general mathieson was on the point of going out for a drive with his niece, who was buttoning her glove, when a servant entered the drawing room and said that a gentleman wished to speak to him.
"who is he? did he give you his name or say what was his business?"
"no, sir. i have not seen him before. he merely asked me to give you his message."
"i suppose i had better see him, hilda."
"well, uncle, i will get out of the way and go downstairs when he has come in. don't let him keep you, for you know that when i have put you down at your club i have an engagement to take lina crossley to do some shopping first, and then for a drive in the park."
"i don't suppose that he will be five minutes, whoever he is."
hilda slipped away just in time to avoid the visitor. as the manservant opened the door the general looked with some interest at the stranger, for such it seemed to him his visitor was. he was a tall man, well dressed, and yet without the precision that would mark him as being a member of a good club or an habitué of the row.
"you don't remember me, general?" he said, with a slight smile.
"i cannot say that i do," the general replied. "your face does not seem unfamiliar to me, though i cannot at the present moment place it."
"it is rather an uncommon name," the visitor said; "but i am not surprised that you do not remember it or me, for it is some twenty years since we met. my name is simcoe."
"twenty years!" the general repeated. "then it[pg 66] must have been in india, for twenty years ago i was in command of the benares district. simcoe!" he broke off excitedly. "of course i knew a gentleman of that name who did me an inestimable service; in fact, he saved my life."
"i don't know that it was as much as that, but at least i saved you from being mauled by a tiger."
"bless me!" the general exclaimed, taking a step forward, "and you are the man. i recognize you now, and had i not believed that you had been lost at sea within a month after you had saved my life i should have known you at once, though, of course, twenty years have changed you a good deal. my dear sir, i am happy indeed to know that the report was a false one, and to meet you again." and he shook hands with his visitor with the greatest warmth.
"i am not surprised that you did not recognize me," the latter said; "i was but twenty-five then, and have been knocking about the world ever since, and have gone through some very rough times and done some very hard work. of course you saw my name among the list of the passengers on board the nepaul, which went down with, as was supposed, all hands in that tremendous storm in the bay of bengal. happily, i escaped. i was washed overboard just as the wreck of the mainmast had been cut away. a wave carried me close to it; i climbed upon it and lashed myself to leeward of the top, which sheltered me a good deal. five days later i was picked up insensible and was carried to singapore. i was in hospital there for some weeks. when i quite recovered, being penniless, without references or friends, i shipped on board a vessel that was going on a trading voyage among the islands. i had come out to see the world, and thought that i might as well see it that way as another. it would take a long time to relate my after-adventures; suffice it that at last, after numerous wanderings, i became chief adviser of a powerful chief in burmah, and finally have returned home, not exactly a rich man, but with enough to live upon in more than comfort for the rest of my life."[pg 67]
"how long have you been in london?"
"i have been here but a fortnight; i ran down home to see if i had relatives living, but found that an old lady was the sole survivor of my family. i need scarcely say that my first business on reaching london was to rig myself out in a presentable sort of way, and i may say that at present i feel very uncomfortable in these garments after being twenty years without putting on a black coat. i happened the other day to see your name among those who attended the levée, and i said to myself at once, 'i will call upon the general and see if he has any remembrances of me.'"
at this moment a servant entered the room with a little note.
"my dear uncle: it is very naughty of you to be so long. i am taking the carriage, and have told them to put the other horse into the brougham and bring it round for you at once."
for more than an hour the two men sat talking together, and simcoe, on leaving, accepted a cordial invitation from the general to dinner on the following day.
"well, uncle, who was it?" hilda asked, when they met in the drawing room a few minutes before the dinner hour. "you said you would not be five minutes, and i waited for a quarter of an hour and then lost patience. i asked when i came in how long he had stayed, and heard that he did not leave until five o'clock."
"he was a man who had saved my life in india, child."
"dear me! and have you never heard of him since, uncle?"
"no, dear. i did my best to find out his family, but had no idea of ever seeing the man himself, for the simple reason that i believed that he died twenty years ago. he had sailed in a vessel that was reported as lost with all hands, so you may well imagine my surprise when he told me who he was."[pg 68]
"did you recognize him at once, uncle?"
"not at first. twenty years is a long time; and he was only about five-and-twenty when i knew him, and of course he has changed greatly. however, even before he told me who he was i was able to recall his face. he was a tall, active young fellow then, and i could certainly trace the likeness."
"i suppose he was in the army, uncle?"
"no; he was a young englishman who was making a tour through india. i was in command at benares at the time, and he brought me letters of introduction from a man who had come out in the same ship with him, and also from a friend of mine in calcutta. a few days after he arrived i was on the point of going up with a party to do some tiger-shooting in the terai, and i invited him to come with us. he was a pleasant fellow and soon made himself popular. he never said much about himself, but as far as i understood him he was not a rich man, but he was spending his money in seeing the world, with a sort of happy confidence that something would turn up when his money was gone.
"we were out a week and had fair sport. as you have often heard me say, i was passionately fond of big-game shooting, and i had had many narrow escapes in the course of my life, but i never had so narrow a one as happened to me on that occasion. we had wounded a tiger and had lost him. we had spent a couple of hours in beating the jungle, but without success, and had agreed that the brute could not have been hit as hard as we had believed, but must have made off altogether. we were within fifty yards of the edge of the jungle, when there was a sudden roar, and before i could use my rifle the tiger sprang. i was not in a howdah, but on a pad; and the tiger struck one of its forepaws on my knee. with the other he clung for a moment to the pad, and then we went down together. the brute seized me by the shoulder and sprang into the jungle again, carried me a dozen yards or so, and then lay down, still holding me by the shoulder.[pg 69]
"i was perfectly sensible, but felt somewhat dazed and stupid; i found myself vaguely thinking that he must, after all, have been very badly hit, and, instead of making off, had hid up within a short distance of the spot where we saw him. i was unable to move hand or foot, for he was lying on me, and his weight was pressing the life out of me. i know that i vaguely hoped i should die before he took a bite at my shoulder. i suppose that the whole thing did not last a minute, though to me it seemed an interminable time. suddenly there was a rustling in the bush. with a deep growl the tiger loosed his hold of my shoulder, and, rising to his feet, faced half round. what happened after that i only know from hearsay.
"simcoe, it seems, was riding in the howdah on an elephant behind mine. as the tiger sprang at my elephant he fired and hit the beast on the shoulder. it was that, no doubt, that caused its hold to relax, and brought us to the ground together. as the tiger sprang with me into the jungle simcoe leaped down from the howdah and followed. he had only his empty rifle and a large hunting-knife. it was no easy work pushing his way through the jungle, but in a minute he came upon us. clubbing his gun, he brought it down on the left side of the tiger's head before the brute, who was hampered by his broken shoulder, and weak from his previous wound, could spring. had it not been that it was the right shoulder that was broken, the blow, heavy as it was, would have had little effect upon the brute; as it was, having no support on that side, it reeled half over and then, with a snarling growl, sprang upon its assailant. simcoe partly leaped aside, and striking again with the barrel of his gun,—the butt had splintered with the first blow,—so far turned it aside that instead of receiving the blow direct, which would certainly have broken in his skull, it fell in a slanting direction on his left shoulder.
"the force was sufficient to knock him down, but, as he fell, he drew his knife. the tiger had leaped partly beyond him, so that he lay under its stomach, and it could not for the moment use either its teeth or claws. the[pg 70] pressure was terrible, but with his last remaining strength he drove the knife to the full length of its blade twice into the tiger's body. the animal rolled over for a moment, but there was still life in it, and it again sprang to its feet, when a couple of balls struck it in the head, and it fell dead. three officers had slipped down from their howdahs when they saw simcoe rushing into the jungle, and coming up just in time, they fired, and so finished the conflict.
"there was not much to choose between simcoe and myself, though i had certainly got the worst of it. the flesh of his arm had been pretty well stripped off from the shoulder to the elbow; my shoulder had been broken, and the flesh torn by the brute's teeth, but as it had not shifted its hold from the time it first grasped me till it let go to face simcoe, it was not so bad as it might have been. but the wound on the leg was more serious; its claws had struck just above the knee-cap and had completely torn it off. we were both insensible when we were lifted up and carried down to the camp. in a fortnight simcoe was about; but it was some months before i could walk again, and, as you know, my right leg is still stiff. i had a very narrow escape of my life; fever set in, and when simcoe went down country, a month after the affair, i was still lying between life and death, and never had an opportunity of thanking him for the manner in which, practically unarmed, he went in to face a wounded tiger in order to save my life. you may imagine, then, my regret when a month later we got the news that the nepaul, in which he had sailed, had been lost with all hands."
"it was a gallant action indeed, uncle. you told me something about it soon after i came here, when i happened to ask you how it was that you walked so stiffly, but you did not tell it so fully. and what is he going to do now?"
"he is going to settle in london. he has been, as he says, knocking about in the east ever since, being engaged in all sorts of adventures; he has been for some time in the service of a native chief some way up near the[pg 71] borders of burmah, siam, and china, and somehow got possession of a large number of rubies and other precious stones, which he has turned into money, and now intends to take chambers and settle down to a quiet life, join a club, and so on. of course i promised to do all in my power to further his object, and to introduce him into as much society as he cared for."
"what is he like, uncle?"
"he is about my height, and i suppose about five-and-forty—though he looks rather older. no wonder, after such a life as he has led. he carries himself well, and he is altogether much more presentable than you would expect under the circumstances. indeed, had i not known that he had never served, i should unhesitatingly have put him down as having been in the army. there is something about the way he carries his shoulders that you seldom see except among men who have been drilled. he is coming here to dine to-morrow, so you will see him."
"that relieves me of anxiety, uncle; for you know you had a letter this morning from colonel fitzhugh, saying that he had been unexpectedly called out of town, and you said that you would ask somebody at the club to fill his place, but you know you very often forget things that you ought to remember."
"i certainly had forgotten that when i asked him to come, and as i came home i blamed myself for not having asked someone else, so as to make up an even number."
a month later mr. simcoe had become an intimate of general mathieson's house. it had always been a matter of deep regret to the general that he had been unable to thank the man who at terrible risk to his life had saved him from death, and that feeling was heightened when the news came that his preserver had been drowned, and that the opportunity of doing so was forever lost. he now spared no pains to further his wishes. he constantly invited him to lunch or dinner at his club, introduced him to all his friends in terms of the highest eulogium, and repeated over and over again the story of his heroic action. as his own club was a military one he could not[pg 72] propose him there, but he had no difficulty in getting friends to propose and support him for two other clubs of good standing.
several of the officers to whom he introduced simcoe had been at benares at the time he was hurt. these he recognized at once, and was able to chat with them of their mutual acquaintances, and indeed surprised them by his knowledge of matters at the station that they would hardly have thought would be known to one who had made but a short stay there. one of them said as much, but simcoe said, laughing, "you forget that i was laid up for a month. everyone was very good to me, and i had generally one or two men sitting with me, and the amount of gossip i picked up about the station was wonderful. of course there was nothing else to talk about; and as i have a good memory, i think i could tell you something about the private affairs of pretty nearly every civilian and military man on the station."
everyone agreed that simcoe was a very pleasant and amusing companion. he was full of anecdotes of the wild people that he had lived among and of the adventures and escapes he had gone through. although none of the benares friends of the general recognized simcoe when they first met him, they speedily recalled his features. his instant recognition of them, his acquaintance with persons and scenes at and around benares was such that they never for a moment doubted his identity, and as their remembrance of the general's visitor returned they even wondered that their recognition of him had not been as instant as his of them. as to his means, not even to the general had simcoe explained his exact position. he had taken good apartments in jermyn street, gave excellent little dinners there, kept undeniably good wine and equally excellent cigars, dressed well, and was regarded as being a thoroughly good fellow.
the general was not a close observer. had he been so, he would speedily have noticed that his niece, although always polite and courteous to mr. simcoe, did not receive him with the warmth and pleasure with which she[pg 73] greeted those who were her favorites. on his part the visitor spared no pains to make himself agreeable to her; he would at once volunteer to execute any commission for her if she happened to mention in his presence anything that she wanted. one evening when she was going to a ball he sent her an expensive bouquet of flowers. the next day when she saw him she said:
"i am very much obliged to you for those lovely flowers, and i carried the bouquet last night, but please do not send any more. i don't think that it is quite nice to accept presents from anyone except very near relations. it was very kind of you to think of it, but i would really rather that you did not do it again. uncle gives me carte blanche in the way of flowers, but i do not avail myself of it very largely, for the scent is apt to make me feel faint, and beyond the smallest spray i seldom carry any. i made an exception last night, for those you sent me were most lovely. you don't mind my saying that, do you?"
"not at all, miss covington; and i quite understand what you mean. it seemed natural to me to send you some flowers. out in the pacific islands, especially at samoa and tahiti, and, indeed, more or less everywhere, women wear a profusion of flowers in their hair, and no present is so acceptable to them."
"i fancy flowers do not cost so much there as they do here, mr. simcoe?"
"no," the latter laughed; "for half a dollar one can get enough to render a girl the envy of all others."
"i think you were right to ask mr. simcoe not to repeat his present, hilda," the general said. "i particularly noticed the bouquet that you carried last night."
"yes, uncle, there was nothing equal to it in the room; it must have cost three or four guineas."
"i don't think that you quite like him; do you, hilda?"
"i like him, uncle, because he saved your life; but in other respects i do not know that i do like him[pg 74] particularly. he is very pleasant and very amusing, but i don't feel that i quite understand him."
"how do you mean that you don't understand him?"
"i cannot quite explain, uncle. to begin with, i don't seem to get any nearer to him—i mean to what he really is. i know more of his adventures and his life than i did, but i know no more of him himself than i did three months ago when i first met him at dinner."
"at any rate you know that he is brave," the general said, somewhat gravely.
"yes, i know that, of course; but a man can be brave, exceptionally brave, and yet not possess all other good qualities. he did behave like a hero in your case, and i need not say that i feel deeply grateful to him for the service that he rendered you; still, that is the only side of his nature that i feel certain about."
"pooh! pooh! hilda," the general said, with some irritation. "what do you know about nine-tenths of the men you meet? you cannot even tell that they are brave."
"no, uncle; i know only the side they choose to present to me, which is a pleasant side, and i do not care to know more. but it is different in this case. mr. simcoe is here nearly every day; he has become one of our inner circle; you are naturally deeply interested in him, and i am, therefore, interested in him also, and want to know more of him than i have got to know. he is brave and pleasant; is he also honest and honorable? is he a man of thoroughly good principles? we know what he tells us of his life and his adventures, but he only tells us what he chooses."
the general shrugged his shoulders.
"my dear child, you may say the same thing of pretty nearly every unmarried man you meet. when a man marries and sets up a household one does get to know something about him. there are his wife's relations, who, as a rule, speak with much frankness concerning a man who has married their daughter, sister, or cousin. but as to bachelors, as a rule one has to take them at their[pg 75] own valuation. of course, i know no more than you do as to whether simcoe is in all respects an honorable gentleman. it is quite sufficient that he saved my life, almost at the sacrifice of his own, and whatever the life he may have led since is no business of mine. he is distinctly popular among those i have introduced him to, and is not likely in any way to discredit that introduction."
that hilda was not entirely satisfied was evident by the letter she wrote when her uncle had, as usual, gone up one afternoon to his club.
"my dear netta: i have told you several times about the mr. simcoe who saved uncle's life out in india, and who is so intimate at the house. i can't say that either my acquaintance with or my liking for him increases. he does not stand the test of the system, and the more i watch his lips the less i understand him. he talks fluently and quickly, and yet somehow i feel that there is a hesitation in his speech, and that his lips are repeating what they have learned, and not speaking spontaneously. you know that we have noticed the same thing among those who have learned to speak by the system but are not yet perfect in it, so i need not explain further what i mean, as you will understand it. for example, i can always tell at a public meeting, or when listening to a preacher, whether he is speaking absolutely extemporarily or whether he has learned his speech by heart beforehand.
"i really strongly misdoubt the man. of course i know that he saved my uncle's life; beyond that i know nothing of him, and it is this very feeling that i do know nothing that disquiets me. i can no more see into him than i can into a stone wall. i can quite understand that it is of very great importance to him to stand well with the general. he came here a stranger with a queer history. he knew no one; he had money and wanted to get into society. through my uncle he has done so; he has been elected to two clubs, has made a great number of acquaintances, goes to the row, the royal academy, the theaters, and so on, and is, at any rate, on nodding terms[pg 76] with a very large number of people. all this he owes to my uncle, and i fail to see what else he can wish for. it would be natural with so many other engagements that he should not come to us so often as he used to do, but there is no falling off in that respect. he is the tame cat of the establishment. i dare say you think me silly to worry over such a thing, but i can't help worrying. i hate things i don't understand, and i don't understand this man.
"another thing is, walter does not like him. he constantly brings the child toys, but walter does not take to him, refuses absolutely to sit upon his knee, or to be petted by him in any way. i always think that it is a bad sign when a child won't take to a man. however, i will not bother you more about it now; i will keep him out of my letters as much as i can. i wish i could keep him out of my mind also. as i tell myself over and over again, he is nothing to me, and whether he possesses all the virtues or none of them is, or at any rate should be, a matter of indifference to me. i can't help wishing that you had come over here two months later, then i should have had the benefit of your advice and opinion, for you know, netta, how accustomed i was for years to consider you almost, if not quite, infallible."
