The Grand Sophy (27 page)

A dingy hackney, once a gentleman’s coach, attracted little notice, but when it drew up and a tall, well-dressed young woman alighted, holding up her flounced skirts to avoid soiling them against a pile of garbage, several loafers and two small, ragged boys drew near to stare at her. Various comments were made, but these were happily phrased in such cant terms as were quite incomprehensible to Sophy. She had been stared out of countenance in too many Spanish and Portuguese villages to be in any way discomposed by the attention she was attracting, and after running a critical eye over her audience, beckoned to one of the small boys, and said with a smile, “Tell me, does a man called Goldhanger live here?”

The urchin gaped at her, but when she held out a shilling to him, caught his breath sharply, and, stretching out a claw of a hand, uttered; “Fust floor!” He then grabbed the coin and took to his heels before any of his seniors could relieve him of it.

The glimpse of largesse made the crowd converge on Sophy, but the jarvey climbed down from the box, his whip in his hand, and genially invited anyone who had a fancy for a little of the home-brewed to come on. No one accepted the invitation, and Sophy said, “Thank you, but pray do not start a brawl! I wish you will wait for me here, if you please.”

“If I was you, missie,” said the jarvey earnestly, “I’d keep out of a ken like this here, that’s what I’d do! You don’t know what might happen to you!”

“Well, if anything happens to me,” responded Sophy cheerfully, “I shall give a loud scream, and you may come in and rescue me. I shall not, I think, keep you waiting for very long.”

She then picked her way through the kennel and entered the house that had been pointed out to her. The door stood open and a flight of uncarpeted stairs lay at the end of a short passage. She went up them and found herself on a small landing. Two doors gave on to this, so she knocked on them both in an imperative way. There was a pause, and she had an unpleasant feeling that she was being watched. She looked around, but there was no one in sight, and it was only when she turned her head again that she saw that an unmistakable eye was regarding her though a small hole in one of the panels of the door at the back of the house. It disappeared instantly; there was the sound of a key turning in a lock, and the door was slowly opened to reveal a thin, swarthy individual, with long greasy curls and Semitic nose, and an ingratiating leer. He was dressed in a suit of rusty black, and nothing about him suggested sufficient affluence to lend as much as five hundred pence to anyone. His hooded eyes rapidly took in every detail of Sophy’s appearance, from the curled feathers in her high-crowned hat to the neat kid boots upon her feet.

“Good morning!” said Sophy. “Are you Mr. Goldhanger?”

He stood, a little bent, before her, wiping his hands together. “And what would you be wanting with Mr. Goldhanger, my lady?” he asked.

“I have business with him,” replied Sophy. “So if you are he please do not keep me standing in this dirty passage any longer! I cannot conceive why you do not at least sweep the floors!”

Mr. Goldhanger was considerably taken aback, a thing that had not happened to him for a very long time. He was accustomed to receiving all sorts and conditions of visitors, from furtive persons who stole into the house under cover of darkness and spilled strange wares upon the desk under the light of the one oil lamp, to haggard-eyed young men of fashion seeking relief from their immediate obligations, but never before had he opened his door to a self-possessed young lady who took him to task for not sweeping the floors.

“I wish you will stop staring at me in that foolish way!” said Sophy. “You have already peered at me through that hole in the door, and you must by now have convinced yourself that I am not a law officer in disguise.”

Mr. Goldhanger protested. The insinuation that he would not welcome a visit from a law officer seemed to wound him. However, he stood back to allow Sophy to enter the room and invited her to take a chair on one side of the large desk which occupied the center of the floor.

“Yes, but I shall be obliged to you if you will first dust it,” she said.

Mr. Goldhanger performed this office with one of his long coattails. He heard the key grate behind him, and turned sharply to see his visitor removing it from the lock.

“You won’t object to my locking the door, I daresay,” said Sophy. “I don’t in the least desire to be interrupted by any of your acquaintances, you see. And since I should much dislike to be spied on, you will permit me to stuff my handkerchief into that Judas of yours.” She removed one hand from her large swans down muff as she spoke and poked a corner of her handkerchief into the hole.

Mr. Goldhanger had the oddest feeling that the world had begun to revolve in reverse. For years he had taken care never to get into any situation he was unable to command, and his visitors were more in the habit of pleading with him than of locking the door and ordering him to dust the furniture. He could see no particular harm in allowing Sophy to retain the key, for although she was a large young woman he had no doubt of being able to wrest it from her should such a need arise. His instinct made him prefer, whenever possible, to maintain a manner of the utmost urbanity, so he now smiled and bowed, and said that my lady was welcome to do what she pleased in his humble abode. He then betook himself to the chair on the other side of the desk and asked what he might have the honor of doing for her.

“I have come on a very simple matter,” responded Sophy. “It is merely to recover from you Mr. Hubert Rivenhall’s bond and the emerald ring given you as a pledge.”

“That,” said Mr. Goldhanger, smiling more ingratiatingly than ever, “is indeed a simple matter. I shall be delighted to oblige you, my lady. I need not ask whether you have brought with you the funds, for I am sure such a businesslike lady—”

“Now, that is excellent!” interrupted Sophy cordially. “I find that so many persons imagine that if one is a female one has no head for business, and that, of course, leads to a sad waste of time. I must tell you at once that when you lent five hundred pounds to Mr. Rivenhall you lent money to a minor. I expect I need not explain to you what that means.”

She smiled in the most friendly way as she spoke these words, and Mr. Goldhanger smiled back at her, and said softly, “What a well-informed young lady, to be sure! If I sued Mr. Rivenhall for my money I could not recover it. But I do not think Mr. Rivenhall would like me to sue him for it.”

“Of course he would not,” Sophy agreed. “Moreover, although it was extremely wrong of you to have lent him any money, it seems unjust that you should not at least recover the principal.”

“Most unjust,” said Mr. Goldhanger. “There is also a little matter of the interest, my lady.”

Sophy shook her head. “No, I shan’t pay you a penny in interest, which may perhaps teach you a lesson to be more careful in future. I have with me five hundred pounds in bills, and when you have handed me the bond and the ring I will give them to you.”

Mr. Goldhanger could not help laughing a little at this, for although he had not very much sense of humor he could not but be tickled at the thought that he would forego his interest at the command of a young lady. “I think I prefer to keep the bond and the ring,” he said.

“I expect you would prefer it,” said Sophy.

“You should consider, my lady, that I could do Mr. Rivenhall a great deal of harm,” Mr. Goldhanger pointed out. “He is up at Oxford, isn’t he? Yes, I don’t think they would be pleased there if they knew of his little transaction with me. Or—”

“They would not be at all pleased,” said Sophy. “It would be a trifle awkward for you, though, would it not? But perhaps you could persuade them that you had no notion that Mr. Rivenhall was under age.”

“Such a clever young lady!” smiled Mr. Goldhanger.

“No, but I have a great deal of common sense, which tells me that if you refuse to give up the bond and the ring the best course for me to pursue would be to drive at once to Bow Street and lay the whole matter before the magistrate there.”

The smile faded; Mr. Goldhanger watched her through narrowed eyelids. “I don’t think you would be wise to do that,” he said.

“Don’t you? Well, I think it is the wisest thing I could possibly do, and I have a strong feeling that they would like to have news of you in Bow Street.”

Mr. Goldhanger shared this feeling. But he did not believe that Sophy meant what she said, his clients having the most providential dislike of publicity. He said, “I think my Lord Ombersley would prefer to pay me my money.”

“I daresay he would, and that is why I have told him nothing about it, for I think it nonsensical to be blackmailed by such a creature as you all for the want of a little courage.”

This unprecedented point of view began to engender in Mr. Goldhanger a dislike for his guest. Women, he knew, were unpredictable. He leaned forward in his chair, and tried to explain to her some of the more disagreeable consequences that would befall Mr. Rivenhall if he repudiated any part of his debt. He spoke well, and it was a sinister little speech that seldom failed to impress its hearers. It failed today.

“All this,” said Sophy, cutting him short, “is nonsense, and you must know that as well as I do. All that would happen to Mr. Rivenhall would be that he would get a great scold and be in disgrace with his father for a while, and as for being sent down from Oxford, no such thing! They will never know anything about it there, because it is my belief that you do worse things than lending money at extortionate rates to young men, and once I have been to Bow Street, ten to one they will contrive to put you in prison on quite another charge! What is more, the instant it becomes known to the law officers that you lent money to a minor you will be unable to recover a penny of it. So pray do not talk any more to me in that absurd way! I am not in the least afraid of you or of anything you can do.”

“You are very courageous,” said Mr. Goldhanger gently. “Also you have much common sense, as you told me. But I too have common sense, my lady, and I do not think that you came to see me with the consent, or even the knowledge, of your parents, or your maid, or even of Mr. Hubert Rivenhall. Perhaps you would indeed inform against me at Boy Street. I do not know, but perhaps you may never be grant the opportunity. Now, I should not like to be harsh to sue a beautiful young lady, so shall we agree to a little compromise? You will give me the five hundred pounds you have brought with you, and those pretty pearls you wear in your ears, and I will hand you Mr. Rivenhall’s bond, and we shall both of us be satisfied.”

Sophy laughed. “I imagine you would be more than satisfied!” she said. “I will give you five hundred pounds for the bond and the ring, and nothing more.”

“But perhaps you have loving parents who would be willing to give me much, much more to have you restored to them, alive, my lady, and unhurt?”

He rose from his chair as he spoke, but his objectionable guest, instead of displaying decent alarm, merely withdrew her right hand from her muff. In it she held a small but eminently serviceable pistol. “Pray sit down again, Mr. Goldhanger!” she said.

Mr. Goldhanger sat down. He believed that no female could stand loud reports, much less pull triggers, but he had seen quite enough of Sophy to be reluctant to put this belief to the test. He begged her not to be foolish.

“You must not be afraid that I don’t know how to handle guns,” Sophy told him reassuringly. “Indeed, I am a very fair shot. Perhaps I ought to tell you that I have lived for some time in Spain, where of course they have a great many unpleasant people, such as bandits. My father taught me to shoot. I am not such a fine shot as he is, but at this range I would engage to put a bullet through any part of you I chose.”

“You are trying to frighten me,” said Mr. Goldhanger querulously, “but I am not frightened of guns in women’s hands, and I know very well it is unloaded!”

“Well, if you move out of that chair you will discover that it is loaded,” said Sophy. “At least, you will be dead, but I expect you will know how it happened.”

Mr. Goldhanger gave an uneasy laugh. “And what would happen to you, my lady?” he asked.

“I don’t suppose that anything very much would happen to me,” she replied. “And I cannot conceive how that should interest you when you were dead. However, if it does, I will tell you just what I should say to the law officers.”

Mr. Goldhanger, forgetting his urbanity, said testily that he did not desire to hear it.

“You know,” said Sophy, frowning slightly, “I cannot help thinking that it might be a very good thing if I were to shoot you in any event. I did not mean to when I first came, because naturally I cannot approve of murder, but I see that you are a very evil man, and I cannot help wondering if a really courageous person would not shoot now and so rid the world of someone who has done a great deal of harm in it.”

“Put that silly gun away, and we will talk business!” Mr. Goldhanger besought her.

“There is nothing more to talk about, and I feel much more comfortable with the gun in my hand. Are you going to give me what I came for, or shall I go to Bow Street and inform them there that you tried to kidnap me?”

“My lady,” said Mr. Goldhanger, on a whining note, “I am only a poor man! You—”

“You will be much richer when I have paid you back your five hundred pounds,” Sophy pointed out.

He brightened, for it had really seemed for a few minutes as though he might be forced to forgo even this sum. “Very well,” he said. “I do not wish any unpleasantness, so I will give back the bond. The ring I cannot give back, for it was stolen from me.”