- CHAPTER IV -
The Baroness Gobelli’s temperament was as inconsistent as her dress. Under the garb of jocose good-humour, which often degenerated to horse play, she concealed a jealous and vindictive disposition which would go any lengths, when offended, to revenge itself. She was wont to say that she never forgot nor forgave an injury, and that when she had her knife (as she termed it) in a man she knew how to bide her time, but that when the time came, she turned it. These bloodthirsty sentiments, coupled with an asseveration which was constantly on her lips, that when she willed the death of anyone he died, and that she had powers at her command of which no one was aware but herself, frightened many timid and ignorant people into trying to propitiate so apparently potent a mortal, and generally kowtooing before her. To such votaries, so long as they pleased her, Madame Gobelli was used to shew her favour by various gifts of dresses, jewelry, or money, according to their circumstances, for in some cases she was lavishly generous but she soon tired of her acquaint-ances and replaced them by fresh favourites.
The hints that she gave forth regarding herself and her antecedents, were too extraordinary to gain credence except from the most ignorant of her auditors, but the Baroness always spoke in parables and left no proof of what she meant, to be brought up against her. This proved that if she were clever, she was still more cunning. The hints she occasionally gave of being descended from Royal blood, though on the wrong side of the blanket, and of the connection being acknowledged privately if not publicly by the existing members of the reigning family, were received with open mouths by people of her own class but rejected with scorn by such as were acquainted with those whom she affected to know. It was remarkable also, and only another proof that whatever her real birth and antecedents the Baroness Gobelli was unique, that notwithstanding her desire to be considered noble by birth if not by law, she never shirked the fact that the Baron was in trade—on the contrary she rather made a boast of it and used to relate stories bringing it into ridicule with the greatest gusto. The fact being that Baron Gobelli was the head of a large firm of export bootmakers trading in London under the name of Fantaisie et Cie, the boots and shoes of which, though professedly French, were all manufactured in Germany where the firm maintained an enormous factory. The Baroness could seldom be in the company of anyone for more than five minutes without asking them where they bought their boots and shoes, and recommending them to Fantaisie et Cie as the best makers in London. She wanted to be first in everything—in popularity, in notice, and in conversation—if she could not attract attention by her personality she startled people by her vulgarity—if she could not reign supreme by reason of her supposed birth, she would do so by boots and shoes if nothing else—and if anybody slighted her or appeared to discredit her statements, he or she was immediately marked down for retaliation.
Harriet Brandt had not been many days in Heyst before the Baroness had become jealous of the attention which she paid Mrs. Pullen and her child. She saw that the girl was attractive, she heard that she was rich, and she liked to have pretty and pleasant young people about her when at home—they drew men to the house and reflected a sort of credit upon herself—and she determined to get Harriet away from Margaret Pullen and chain her to her own side instead. The Baroness hated Miss Leyton quite as much as Elinor hated her. She was quick of hearing and very intuitive—she had caught more than one of the young lady’s uncomplimentary remarks upon herself, and had divined still more than she had heard. She had observed her sympathy with Bobby also, and that she encouraged him in his boyish rebellion. For all these reasons, she “had her knife” into Miss Leyton and was waiting her opportunity to turn it. And she foresaw—with the assistance perhaps of the Powers of Darkness, of whose acquaintance she was so proud—that she would be enabled to take her revenge on Elinor Leyton through Harriet Brandt.
But her first advances to the latter were suavity itself. She was not going to frighten the girl by shewing her claws until she had stroked her down the right way with her pattes de velours.[93]
She came upon her one morning as she sat upon the sands with little Ethel in her arms. The nurse was within speaking distance, busy with her needlework, and the infant seemed so quiet with Miss Brandt and she took such evident pleasure in nursing it, that Mrs. Pullen no longer minded leaving them together, and had gone for a stroll with Miss Leyton along the Digue. So the Baroness found Harriet, comparatively speaking, alone.
“So you’re playing at nursemaid again!” she commenced in her abrupt manner. “You seem to have taken a wonderful fancy to that child!”
“She is such a good little creature,” replied Harriet, “she is no trouble whatever. She sleeps half the day!”
Miss Brandt had a large box of chocolates beside her into which she continually dipped her hand. Her mouth, too, was stained with the delicate sweet meat—she was always eating either fruit or bonbons. She handed the box now, with a timid air, to the Baroness.
“Do you care for chocolate, Madame?” she asked.
The Baroness did not like to be called “Madame” according to the French fashion. She thought it derogated from her dignity. She wished every one to address her as “my lady,” and considered she was cheated out of her rights when it was omitted. But she liked chocolate almost as well as Harriet did.
“Thank you! I’ll ’ave a few!” she said, grabbing about a dozen in her huge hand at the first venture. “What a liking for candies the Amurricans seem to ’ave introduced into England! I can remember the time when you never saw such a thing as sweets in the palace—I don’t think they were allowed—and now they’re all over the place. I shouldn’t wonder if Her Majesty hasn’t a box or two in her private apartments, and as for the Princesses, well—!”
“The Palace!—Her Majesty!”—echoed Miss Brandt, opening her dark eyes very wide.
“As I tell ’em,” continued the Baroness, “they won’t ’ave a tooth left amongst the lot of ’em soon! What are you staring at?”
“But—but—do you go to the Queen’s palace?” demanded Harriet, incredulously, as well she might.
“Not unless I’m sent for, you may take your oath! I ain’t fond enough of ’em for all that; besides, Windsor’s ’orribly damp and don’t suit me at all. But you mustn’t go and repeat what I tell you in the Hotel. It might give offence in high places if I was known to talk of it. You see there’s some of ’em has never seen me since I married the Baron! Being in trade they thought ’e wasn’t good enough for me! I’ve ’eard that when Lady Morton—the dowager Countess, you know—was asked if she ’ad seen me lately, she called out loud enough for the whole room to ’ear, ‘Do you mean the woman that married the boot man? No! I ’aven’t seen ’er, and I don’t mean to either!’ Ha! ha! ha! But I can afford to laugh at all that, my dear!”
“But—I don’t quite understand!” said Harriet Brandt, with a bewildered look.
“Why! the Baron deals in shoe-leather! ’Aven’t you ’eard it? I suppose we’ve got the largest manufactory in Germany! Covers four acres of ground, I give you my word!”
“Shoe-leather!” again ejaculated Harriet Brandt, not knowing what to say.
“Why, yes! of course all the aristocracy go in for trade now-adays! It’s the fashion! There’s the Viscountess Gormsby keeps a bonnet shop, and Lord Charles Snowe ’as a bakery, and Lady Harrison ’as an old curiosity shop and stands about it dusting tables and chairs all day! But how can you know anything about it, just coming from the West Indies and all those ’orrid blacks! Ain’t you glad to find yourself amongst Christians again?”
“This is the first time I ever left Jamaica,” said Miss Brandt, “I was born there.”
“But you won’t die there, or I’m much mistaken! You’re too good to be wasted on Jamaica! When are you going back to England?”
“O! I don’t know! I’ve hardly thought about it yet! Not while Mrs. Pullen stays here though!”
“Why! you’re not tied to ’er apron-string, surely! What’s she t
o you?”
“She is very kind and I have no friends!” replied Miss Brandt.
The Baroness burst into a coarse laugh.
“You won’t want for friends once you shew your face in England, I can tell you. I’d like to ’ave you at our ’ouse, the Red ’Ouse we call it. Princess—but there, I mustn’t tell you ’er name or it’ll go through the Hotel, and she says things to me that she never means to go further—but she said the other day that she preferred the Red ’Ouse to Windsor! And for comfort and cheerfulness so she may!”
“I suppose it is very beautiful then!” observed Harriet.
“You must judge for yourself,” replied the Baroness with a broad smile, “when you come to London. You’ll be your own mistress there I suppose, and not so tied as you are here! I call it a shame to keep you dancing attendance on that brat when there’s a nurse whose business it is to look after ’er!”
“O! but indeed it is my own wish!” said the girl as she cuddled the sleeping baby to her bosom and laid her lips in a long kiss upon its little mouth. “I asked leave to nurse her! She loves me and even Nurse cannot get her off to sleep as I can! And it is so beautiful to have something to love you, Madame Gobelli! In the Convent I felt so cold—so lonely! If ever I took a liking to a girl we were placed in separate rooms! It is what I have longed for—to come out into the world and find someone to be a friend and to love me, only me, and all for myself!”
Madame Gobelli laughed again.
“Well! You’ve only got to shew those eyes of yours to get plenty of people to love you and let you love them in return—that is, if the men count in your estimation of what’s beautiful!”
Harriet raised her eyes and looked at the woman who addressed her.
There was the innocence of Ignorance in them as yet, but the slumbering fire in their depths proved of what her nature would be capable when it was given the opportunity to shew itself. Hers was a passionate temperament, yearning to express itself—panting for the love which it had never known—and ready to burst forth like a tree into blossom directly the sun of Desire and Reciprocity shone upon it. The elder woman, who had not been without her little experiences in her day, recognised the feeling at once and thought that she would not give a fig for the virtue of any man who was subjected to its influence.
“I don’t think that you’ll confine your attentions to babies long!” quoth the Baroness, as she encountered that glance.
“How do you know?” said her young companion.
“Ah! it’s enough that I do know, my dear! I ’ave ways and means of knowing things that I keep to myself! I ’ave friends about me too who can tell me everything—who can ’elp me, if I choose, to give Life and Fortune to one person and Trouble and Death to another—and woe to them that offend me, that’s all!”
But if the Baroness expected to impress Miss Brandt with her hints of terror she was mistaken. Harriet did not seem in the least astonished. She had been brought up by old Pete and the servants on her father’s plantation to believe in witches and the evil eye, and “Obeah”[94] and the whole cult of Devil worship.
“I know all about that,” she remarked presently, “but you can’t do me either good or harm. I want nothing from you and I never shall!”
“Don’t you be too sure of that!” replied Madame Gobelli, nodding her head. “I’ve brought young women more luck than enough with their lovers before now—yes! and married women into the bargain! If it ’adn’t been for me, Lady—there! it nearly slipped out didn’t it?—but there’s a certain Countess who would never ’ave been a widow and married for the second time to the man of ’er ’eart, if I ’adn’t ’elped ’er and she knows it too! By the way, ’ow do you like Miss Leyton?”
“Not at all,” replied Harriet quickly. “She is not a bit like Mrs. Pullen—so cold and stiff and disagreeable! She hardly ever speaks to me! Is it true that she’s the daughter of a lord, as Madame Lamont says, and is it that makes her so proud?”
“She’s the daughter of Lord Walthamstowe, but that’s nothing. They’ve got no money. ’Er people live down in the country, quite in a beggarly manner. A gal with a fortune of ’er own would rank ’eads and ’eads above ’er in Society. There’s not much thought of beside money now-a-days, I can tell you!”
“Why does she stay with Mrs. Pullen then? Are they any relation to each other?” demanded Harriet.
“Relation, no! I expect she’s just brought ’er ’ere out of charity, and because she couldn’t afford to go to the seaside by ’erself!”
She had been about to announce the projected relationship between the two ladies when a sudden thought struck her. Captain Ralph Pullen was expected to arrive in Heyst in a few days—thus much she had ascertained through the landlady of the Lion d’Or. She knew by repute that he was considered to be one of the handsomest and most conceited men in the Limerick Rangers, a corps which was noted for its good-looking officers. It might be better for the furtherance of her plans against the peace of Miss Leyton’s mind, she thought, to keep her engagement to Captain Pullen a secret—at all events no one could say it was her business to make it public. She looked in Harriet Brandt’s yearning, passionate eyes, and decided that it would be strange if any impressionable young man could be thrown within their influence without having his fidelity a little shaken, especially if affianced to such a cold, uninteresting “bit of goods” as Elinor Leyton. Like the parrot in the story, though she said nothing, she “thought a deal” and inwardly rumbled with half-suppressed laughter as she pictured the discomfiture of the latter young lady, if by any chance she should find her fiancé’s attentions transferred from herself to the little West Indian.
“You seem amused, Madame!” said Harriet presently.
“I was thinking of you and all the young men who are doomed to be slaughtered by those eyes of yours,” said the Baroness. “You’d make mischief enough amongst my friends, I bet, if I ’ad you at the Red ’Ouse!”
Harriet felt flattered and consciously pleased. She had never received a compliment in the Convent—no one had ever hinted that she was pretty and she had had no opportunity of hearing it since.
“Do you think I am handsome then?” she enquired with a heightened colour.
“I think you’re a deal worse! I think you’re dangerous!” replied her new friend, “and I wouldn’t trust you with the Baron any further than I could see you!”
“O! how can you say so?” exclaimed the girl, though she was pleased all the same to hear it said.
“I wouldn’t, and that’s the truth! Gustave’s an awful fellow after the gals. I ’ave to keep a tight old on ’im, I can tell you, and the more you keep out of ’is way, the better I shall be pleased! You’ll make a grand match some day if you’re only sharp and keep your eyes open.”
“What do you call a grand match?” asked Harriet, as she let the nurse take the sleeping child from her arms without remonstrance.
“Why! a Lord or an Honourable at the very least! since you ’ave money of your own. It’s money they’re all after in these times you know—why! we ’ave dooks and markisses marrying all sorts of gals from Amurrica—gals whose fathers made their money in oil, or medicine, or electricity, or any other dodge, so long as they made it! And why shouldn’t you do the same as the Amurrican gals? You have money, I know—and a goodish lot I fancy—” added the Baroness, with her cunning eyes fixed upon the girl as if to read her thoughts.
“O! yes!” replied Harriet, “Mr. Trawler, my trustee, said it was too much for a young woman to have under her own control, but I don’t know anything about the value of money, never having had it to spend before. I am to have fifteen hundred pounds every year. Is that a good deal?”
“Quite enough to settle you in life, my dear!” exclaimed the Baroness, who immediately thought what a good thing it would be if Miss Brandt could be persuaded to sink her capital in the boot trade, “and all under your own control too! You are a lucky young woman! I know ’alf a dozen lords—not to say Princes
—who would jump at you!”
“Princes!” cried Harriet, unable to believe her ears.
“Certainly! Not English ones of course, but German, which are quite as good after all, for a Prince is a Prince any day! There’s Prince Adalbert of Waxsquiemer, and Prince Harold of Muddlesheim, and Prince Loris of Taxelmein, and ever so many more, and they’re in and out of the Red ’Ouse twenty times a day! But don’t you be in an ’urry! Don’t take the first that offers, Miss Brandt! Pick and choose! Flirt with whom you like and ’ave your fun, but wait and look about you a bit before you decide!”
The prospect was too dazzling! Harriet Brandt’s magnificent eyes were opened to their widest extent—her cheeks flushed with expectation—both life and light had flashed into her countenance. Her soul was expanding, her nature was awakening—it shone through every feature—the Baroness had had no idea she was so beautiful! And the hungry, yearning look was more accentuated than before—it seemed as if she were on the alert, watching for something, like a panther awaiting the advent of its prey. It was a look that women would have shrunk from, and men welcomed and eagerly responded to.
“I should like to go and see you when I go to England—very much!” she articulated slowly.
“And so you shall, my dear! The Baron and me will be very glad to ’ave you on a visit. And you mustn’t let that capital of yours lie idle, you know! If it’s in your own ’ands you must make it yield double to what it does now! You consult Gustave! ’E’s a regular business man and knows ’ow many beans make five! ’E’ll tell you what’s best to be done with it—’e’ll be a good friend to you, and you can trust ’im with everything!”
The Blood of the Vampire Page 9
