THE RING AND THE GLOVE.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXI, Issue XV, 8 October 1898, Page 477

THE RING AND THE GLOVE.

I felt like Cortez upon a memorable occasion- when the jeweller’s glass door swung' behind me, and, marching up to the counter, I asked for a ring. ‘A ring, sir?’ said the attendant, a cockney to his finger tips. ‘What sort of a ring?’ ‘An engagement ring,’ said I, valorously. ‘What size, sir?’ demanded the man, docketing me mentally. ‘Five and a half,’ I replied, thinking of the glove. ‘That’s rather an unusual size,’ he remarked, rubbing one eyebrow, ‘unless it’s a bangle the lady wants.’ ‘l’m not sure that she wants it at all,’ I murmured, producing the little sandalwood scented bit of silk, ‘but that is the size, I think.’ ‘Oh—it’s the size of the lady’s ’and,’ he observed with mild toleration, unrolling it. ‘Well, sir, ladies’ fingers vary in girth, and it’s more usual to fit them with a piece of cardboard, but we’ll do our best.’ ‘Could not the member be reconstituted?’ I asked impressively. That knocked the conceit out of him; he stared at me helplessly. ‘Fill it with powder or something,’ I explained. It took him five minutes’ self discipline to grasp the startling novelty, but he did, and, under my direction, filled the third finger sheath with plate powder, which I rammed home with my pencil case. Then, producing a miniature calliper, he took measurements and began to search his scintillating stock, displaying a reverent familiarity most impressive to behold. Cleopatra, how they dazzled! Pearls, rubies, emeralds, diamonds, each challenging the admiration, but checking the desire by the narrow parchment slip attached setting forth the price. Forty pounds, £ 50, £ 100 ; it was a charmed place, where money lost its everyday significance, for what man of spirit would be content to offer the girl of his heart a thing costing a miserable tenner when close beside it twinkled a rose diamond worth a jvildemess of ‘monkeys’? I felt almost pauperized, recollecting that I had only £75 available from the Derby hundred. ‘Now, sir, what do you think of this?’ asked the shopman patronizingly, as he displayed an opal changeful as the shifting sunlight on a misty sea. ‘lt’s exactly the lady’s size, mak-

ing allowances, for, of course, she won’t want to wear it over 'er glove.’ ‘Are not opals unlucky?’ said I, endeavouring to decipher the price. ‘Oh, we don’t hold with such superstition,’ replied the jeweller loftily, ‘but they do say one will keep you from being poisoned.*

‘Then I shall leave it for the next rich widow,’ I answered. ‘But what is the eost of this?’

I alluded to an emerald set amid pearls, which I already saw glittering on the loveliest hand in the world. He extracted it with a silent respect he borrowed from my eagerness, and made a measurement while I watched him, my heart beating madly. The size was exactly the same; the price—but that is a detail. I decided upon it. The shopman thanked me perfunctorily andlleaned against the counter, feeling like one who had received a great favour. But when I fumbled in my pocket for the notes and heard their crisp crackle my confidence returned, and then, as I watched the splendid thing flashing in its violet bed I believed I must after all be a rich man, unknown to myself, so great was the suggestion of unlimited wealth thus conveyed.

‘I should like a piece of glass on the inside of the case lid,' I observed carelessly. ‘ls it usual?’ ‘That’s looking glass?’ queried the lapidary, glancing up from a surreptitious examination of the notes.

I nodded. I knew I must be getting red.

‘Well,’ he remarked tolerantly, ‘it's not exactly usual, but it's a pretty idea—'ightens the attraction of the gem, makes the lady see the present from two points of view.’ ‘Hardly an advantage sometimes,' I observed, ‘but- can you do it?"

‘Well, yes, I should think, 'he replied condescendingly. ‘Then get it done, and I shall stand the racket!’ I answered magnificently. He hurried away to effect the alteration, his place being taken by a bald headed salesman who wore spectacles, and talked to me over them soothingly, as one would to a person of weak intellect, while I formulated piratical schemes and asked him puerile questions with a gravity equalling his own.

When I left the shop I headed straight for Bloomsbury Square, but remembering that she might lx? just then occupied by domestic duties, decided to call later in the day. Even the ring in my pocket gave me no additional courage, and presently I began to think it was not quite royal enough. Edging my way to Regent’s Park, I hunted out a quiet spot and sat down to examine it at leisure. It was glorious still, but somehow not so glorious as I could have wished, and I was actually questioning the wisdom of my choice when an approaching footfall made me close the case. It was light, though firm, and the everlasting flint would have worn well beneath it. Something, more of the intellect than of the sense, made me look up, and I saw her.

The sensation of being shot through the heart has not, I believe, received adequate literary expression, those who experience it being usually preoccupied at the exact moment with other matters; but I think 1 know what it means. She stopped, and we gazed at each other. She was in deep black, but the pallor" had gone from her oval cheeks. She made me a halftentative -bow. I sprang to my feet. “I’m so glad to see you,’ I cried, ‘because—l want to restore something" you forgot in the restaurant yester —a few weeks ago." ‘How kind of you! she said, coming nearer. ‘Oh, not at all,’ 1 replied; ‘but I hope you were not inconvenienced. 1 should have sent it, but I—l didn’t.’ I put my hand in my pocket hurriedly, and extracted my handkerchief, which in turn brought to light a sheaf of letters and memoranda 1 shook out at her feet like a skilful conjurer. Then I tried the other pocket, but vainly. ‘lt's a glove,’ I said weakly, gathering up my belongings, ‘one of yours, don’t you know?' ‘I recollect —I missed it.’ she said coldly. ‘But the cab went so quickly,' 1 pleaded; ‘ah, do sit down until I find it!’ She did so. I was in a gentle perspiration. ‘Pray do not take so much trouble.' she murmured, plaintively. ‘Hurrah, I have it!' I cried, and I extracted the wisp of silk from my

watch pocket, where I had thrust it on leaving the shop.

‘So kind of you,’ she observed, taking it. Then the powder ran over her dress.

‘How stupid!' I gasped, completely demoralized now, and retaking the glove 1 shook it vigorously until I had created a miniature dust storm. She sneezed. I devoutly wished that the flying machine was an accomplished fact.

‘lt’s ruined,’ I muttered woefully, for it certainly presented a piebald appearance.

She smiled. I sat down, saying desperately— ‘Would you allow me to keep it —the thing is of no use now?’ ‘Why?’ she answered quietly; but. the voice was low.

‘To remind me of that happy day,* I replied, shyly. ‘lndeed? 1 am glad that you think of it as a pleasant one,' she said graciously. ‘Mr Turnbull was declaiming all the way back in the cab. He seemed prejudiced against you.’

"He may be described as a man whomeans well,’ 1 observed severely. ‘I hope he said something actionable.’

‘Oh, hardly that!’ she answered laughingly; ‘but he seems to have changed his opinion lately. Your name happened to come up in conversation to-day, ami he said '

She paused: a sudden flame leaped into her cheeks. ‘What did he say?’ I demanded, trying to look away.

"He said you were an honourable man,’ she replied, the point of her

parasol tracing 1 a lop-sided isosceles triangle in the dust, ‘but 'Ah, there is much virtue in that "but,” ' I observed bitterly. That you ought to settle down,’ she continued, tossing her head and rising. •So I shall!’ I cried; ‘but it depends upon my lady. I have her portrait here in this case. She is the only girl I shall ever care for in that way,’ I added, because a little qualification does no harm at even the most exalted moments. ‘By the way, she is an acquaintance of yours, too.’ And, pressing the spring, I handed the casket to her as the lid flew back. She glanced at me curiously, very pale now. I, weak about the knees, watched a child trundle a hoop past us. She uttered a little cry that sank into a sobbing laugh. Then she sat down beside me and put one of the hands I ho|»e to hold when Death beckons me down the last dim turning of life's road, into mine. ‘1 trust she will make you a good wife.’ she said gravely. And—well, surely man born of woman can guess the rest.

HOW NAPOLEON FORESAW HIS DOOM.

Over the profound mind of Napoleon two permanent misgivings rose and brooded, like evil planets, which shone into the depths of his abysmal calculations, to prognosticate his end. Victory seemed to ride in chariots of glory upon his visible horizon, promising him such universal power, as had never yet been granted to a single man. But within his mind, amidst the reflex play of incalculable chances, foreseen, provided against, and tabulated, in spite of absolute uncertainty—those misgivings mocked him. The one concerned the influence of women in politics; the other, the influence of England on the world. In order to annihilate their pernicious power, he first reduced women not only to the appearance but to the condition of puppets. But the effects of his action were long neutralised by the law of nature which had given him Josephine to wife. Not until Fortune, weary of her favours, suffered him to discard Josephine, did Napoleon become aware of all he had unconsciously possessed, and wilfully thrown away, of the infinite policy of woman. Determined to govern alone, free from criticism on the one hand or seduction on the other, he quenched as he believed the malevolent influence of the sex, simply by obscuring it from sight. THAT OTHER STAR. So far successful in his aversion of the Evil Eye, he was able to bend all his mind upon the malignant rays of that other Star, which shone across the strip of sea that separated him from England. Turn where he would, its light followed him, projecting into his consciousness that instinctive warning which great men dread more than the assassin’s knife;, that assertion, at once scorned and believed in, ‘Brother, thou shalt fall.’ His readirig of the English mind went fat more astray than any theories he miglit have conceived upon the fatal results of feminine power. For neither the Greek nor the Italian nor the Jew in him could afford him reliable assistance in discovering the basis of the English character. From first to last he was left in entire ignorance of a race which always baffled and at last defeated him. The art of Napoleon, in spite of exquisite insight, was inadequate to the problem which it presented. He knew of no metaphysical process which would reveal to him the brutal and moral structure of the British backbone. His conclusions on the English idiosyncracy were continually incorrect. Whether he appealed to the nation’s pride, its patriotism, or love of gain, he never touched the nerve he sought to reach. The answer to his policy was invariably a directly opposite one to that he might have expected. In diplomatic relations with England he failed, because there can be no diplomacy where there is no point of contact in mental vision. THE LAW OF FORCE. There remains one argument which has proved an admirable enforcement of his diplomacy with all other nations. The law of Force has a surprising method of coming to terms. Napoleon might be excused for thinking that he, who had assured his policy in Europe by invariable conquest, might dispose of diplomacy with England by the same method. Here, too, however, he had reasons for secret misgivings. At the awe belonging to his greatness, the wondrous Island smiled. He had ruined her traffic, and she was not ruined. He had met her Government with ali his arts, and it had responded with a sledge-hammer. Whom all Europe bowed to she refused to acknowledge. She had not only the massive strength of a giant, but something of the giant’s craft. Odd, that her strength should be so rugged and yet so quick, to root out the very’ core of a dissimulation truly Machiavellian! The compact British nation had conceived by some inveterate reasoning peculiar to its physique that Bonaparte was a liar, and that liars, being vermin, are innoxious only when destroyed. It wasted no time on preambles, nor would it listen to promises nor stay itself upon plausible bases of faith. ‘ln no case will we treat with this man,’ cried Pitt in the House of Com-

mens. And the bulk of the nation echoed him with singular and deafening unanimity. FATE WORKS. What was, then, the mind of Napoleon against the convictions of England? England, with trade at a standstill, and with a handful of soldiers to put against French conscriptions; solid as a people, unilluminated, insular, prejudiced to the limits of the absurd, said to this great Soldier of Fortune— We do not know you, and therefore the whole world shall disown you.’ Fate works through nations, as through individuals. Napoleon foresaw his doom. He

fought against it, derided it, moved heaven and earth to swear it down, and perpetuate his image. But the sense oi impending evil never left him, although he mounted on his symbolic eagles’ wings. It is a sense which, like canker, eats into the heart secretly and rapidly. It possesses a man, and with a fungus growth climbs from his heart to his head, and invests his brain. The sun shines on him, but he feels the poison in his blood. Vainly he fought his deadly stars; vainly, but with skill and courage. The lustre of England, in the thick of conflict, shone unvaried.—‘The Adventures of a Goldsmith,’ By M. H. Bourchier.