University of Virginia Library

8. CHAPTER VIII.
The Two Visitors.

The Duke heard this revelation with astonishment. The boldness and
singular character of such a procedure confounded him. He, however, governed
his feelings and said—

`Then you have seen him to-day?'

`I have, my lord!'

`Where?'

`At my father's!'

`Whose name you are pleased to withhold!' said the Duke, sarcastically.

`For the present, your grace.'

`I am to understand, then, that if I surrender the forged draft I now hold, that
your father will decline prosecuting my son for the forgery palmed upon him?'

`Such is the condition, my lord!'

`And a very singular one! What can be the nature of the compact entered
into by this misguided man with your father? But that too, you say
you are not at liberty to divulge!' remarked the Duke in the same sarcastic
tone. `This Jew, your father is a worthy man, indeed, to enter into a compact
to protect a forger!'

`That forger is your lordship's son!'

`True—I had not thought of that! He is my son and more's the pity! But
for the life of me I cant see what bribe this draft can be to your father to induce
him not only quietly to suffer the loss of the six thousand pounds which
I have refused to pay, but also to refuse to prosecute! You seem to be a person
of intelligence and judgment far above your condition. I am willing to
leave this unpleasant matter in your hands and on your terms. But what
pledge will you give me that you will not prosecute your claim even if I surrender
to you for my son this forged paper? The whole affair is a riddle to
me!'

`I am willing to deposit with your grace the full amount of the draft, and am
ready to forfeit this sum if we prosecute!'

`You are willing and ready to do this?' demanded the Duke with a look of
wonder.

`I am, my lord,' answered the young man, taking a note book from his pocket
and displaying on the table before his grace, five Bank of England notes
for one thousand pounds each.

`You are a very extraordinary person. There must be some strange and
mysterious link of union between my poor son and your father to have such
things done in his behalf!'

The color rose quickly into the face of the youth at this remark, but after
letting fall the heavily fringed lids of his dark oriental eyes a moment to the
floor, he recovered the self-possession which had characterised his manner
throughout this interview.

`There is a bond of union, your grace, which you shall by and by learn.
Shall I have the notes, my lord?' he said, litting his finger from the pile, and
leaving them before the Duke.

`You mean, will I surrender the forged note?'

`I do, my lord!'

`I will, on the condition that you promise never to mention this unhappy
crime to human ears. Censurable as the conduct of my son has been, I have
still great love for him and much charity; for I cannot but feel conscious that
I have done him more wrong than any other man living; for he is my child,
and yet I refuse him my name! He has told me to my face that I must thank
myself for all his conduct! and I assure you, I do severely blame myself.
Were he a legitimate son, I should have borne with him far less than I do. I
am an unhappy man!' The Duke spoke with deep emotion in his voice, and
for a few moments leant his forehead in his hand and covered his eyes.

`I sympathise with you, my lord!'

`Thanks. But, the more I hear you speak, the more I feel convinced that
you were not educated as the son of a mere Jewish merchant. Your air, language,
tone of voice, are cultivated and refined in an unusual degree!'

Here the Duke abruptly addressed a question in French to him. The
young man responded to it in the same language and in the purest idiom. The
Duke then put an inquiry in Italian, which was responded to in the same
tongue and with remarkable eloquence of expression.

`You are not a mere Jew's son—nor yet a Jew!' said the Duke with surprise,
and fixing upon him the closest scrutiny. `There is a mystery in all
this matter with you as well as with the rest!'

`I am but the child of an Israelite, my lord. My father's wealth has been
devoted to my education and thus the superiority you are pleased to flatter
me with, is easily explained. Shall I have the notes?'

`No. Take them! Here is the draft. Take it to my son and tell him
that—nay, say nothing to him from me! Yes—if you have any influence over
him, urge him to return at once to his yacht, as the King has pressing duty
for him. Urge him to this but not from me. So he is with your father?'

`Not now, my lord. He left not long before I did. But he will call to
know my success!'

`Poor Tudor! I did intend with this draft to win him back to virtue and
honor. I did intend to hold it over him as a means of keeping him within the
bounds of integrity! But take it, and tell him—nay, I have no message that
I can frame for him. Urge him only to go on board his yacht!'

`That I will do, my lord!'

`There is the draft! Nay—put up the notes. I am satisfied now that you
are Tudor's friend!'

The young man took the draft and with the notes placed them in his pocket-book.
He then rose and gathering his cloak about him, prepared to leave.
The Duke arose also, and added—

`When shall I have the explanation of this enigma?'

`To-morrow, perhaps, or at least very soon your grace!'

`I am at a loss to comprehend the machinery of this singular proceeding in
relation to Tudor. I act, as a a blind man in the affair, but I trust I shall see
the light soon. I think my conduct in this matter will prove to Tudor my care
for his reputation, and he should himself henceforth a little more regard it!'

The young man now took his leave and the door closed upon him. The
Duke set a moment in a thoughtful attitude and then suddenly pulled at the
bell. It was answered by a youth dressed as a page.

`Merton! Take hat and cloak and follow the young gentleman who just left
here. Be cautious and wary, and as soon as you can, bring me word where
he stops.'

`I obey, your grace,' answered the page, and the next moment he disappeared.

`This is altogether,' said the Duke, `one of the most singular affairs! Such
an extraordinary young Jew too! So Tudor and the old Jew are in a conspiracy
or compact! What can have been his equivalent to be willing to lose his
money for the draft and refuse to prosecute besides! What interest could this

old Jew have in Tudor's being in possession of the forged draft. Well, I am
glad Tudor has had his fears excited; and I hope he will learn a lesson.
Nevertheless, he must leave England, This second forgery confirms me in
the wisdom of the king's decision. Now if he can be got on board his yacht
all will be well yet. Ah—what folly have I been guilty of! The very draft I
was to hold up to him in the presence of the officers when we should get to the
river's mouth, giving him the choice of exile or a prisoner, I have let pass out
of my hands? I have lost the very key to my power. He would laugh at me
for threatening him with arrest now, when he holds one of the forged drafts
and the pieces of the other lie at my feet. Our plans must be changed; for
that he quits England forever, I am resolved upon! He will forge other men's
names next, and then there will be no protection for him in a father's forbearance!
Ah Merton! returned already?'

`Your grace, the gentleman sprung into a hackney coach in waiting, and
the driver drove off at top speed, so as to defy any pursuit except it were on
horseback.'

`Well, let it pass. I shall know by and by I dare say all I desire,' he said
in an under tone. `Wait in the ante-room, Merton, as I have a note for you to
take to the king soon.'

He then took up his pen to add a postscript to the letter he had just before
completed to the King, when to his surprise he found it was missing from the
table. After a close search his suspicions rested upon the stranger, and believing
that he had taken it and would exhibit it to Tudor, filled him with
vexation and chagrin. He saw at once that it would not only defeat the
King's plot, but would place Tudor in a position of more decided hostility than
ever, towards himself.

`The fates of this day are against me,' he said bitterly.

`My lord duke,' said the page opening the door after the stranger had been
ten minutes gone.

`Well?' responded the duke sternly. `Ho! did you see a letter lying upon
the carpet?'

`No, your grace. But —'

`Perhaps the wind has swept it off; search the ante-room.'

`Your grace, I came in to say that there is a Yorkshire man in the vestibule
who insists on coming in, saying he had a letter for you.'

`A country-man? Go, bid him deliver it to you, and wait till I have read it.'

`I asked him for it, and he said, in his broad dialect he would give it only
to your grace's own hand as it wasn't sealed, and `yong eyeses mout peep between
it and reed deadly secrets!'

`Then show him up. I have strange visitors since dinner. Here comes a
hob-nail footstep; heavy enough for the giant Gog. So, fellow you have been
so ill-mannered as to force yourself into my presence in this coarse guise of
the stable-yard, instead of delivering your message to my page,' said the Duke
surveying his tall stout figure clad in a Yorkshire farmer's frock, boots and
hat, which latter he kept on his head, tied down with twine passed under his
chin. `Take off your hat, sirrah!'

`He says he can't, your grace; he told me, when I bade him do it, how he
had a wen on the top o' it, big as his fist, and he was `mouty feer'd he'd cotch
cold in it, asides, it wasn't sightly!'

The Duke smiled at the droll way the flippant page imitated the peasant's
dialect and then said,

`If you have a letter for me present it?'

`Here it be your lor'ship's honor, said the clown, taking it from a huge pocket
and thrusting it towards his Grace with a backward scrape of the foot by way
of an obeisance. `The gemman said he took it by mistak off the table when
he took oop som' money bills he laid thar; and he bade me tell your lordship's
honor he didn't oopen it at all!'

`It is the very letter I was in search of,' exclaimed the Duke, on casting his

eyes upon it. `What gentleman do you speak of? How came this into your
hands?'

`Voy, yer lordships' honor, I vos a stanin' a lookln'aboot loike, ven a gemmen
vot vos a gettin' in a coach guv it to me, and sus, sus he, take this to the
Dook and giv it in his own han' and the Dook 'll giv'ye a half crown. So yer
lordships' honor I givs it just as I was axed to do!'

Here the disguised Tudor Dauling made an awkward bow, and extended
his thickly-gloved hand for the coin he had named. The truth of the story
was, that Dauling and the Jewess were acting in concert. After he had left
the inn in his peasant's frock, with the intention of calling on his father, as his
way lay near the Jew's shop, he thought he would, to test his disguise, stop
and see if Moloch would be able to recognise him. He entered the shop, and
seeing the Jew writing at a low-black desk in one corner, he addressed him,
and priced several articles which Moloch showed to him; for rich as the
money lender was, he did not disdain to wait on the humblest customer, from
whose leathern purse he might possibly transfer a penny to his own iron coffers.
While they were thus occupied, Tudor was surprised to see a young man
in a fashionable costume descending the narrow stairs and emerge into the
shop. At a glance he saw that the face was that of the Jew's neice—his own
wife intended! though had he not seen her disguised before as a banker's
clerk and now expected to behold her there, he would not have suspected her
to have been other than she seemed—a handsome Jewish youth.

`You are then ready?' said the Moloch, in a low tone, but which he did not
think it of any importance to drop to a whisper before the dull Yorkshire-man.

`I am uncle,' answered Rachel, in the same subdued voice, which, however,
Dauling overheard.

`I tear your plan will fail, and it is besides, a very dangerous one. I wish
you would devise some other.'

This plan, be it said, was that she should in some way gain audience of the
Duke and persuade him to go with her to see his son whom she was to represent
as dying from a poison administered by himself, on learning that his father
had the evidences of his forgery. The, Duke, knowing, that Tudor and
himself were the only persons privacy to this fact, would instantly have credited
her words, and believing she came from his son, would hasten to him.—
He was to be driven to a certain dwelling near the Jew's house, and then the
forged draft was to be demanded of him, and if he resisted it was to be taken
from him by threats of death. If he had not the paper with him, he was to be
compelled to write an order, and send Racher (still disguised as a young man)
to his palace with directions how to get it.

Tudor overheard just enough of the conversation between the uncle and
neice, to show him that, as he imagined, some personal violence was contemplated
against the Duke if he refused their demand. This purpose he was resolved
should not be carried out; for he was not so lost as to sufler the life of
his father to be put in such peril. He, therefore, abruptly made himself known
to them not a little to their astonishment.

`I have thought of a better way of managing this matter, Moloch,' he said,
after their surprise had a little subsided. `The life and person of the Duke
must be held sacred. I can be a party to no act which affects his personal
liberty.'

`Name your plan, my lort,' said Moloch with a slight frown of displeasure.

`You shall draw a bill for six thousand pounds in my favor, and I will place
my father's acceptance upon it! Date it when you will, but make it to have
matured to-day.'

The Jew regarded him with surprise; but, without heeding him. Tudor
went on to detail the plan which we have already seen so successfully carried
out by the Jewess. His confidence in its being successful was based upon his
belief that the Duke, when he found that there was a second forged draft in
the hands of a Jewish broker, who had the power to cast the maker of it into
prison (but who would decline doing so, if the first draft was given up) would

yield it, although he might be ignorant of the motives which actuated the
Jew's decision; for Tudor well knew the Duke's paternal weakness, and, although,
he feared to have him hold in his hands the evidence of his crime, he
felt that it would require circumstances of the most aggravated nature which
would induce his father to make up his mind to surrender him to the Jew's
mercy, and into the stern power of the law.

This plan Moloch approved of, and the bill being made Rachel took it and
proceeded on her mission, though, secure in his disguise, Tudor was desirous
of being himself the messenger to the Duke; for if he, himself, could succeed,
he felt that he should be freed from his pledge to the Jewess. But both Moloch
and the fair and ambitious Rachel saw this view of the case as well as
he, and as they were playing a deep game, as the reader will yet discover, it
was no part of theirs to relinquish a single advantage they had obtained.
Finding he must yield, Tudor suffered her to depart: and, anxious to ascertain
the result, he soon followed the hackney-coach and waited outside the palace.

`What success?' he asked as the Jewess approached the carriage, looking
over as she walked, an open letter.

`I have obtained it, my lord,' she answered with a look of pleasure. `But
here is something that concerns you! My eye caught your name and the address
to the king, and thinking you ought to know what the Duke was communicating
respecting you, I took it up unseen. Perhaps you can understand
it better than I can! You will soon be with my uncle?' she said placing the
letter in his hand and springing into the carriage.

`Yes,' answered Tudor with a sigh at the prospect of losing his liberty to
the Jewess. He felt, for a moment, he had rather have braved the consequences
of its possession by his father. He now read the letter which she had
placed in his hands and saw at once through the plot which was formed against
him. With quick presence of mind he resolved, favored by his disguise, to
return it at once to the Duke, before he could suspect he could have seen it;
for he knew the conspiracy would not be carried out if it was suspected he
was advised of it; and it was by no means his wish, now, that it should be
stopped