The Devil's Spectacles Page 2

  ‘Her uncle has no objection,’ my mother said; ‘and I shall be more than glad to see her. A most interesting creature, as I hear. So lovely, and so good, that they call her The Angel, at school. I say nothing about her nice little fortune or the high military rank that her poor father possessed.

  You don’t care for these things. But, oh, Alfred, it would make me so happy if you fell in love with Zilla and married her!’

  Three days before, I had made my proposal to Cecilia, and had been accepted—subject to my mother’s approval. I thought this a good opportunity of stating my case plainly; and I spoke out.

  Never before had I seen my mother so outraged and disappointed—enraged with Cecilia; disappointed in me. ‘A woman without a farthing of dowry; a woman who was as old as I was; a woman who had taken advantage of her position in the house to mislead and delude me!’ and so on, and so on. Cecilia would certainly have been sent away if I had not declared that I should feel it my duty, in that event, to marry her immediately. My mother knew my temper, and refrained from giving Cecilia any cause of offence. Cecilia, on her side, showed what is called a proper pride; she declined to become my wife until my mother approved of her. She considered herself to be a martyr; and I considered myself to be an abominably ill-treated man. Between us, I am afraid we made my good mother’s life unendurable—she was obliged to be the first who gave way. It was understood that we were to be married in the spring. It was also understood that Zilla was bitterly disappointed at having her holiday visit to us put off. ‘She was so anxious to see you, poor child.’ my mother said to me; ‘but I really daren’t ask her here under present circumstances. She is so fresh, so innocent, so infinitely superior in personal attractions to Cecilia, that I don’t know what might happen if you saw her now. You are the soul of honor, Alfred; but you and Zilla had better remain strangers to each other—you might repent your rash engagement.’ After this, it is needless to say that I was dying to see Zilla; while, at the same time, I never for an instant swerved from my fidelity to Cecilia.

  Such was my position, on the memorable day when Septimus Notman died, leaving me possessor of the Devil’s Spectacles.

  III THE TEST OF THE SPECTACLES

  The first person whom I encountered on returning to the house was the butler. He met me in the hall, with a receipted account in his hand which I had sent him to pay. The amount was close on a hundred pounds, and I had paid it immediately. ‘Is there no discount?’ I asked, looking at the receipt.

  “The parties expect cash, sir, and charge accordingly.’

  He looked so respectable when he made this answer, he had served us for so many years, that I felt an irresistible temptation to try the Devil’s Spectacles on the butler, before I ventured to look through them at the ladies of my family. Our honest old servant would be such an excellent test.

  ‘I am afraid my sight is failing me,’ I said.

  With this exceedingly simple explanation I put on the spectacles and looked at the butler.

  The hall whirled round with me; on my word of honor I tremble and turn cold while I write of it now. Septimus Notman had spoken the truth!

  In an instant the butler’s heart became hideously visible—a fat organ seen through the medium of the infernal glasses. The thought in him was plainly legible to me in these words: ‘Does my master think I’m going to give him the five per cent off the bill? Beastly meanness, interfering with the butler’s perquisites.’

  I took off my spectacles and put them in my pocket.

  ‘You are a thief,’ I said to the butler. ‘You have got the discount money on this bill—five pounds all but a shilling or two—in your pocket. Send in your accounts; you leave my service.’

  “To-morrow, sir, if you like!’ answered the butler, indignantly. ‘After serving your family for five-and-twenty years, to be called a thief for only taking my perquisites is an insult, Mr Alfred, that I have not deserved.’ He put his handkerchief to his eyes and left me.

  It was true that he had served us for a quarter of a century; it was also true that he had taken his perquisite and told a fib about it. But he had his compensating virtues. When I was a child he had given me many a ride on his knee and many a stolen drink of wine and water. His cellar-book had always been honestly kept; and his wife herself admitted that he was a model husband. At other times I should have remembered this, I should have felt that I had been hasty, and have asked his pardon. At this time I failed to feel the slightest compassion for him, and never faltered for a moment in my resolution to send him away. What change had passed over me?

  The library door opened, and an old schoolfellow and college friend of mine looked out. ‘I thought I heard your voice in the hall,’ he said; ‘I have been waiting an hour for you.’

  ‘Anything very important,’ I asked, leading the way back to the library.

  ‘Nothing of the least importance toyou,’ he replied, modestly.

  I wanted no further explanation. More than once already I had lent him money, and, Sooner or later, he had always repaid me. ‘Another little loan?’ I inquired, smiling pleasantly.

  ‘I am really ashamed to ask you again, Alfred. But if you could lend me fifty pounds—just look at that letter.’

  What mean impulse led me to repeat the excuse about my failing sight, and to read his heart on pretence of reading his letter?

  He made some joke, suggested by the quaint appearance of the Spectacles. I was too closely occupied to appreciate his sense of humor. What had he just said to me? He had said. ‘I am ashamed to ask you again.’ And what had he thought while he was speaking? He had thought.

  ‘When one has a milch cow at one’s disposal, who but a fool would fail to take advantage of it?’

  I handed him back the letter (from a lawyer, threatening ‘proceedings’) and said, in my hardest tones, ‘It’s not convenient to oblige you this time.’ He stared at me like a man thunderstruck ‘Is this a joke, Alfred?’ he asked.

  ‘Do I look as if I was joking?’

  He took up his hat. ‘There is but one excuse for you,’ he said. ‘Your social position is too much for your weak brain—your money has got into your head. Good morning.’

  I had been indebted to him for all sorts of kind services at school and college. He was an honorable man, and a faithful friend. If the galling sense of his own narrow means made him unjustly contemptuous towards rich people, it was a fault (in my case, an exasperating fault), no doubt. But who is perfect? And what are fifty pounds to me? This is what I should once have

  felt, before he could have found time enough to get to the door. As things were, I let him go and thought myself well rid of a mean hanger-on who only valued me for my money.

  Being now free to visit the ladies, I rang the bell and asked if my mother was at home. She was in her boudoir. And where was Miss Cecilia? In the boudoir, too.

  On entering the room I found visitors in the way, and put off the trial of the Spectacles until they had taken their leave. Just as they were going a thundering knock at the door announced more visitors. This time, fortunately, we escaped with no worse consequences than the delivery of cards. We actually had two minutes to ourselves I seized the opportunity of reminding my mother that I was constitutionally inaccessible to the claims of Society, and that I thought we might as well have our house to ourselves for half an hour or so. ‘Send word down stairs,’ I said,

  ‘that you are not at home.’

  My mother—magnificent in her old lace, her admirably dressed gray hair, and her finely falling robe of purple silk—looked across the fireplace at Cecilia—tall, and lazy, and beautiful, with lovely brown eyes, luxuriant black hair, a warmly-pale complexion, and an amber-colored dress—and said to me, ‘You forget Cecilia. She likes Society.’

  Cecilia looked at my mother with an air of languid surprise. ‘What an extraordinary mistake!’

  she answered. ‘I hate Society.’

  My mother smiled—rang the bell—and gave the order—Not at home. I produ
ced my Spectacles. There was an outcry at the hideous ugliness of them. I laid the blame on ‘my oculist,’

  and waited for what was to follow between the two ladies. My mother spoke. Consequently I looked it my mother.

  [I present her words first, and her thoughts next, in parenthesis.]

  ‘So you hate society, my dear? Surely you have changed your opinion lately?’

  (‘She doesn’t mind how she lies as long as she can curry favor with Alfred. False creature.’)

  [I report Cecilia’s answer on the same plan.]

  ‘Pardon me; I haven’t in the least changed my opinion—I was only afraid to express it. I hope I have not given offence by expressing it now.’ (‘She can’t exist without gossip, and then she tries to lay it on me. Worldly old wretch!’)

  What I began to think of my mother, I am ashamed to record. What I thought of Cecilia may be stated in two words. I was more eager than ever to see ‘The Angel of the school,’ the good and lovely Zilla.

  My mother stopped the further progress of my investigations. ‘Take off those hideous Spectacles, Alfred, or leave us to our visitors. I don’t say your sight may not be failing; I only say change your oculist.’

  I took off the Spectacles, all the more willingly that I began to be really afraid of them. The talk between the ladies went on.

  ‘Yours is a strange confession, my dear,’ my mother said to Cecilia. ‘May I ask what motive so young a lady can have for hating Society?’

  ‘Only the motive of wanting to improve myself,’ Cecilia answered. ‘If I knew a little more of modern languages, and if I could be something better than a feeble amateur when I paint in water colours, you might think me worthier to be Alfred’s wife. But Society is always in the way when I open my book or take up my brushes. In London I have no time to myself, and, I really can’t disguise it, the frivolous life I lead is not to my taste.’

  I thought this—(my Spectacles being in my pocket, remember)—very well and very prettily said. My mother looked at me. ‘I quite agree with Cecilia,’ I said, answering the look. ‘We cannot count on having five minutes to ourselves in London from morning to night.’ Another

  knock at the street door contributed its noisy support to my views as I spoke. ‘We daren’t even look out of the window,’ I remarked, ‘for fear Society may look up at the same moment, and see that we are at home.’

  My mother smiled. ‘You are certainly two remarkable young people,’ she said, with an air of satirical indulgence—and paused for a moment, as if an idea had occurred to her which was more than usually worthy of consideration. If her eye had not been on me at the moment, I believe I should have taken my Spectacles out of my pocket. ‘You are both so thoroughly agreed in disliking Society and despising London,’ she resumed, ‘that I feel it my duty, as a good mother, to make your lives a little more in harmony with your tastes, if I can. You complain, Alfred, that you can never count on having five minutes to yourself with Cecilia, Cecilia complains that she is perpetually interrupted in the laudable effort to improve her mind. I offer you both the whole day to yourselves, week after week, for the next three months. We will spend the winter at Long Fallas.’

  Long Fallas was our country seat. There was no hunting; the shooting was let; the place was seven miles from Timbercombe town and station; and our nearest neighbor was a young Ritualistic clergyman, popularly reported in the village to be starving himself to death. I declined my mother’s extraordinary proposal without a moment’s hesitation. Cecilia, with the readiest and sweetest submission, accepted it.

  This was our first open difference of opinion. Even without the Spectacles I could see that my mother hailed it as a good sign. She had consented to our marriage in the spring, without in the least altering her opinion that the angelic Zilla was the right wife for me. ‘Settle it between yourselves, my dears,’ she said, and left her chair to look for her work. Cecilia rose immediately to save her the trouble.

  The instant their backs were turned on me I put on the terrible glasses. Is there such a thing in anatomy as a back view of the heart? There is such a thing assuredly when you look through the Devil’s Spectacles. My mother’s private sentiments presented themselves to me, as follows: ‘If they don’t get thoroughly sick of each other in a winter at Long Fallas I give up all knowledge of human nature. He shall marry Zilla yet.’ Cecilia’s motives asserted themselves with transparent simplicity in these words, ‘His mother fully expects me to say “No.” Horrible as the prospect is, I’ll disappoint her by saying “Yes.”’

  ‘Horrible as the prospect is’ was to my mind a very revolting expression,. considering that I was personally included in the prospect. My mother’s mischievous test of our affection for each other now presented itself to me in the light of a sensible proceeding. In the solitude of Long Fallas, I should surely discover whether Cecilia was about to marry me for my money or for myself. I concealed my Spectacles, and said nothing at the time. But later, when my mother entered the drawing-room dressed to go out for dinner, I waylaid her, and, after announcing that I had reconsidered the matter, declared that I was quite willing to go to Long Fallas. Cecilia came in dressed for dinner also. She had never looked so irresistibly lovely as when she was informed of my change of opinion. ‘What a happy time we shall have,’ she said, and smiled as if she really meant it?

  They went away to their party. I was in the library when they returned. Hearing the carriage stop at the door I went out into the hall, and was suddenly checked on my way to the ladies by the sound of a man’s voice: ‘Many thanks; I am close at home now.’ My mother’s voice followed: ‘I will let you know if we go to the country, Sir John. You will ride over and see us?’

  ‘With the greatest pleasure. Good-night, Miss Cecilia.’ There was no mistaking the tone in which

  those last four words were spoken. Sir John’s accent expressed indescribable tenderness. I retired again to the library.

  My mother came in, followed by her charming companion.

  ‘Here is a new complication,’ she said. ‘Cecilia doesn’t want to go to Long Fallas.’ I asked why. Cecilia answered, without looking at me, ‘Oh, I have changed my mind.’ She turned aside to relieve my mother of her fur cloak. I instantly consulted my Spectacles, and obtained my information in these mysterious terms: ‘Sir John goes to Timbercombe.’

  Very short, and yet suggestive of more than one interpretation. A little inquiry made the facts more clear. Sir John had been one of the guests at the dinner, and he and Cecilia had shaken hands like old friends. At my mother’s request, he had been presented to her. He had produced such an excellent impression that she had taken him in her carriage part of his way home. She had also discovered that he was about to visit a relative living at Timbercombe (already mentioned, I think, as our nearest town). Another momentary opportunity with the Spectacles completed my discoveries. Sir John had proposed marriage (unsuccessfully) to Cecilia, and being still persistently in love with her, only wanted a favorable opportunity to propose again. The excellent impression which he had produced on my mother was perfectly intelligible now.

  In feeling reluctant to give her rejected lover that other opportunity, was Cecilia afraid of Sir John, or afraid of herself? My Spectacles informed me that she deliberately declined to face that question, even in her thoughts.

  Under these circumstances, the test of a dreary winter residence at Long Fallas became, to my mind, more valuable than ever. Single-handed, Cecilia might successfully keep up appearances and deceive other people, though she might not deceive me. But, in combination with Sir John, there was a chance that she might openly betray the true state of her feelings. If I was really the favored man, she would, of course, be dearer to me than ever. If not (with more producable proof than the Devil’s Spectacles to justify me), I need not hesitate to break off the engagement.

  ‘Second thoughts are not always best, dear Cecilia,’ I said. ‘Do me a favour. Let us try Long Fallas, and if we find the place quite unendurable, let us retur
n to London.’

  Cecilia looked at me and hesitated—looked at my mother, and submitted to Long Fallas in the sweetest manner. The more they were secretly at variance, the better the two ladies appeared to understand each other.

  We did not start for the country until three days afterward. The packing up was a serious matter to begin with, and my mother prolonged the delay by paying a visit to her niece at the school in the country. She kept the visit a secret from Cecilia, of course. But even when we were alone, and when I asked about Zilla, I was only favoured with a very brief reply. She merely lifted her eyes to Heaven, and said, ‘Perfectly charming!’

  IV THE TEST OF LONG FALLAS

  We had had a week of it. If we had told each other the truth we should have said, ‘Let us go back to London.’

  Thus far there had been no signs of Sir John. The Spectacles informed me that he had arrived at Timbercombe, and that Cecilia had written to him. But, strangely enough, they failed to disclose what she had said. Had she forgotten it already, or was there some defect, hitherto unsuspected, in my supernatural glasses?

  Christmas Day was near at hand. The weather was, so far, almost invariably misty and wet.

  Cecilia began to yawn over her favorite intellectual resources. My mother waited with

  superhuman patience for events. As for myself, having literally nothing else to amuse me, I took to gratil~ing an improper curiosity

  in the outlying regions of the family circle. In plain English, I discovered a nice little needlewoman, who was employed at Long Fallas. Her name was Miss Peskey. When nobody was looking, I amused myself with Miss Peskey.