft my father holds, and I will wed you the next moment after!'

`I will try, my lord,' said the Jewess with a confidant smile. `If it can be
done at all, it will be done by to-morrow ere this hour.'

`Then you will see me here!'

Dauling had already began to feel diminished reluctance, under all the circumstances,
to take the Jewess to wife, (for she had really awakened an interest
in his bosom) so long as he was not compelled to acknowledge or take her
away from Moloch's dwelling; and taking leave of her and the Jew he quitted
the room escorted by Moloch to the lower door.

`My lort, you had pest keep close avhile till ve see vat can pe done apout
the draft. If te Duke should seek you it would be pad pusiness.'

`I see that, Moloeh. I know where I can be secluded enough till to-morrow.
By the way your neice is not so—that is, I mean to say she is a noble woman!
If she only wasn't a Jewess! But Jewess or no I will fulfil my promise on the
conditions, and make her my wife if she succeeds.'

`To-morrow will show,' answered Moloch as he closed the door upon him.