I Walked in Arden Part 6

One evening, after we had been a few weeks in Deep Harbor, Knowlton arrived at my rooms as soon as he had had supper.

"Teddy, I've got a new job for you and one that'll keep you--well, it'll keep you pretty busy." There was one comforting thing about Knowlton, he never beat about the bush.

"What is it?" I asked anxiously.

"I've just hired a chemical a.s.sistant for you."

"Is that all?"

"No, it's much more complicated than that. This fellow is an old inventor--a kind of genius. At any rate, I've got faith in him. He dreams dreams and sees visions, like the fellow in the Bible--Job, wasn't it? I guess you know what I mean. But he has two serious drawbacks. He isn't practical--not the least idea of the value of money.

It's up to you to see he does economically what he's told. The other drawback is that he drinks and is thoroughly unreliable. You've got to keep him straight and keep him away from the booze. His favourite occupation, aside from chemistry, is alternating Ba.s.s's ale with brandy and Benedictine. Then he gets ugly and his experiments suffer. When he's sober, he's a wonder."

I still was totally at sea as to what was expected of me.

"He looks like a pirate from the Barbary coast--San Francisco," Knowlton went on, "and when he's full he acts like one. I've rented the bedroom that opens into this study for him. You can share the sitting room and work here evenings on your chemical problems. Also you will be able to keep an eye on him. The first time he comes home pickled, you let me know."

This cool way of supplying me with a roommate staggered me.

"Do you wish me to cable your father to authorize this arrangement?"

said Knowlton, with his unerring skill in tracing the course of my thoughts.

"Not if you honestly tell me it is for the good of the business, and not because you want to tie me down."

"Well," he puffed, looking at his cigarette, "I'm frank enough to say it's a mixture of both. We need this man in our business and some one has got to look after him. It's two birds with one barrel."

"It's very inconvenient for me," I objected. "I like to read and experiment with my literary work in the evenings."

"The world is often an inconvenient place," moralized Knowlton. "It might be inconvenient for several of us if old Prospero gets to hitting the booze."

"Prospero?" I enquired, surprised by Knowlton's sudden excursion into literature.

"That's the best name I know for him. I learned a piece about him in school once, something about cloud-capped palaces leaving a wreck behind them, or words to that effect. I have a hunch that if you steer old Prospero right, he'll bring one of those cloud-capped palaces down to earth. The only thing that worries me is the danger of the wreck behind.

Shakespeare certainly knew human nature all right. He was a wise boy."

Knowlton achieved his carefully planned purpose of disarming me. I laughed and even began to feel most curious concerning Prospero.

"What is the real name of your genius?" I asked, still postponing my final decision.

"John de Fougere is what he call's himself, since he decided he had French blood. As a matter of fact he took this name to avoid an unnecessary wife in Cripple Creek. That's a piece of information I've salted away for what it may be worth to us. Just now he is living with an ex-circus gymnast. I'm buying the lady off, and persuaded John to pay his alimony to her. He thinks I think this circus woman is his wife.

Prospero's right name is Donald McClintock and he hails originally from South Carolina. There's still some Scotch that isn't whiskey in him somewhere."

"I think you have planned a rather heavy contract for me. Won't he get restless without his gymnastic companion?"

"No. You see Prospero is all brains and no physical strength. Lately the lady has taken to practicing her gymnastic skill on him and beats him up every time he stays out nights. He says she is too cra.s.sly material to appreciate his knowledge of chemistry. If we can keep him in shape and use his brains for three months, I'll be satisfied."

"All right" I agreed finally. "You may move him in here and I'll stand it as long as I can. When does he arrive?"

"Day after tomorrow."

With this Knowlton rose and took himself off, leaving me to meditate upon this new complication in life.

Wednesday evening brought Prospero. Knowlton escorted him to my apartment, and the door between my study and the extra bedroom was formally opened. Prospero revealed the reason for his name. He was a tall, gaunt, swarthy individual over whose sharp bones a sallow, shrunken skin clung tightly. His eyes, deep sunken and brown, glowed beneath bushy eyebrows. His long, lean face was adorned with a waxed moustache and sharp pointed goatee, which, together with an ample brimmed felt hat, gave him the appearance of a royalist of the ancient regime. He wore a Byronic collar, above which protruded an enormous Adam's apple resting in the folds of a flowing black tie. His hands, tapering like a vulture's claws, were covered with cheap imitation jewelry. A suit of outrageous checked tweeds and patent leather pumps gave the last touch to his bizarre appearance. Any one seeing him would seize upon him as a character newly stepped from some detective story or tale of mystery. His breath was strongly impregnated with alcohol, which the smoke of a Cuban cigarette hanging loosely from a flabby lower lip could not conceal. He seemed even more out of place in Deep Harbor than I did. Some mediaeval alchemist's cell, hung with crocodiles and stuffed owls, was the only natural background for him.

With him he brought infinite luggage--everything from a steamer roll to a canvas dunnage bag, all of it portable. As we shook hands, an act which he performed in a most friendly manner, he crossed the room, opened one of his mysterious overflowing bags, and produced a box of costly chocolates. These he solemnly pa.s.sed--like the Dodo in "Alice in Wonderland," I thought. Like Alice I took one, fearing to offend him.

Then he drew his chair up to a table and announced that he was ready to talk business.

Knowlton evidently understood what was expected, for he took out a roll of bills and counted out a respectable pile. "I think you will find the amount correct--two months' pay in advance as per our agreement," said Knowlton. Prospero made great ceremony of counting and recounting the bills in silence, moistening his fingers frequently and getting the smoke from his cigarette in his eyes at intervals during the process.

"And now, Teddy, my lad," he said suddenly to me, to my intense surprise, calling me by my nickname in this unexpected way, "we'll go out, get something to eat, and see the town."

I looked at Knowlton, and his expression denoted approval. I fetched my hat and the two of us sallied forth. Don Quixote and Sancho were not a more ill-a.s.sorted couple, and it was not strange that men turned to stare at us in the street.

"You are French, I believe," I said at last in a desperate effort to start conversation. I didn't believe it, but I wanted to know what he would say. His answer was astounding.

"I am a descendant of Charles Martel," he announced as if he were stating the most ordinary fact. I let the statement pa.s.s in silence.

"Are you leading me to the best restaurant in town?" he queried a block further on.

"If you wish," I replied. "The best restaurant in town is a relative question. We'll try the so-called grill room at the Otooska House."

Our entrance together was easily the event of the evening. Prospero demanded a table like an emperor issuing a proclamation. Waiters came upon the run from every nook and cranny and crowded tables upon us. He was content to sit at the most conspicuous. To one waiter he handed his hat, to another his stick, to a third, his gloves, and bade a fourth "Divest my friend of his paraphernalia." There was a distinct touch of Wilkins Micawber in his make-up, I decided; still, one must expect that of a present-day relative of Charles Martel.

"Stout and oysters for two," he commanded. "I have ventured to order stout and oysters in compliment to you," he explained. "The combination is new to me, but I have read about it in Charles d.i.c.kens' novels."

"We are rather inland for oysters," I said. "They have an indecent habit here of serving them nude on a plate--without their sh.e.l.l, I mean," I added, as Prospero frowned questioningly.

"You are a chemist, Edward? Am I right?" Prospero's questions sounded like those of Rhadamanthus.

"I'm trying to be one," I modestly rejoined.

"I am the greatest chemist in the world, if I choose to let men know it." It seemed to me rather ill concealed for a secret of such importance. "I have an idea here--" he tapped his forehead--"that will make me rich beyond the dreams of avarice. Would you like to know what it is?"

"Very much," I said sipping my stout gratefully.

"Listen!" he proclaimed. "I have discovered the secret of making electricity direct from coal! What do you think of me now?" And he sat back to study the effect of his dramatic announcement on me. I felt that common politeness compelled me in some way to rise to the occasion.

"It sounds marvellous," I said. "Have you ever done it?"

He waved this question aside with a long draft of stout. "Not yet," he sputtered through the brown foam on his moustache, "but that is immaterial, for I know the secret." I contemplated him a bit ruefully, wondering if the hard-headed Knowlton had made a good bargain in saddling us with this.

"You doubt me," he remarked. "That is because you do not know me yet. Do you know"--suddenly dropping his voice to a whisper--"I am not convinced yet that the alchemist's search for the philosopher's stone was vain. It might be possible--locked within the element radium that secret lies.

And if men are to find it out, I shall be that man."

"Oh, h.e.l.l, Mr. Fougere!" I said much nettled, "all this has very little to do with the chemistry we use in our business."

"True, my young materialist, true. He who looks straight before his nose shall see but the dust. My gaze is among the stars. But you need not worry. I shall give you and your father every cent's value that the most exacting business man could ask of me. If you care nothing for my true brains and want only my routine daily labour, that will be _your_ loss--yet I shall not hold it against you. Money is the curse of the age."