The Trail of the Serpent/Book 5/Chapter 6
Chapter VI.
Signor Mosquetti relates an Adventure.
On the evening which follows the very afternoon during which Richard Marwood made his first and only essay in the milk-trade, the Count and Countess de Marolles attend a musical party—I beg pardon, I should, gentle reader, as you know, have said a soirée musicale—at the house of a lady of high rank in Belgrave Square. London was almost empty, and this was one of the last parties of the season; but it is a goodly and an impressive sight to see—even when London is, according to every fashionable authority, a perfect Sahara—how many splendid carriages will draw up to the awning my Lady erects over the pavement before her door, when she announces herself "at home;" how many gorgeously dressed and lovely women will descend therefrom, scenting the night air of Belgravia with the fragrance wafted from their waving tresses and point-d'Alençon-bordered handkerchiefs; lending a perfume to the autumn violets struggling out a fading existence in Dresden boxes on the drawing-room balconies; lending the light of their diamonds to the gas-lamps before the door, and the light of their eyes to help out the aforesaid diamonds; sweeping the autumn dust and evening dews with the borders of costly silks, and marvels of Lyons and Spitalfields, and altogether glorifying the ground over which they walk.
On this evening one range of windows, at least, in Belgrave Square is brilliantly illuminated. Lady Londersdon's Musical Wednesday, the last of the season, has been inaugurated with éclat by a scena from Signora Scorici, of Her Majesty's Theatre and the Nobility's Concerts; and Mr. Argyle Fitz-Bertram, the great English basso-baritono, and the handsomest man in England, has just shaken the square with the buffo duet from the Cenerentola—in which performance he, Argyle, has so entirely swamped that amiable tenor Signor Maretti, that the latter gentleman has serious thoughts of calling him out to-morrow morning; which idea he would carry into execution if Argyle Fitz-Bertram were not a crack shot, and a pet pupil of Mr. Angelo's into the bargain.
But even the great Argyle finds himself—with the exception of being up to his eyes in a slough of despond, in the way of platonic flirtation with a fat duchess of fifty—comparatively nowhere. The star of the evening is the new tenor, Signor Mosquetti, who has condescended to attend Lady Londersdon's Wednesday. Argyle, who is the best-natured fellow as well as the most generous, and whose great rich voice wells up from a heart as sound as his lungs, throws himself back into a low easy-chair—it creaks a little under his weight, by the bye—and allows the duchess to flirt with him, while a buzz goes round the room; Mosquetti is going to sing. Argyle looks lazily out of his half-closed dark eyes, with that peculiar expression which seems to say—"Sing your best, old fellow! My g in the bass clef would crush your half-octave or so of falsetto before you knew where you were, or your 'Pretty Jane' either. Sing away, my boy! we'll have 'Scots wha hae' by-and-by. I've some friends down in Essex who want to hear it, and the wind's in the right quarter for the voice to travel. They won't hear you five doors off. Sing your best."
Just as Signor Mosquetti is about to take his place at the piano, the Count and Countess de Marolles advance through the crowd about the doorway.
Valerie, beautiful, pale, calm as ever, is received with considerable empressement by her hostess. She is the heiress of one of the most ancient and aristocratic families in France, and is moreover the wife of one of the richest men in London, so is sure of a welcome throughout Belgravia.
"Mosquetti is going to sing," murmurs Lady Londersdon; "you were charmed with him in the Lucia, of course? You have lost Fitz-Bertram's duet. It was charming; all the chandeliers were shaken by his lower notes; charming, I assure you. He'll sing again after Mosquetti: the Duchess of C. is éprise, as you see. I believe she is perpetually sending him diamond rings and studs; and the Duke, they do say, has refused to be responsible for her account at Storr's."
Valerie's interest in Mr. Fitz-Bertram's conduct is not very intense; she bends her haughty head, just slightly elevating her arched eyebrows with the faintest indication of well-bred surprise; but she is interested in Signor Mosquetti, and avails herself of the seat her hostess offers to her near Erard's grand piano. The song concludes very soon after she is seated; but Mosquetti remains near the piano, talking to an elderly gentleman, who is evidently a connoisseur.
"I have never heard but one man, Signor Mosquetti," says this gentleman, "whose voice resembled yours."
There is nothing very particular in the words, but Valerie's attention is apparently arrested by them, for she fixes her eyes intently on Signor Mosquetti, as though awaiting his reply.
"And he, my lord?" says Mosquetti, interrogatively.
"He, poor fellow, is dead." Now indeed Valerie, pale with a pallor greater than usual, listens as though her whole soul hung on the words she heard.
"He is dead," continued the gentleman. "He died young, in the zenith of his reputation. His name was—let me see—I heard him in Paris last; his name was———"
"De Lancy, perhaps, my lord?" says Mosquetti.
"It was De Lancy; yes. He had some most peculiar and at the same time most beautiful tones in his voice, and you appeal to me to have the very same."
Mosquetti bowed at the compliment. "It is singular, my lord," he said; "but I doubt if those tones are quite natural to me. I am a little of a mimic, and at one period of my life I was in the habit of imitating poor De Lancy, whose singing I very much admired."
Valerie grasps the delicate fan in her nervous hand so tightly that the group of courtiers and fair ladies, of the time of Louis Quatorze, dancing nothing particular on a blue cloud, are crushed out of all symmetry as she listens to this conversation.
"I was, at the time I knew De Lancy, merely a chorus-singer at the Italian Opera, Paris."
The listeners draw nearer, and form quite a circle round Mosquetti, who is the lion of the night; even Argyle Fitz-Bertram pricks up his ears, and deserts the Duchess in order to hear this conversation.
"A low chorus-singer," he mutters to himself. "So help me, Jupiter, I knew he was a nobody."
"This passion for mimicry," said Mosquetti, "was so great that I acquired a sort of celebrity throughout the Opera House, and even beyond its walls. I could imitate De Lancy better, perhaps, than any one else; for in height, figure, and general appearance I was said to resemble him."
"You do," said the gentleman; "you do very much resemble the poor fellow."
"This resemblance one day gave rise to quite an adventure, which, if I shall not bore you———" he glanced round.
There is a general murmur. "Bore us! No! Delighted, enraptured, charmed above all things!" Fitz-Bertram is quite energetic in this omnes business, and says, "No, no!"—muttering to himself afterwards, "So help me, Jupiter, I knew the fellow was a nuisance!"
"But the adventure! Pray let us hear it!" cried eager voices.
"Well, ladies and gentlemen, I was a careless reckless fellow; quite content to put on a pair of russet boots which half swallowed me, and a green cotton-velvet tunic short in the sleeves and tight across the chest, and to go on the stage and sing in a chorus with fifty others, as idle as myself, in other russet boots and cotton-velvet tunics, which, as you know, is the court costume of a chorus-singer from the time of Charlemagne to the reign of Louis XV. I was quite happy, I say, to lounge on to the stage, unknown, unnoticed, badly paid and worse dressed, provided when the chorus was finished I had my cigarette, dominoes, and my glass of cognac in a third-rate café. I was playing one morning at those eternal dominoes—(and never, I think," said Mosquetti, parenthetically, "had a poor fellow so many double-sixes in his hand)—when I was told a gentleman wanted to see me. This seemed too good a joke—a gentleman for me! It couldn't be a limb of the law, as I didn't owe a farthing—no Parisian tradesman being quite so demented as to give me credit. It was a gentleman—a very aristocratic-looking fellow; handsome—but I didn't like his face; affable—and yet I didn't like his manner."
Ah, Valerie! you may well listen now!
"He wanted me, he said," continued Mosquetti, "to decide a little wager. Some foolish girl, who had seen De Lancy on the stage, and who believed him the ideal hero of romance, and was only in too much danger of throwing her heart and fortune at his feet, was to be disenchanted by any stratagem that could be devised. Her parents had intrusted the management of the affair to him, a relation of the lady's. Would I assist him? Would I represent De Lancy, and play a little scene in the Bois de Boulogne, to open the eyes of this silly boarding-school miss—would I, for a consideration? It was only to act a little stage play off the stage, and was for a good cause. I consented; and that evening, at half-past ten o'clock, under the shadow of the winter night and the leafless trees, I———"
"Stop, stop! Signor Mosquetti!" cry the bystanders. "Madame! Madame de Marolles! Water! Smelling-salts! Your flacon, Lady Emily: she has fainted!"
No; she has not fainted; this is something worse than fainting, this convulsive agony, in which the proud form writhes, while the white and livid lips murmur strange and dreadful words.
"Murdered, murdered and innocent! while I, vile dupe, pitiful fool, was only a puppet in the hands of a demon!"
At this very moment Monsieur de Marolles, who has been summoned from the adjoining apartment, where he has been discussing a financial measure with some members of the lower House, enters hurriedly.
"Valerie, Valerie, what is the matter?" he says, approaching his wife.
She rises—rises with a terrible effort, and looks him full in the face.
"I thought, monsieur, that I knew the hideous abyss of your black soul to its lowest depths. I was wrong; I never knew you till to-night."
Imagine such strong language as this in a Belgravian drawingroom, and then you can imagine the astonishment of the bystanders.
"Good heavens!" exclaimed Signor Mosquetti hurriedly.
"What?" cried they eagerly.
"That is the very man I have been speaking of."
"That? The Count de Marolles?"
"The man bending over the lady who has fainted."
Petrified Belgravians experience a new sensation—surprise—and rather like it.
Argyle Fitz-Bertram twists his black moustachios reflectively, and mutters—
"So help me, Jupiter, I knew there'd be a row! I shan't have to sing 'Scots wha hae,' and shall be just in time for that little supper at the Café de l'Europe."