“How do you feel now?” my host asked, a shade of anxiety crossing his brow.
* * * *
There was still the strange look in my host’s eyes—a sort of passionate and eager longing.
“I am very well, thank you, Sir, and more grateful than I can tell you.”
“Hang the gratitude! Tell me if you feel any sense of repletion? Does the blood seem mounting to the head? Are you quite free from any giddiness? No thickness in the speech? It’s wonderful, it’s providential, my finding you. Such a windfall; and just when I most wanted it. Our blessings truly come when we least expect them.”
I as strange language, but the whole proceedings were so strange that I hardly noticed it. Besides, I was extremely comfortable after my dinner, and disposed to rest.
“Now,” he went on, “while you are digesting—by the way, the digestion is, I trust, unimpaired by drink or excess? Quite so; and what I expected in so good and so gifted a young man. Like an ostrich, as you say. Ho, ho! Ha! Ha! Like an ostrich! It is, indeed; too much. Tell me, now, something, gently and dispassionately, so as not to injure your digestion, about your history.”
I told him all. While I related my simple story he interrupted now and then with some fresh question on the growth, the endurance, the regularity of my appetite, to which I gave satisfactory answers. When I had quite finished he went to the table—I noticed then that all traces of the dinner had disappeared—and laid out a document, by which he placed a pen. Then he drew a chair, sat down in front of me, and assumed a serious air.
“Come,” he said, peremptorily, “let us get now to business.”
I had not the smallest notion what the business was, but I bowed and waited. Perhaps he was going to offer me a clerkship. Visions of a large salary, to suit my expansive appetite, came across my brain.
“In your case,” he began, “the possession of so great an appetite must be attended with serious inconveniences. You have no money, in a few hours you will be hungry again; you will endure great pain and suffering, greater than is felt by men less largely endowed with the greatest blessing—I mean with appetite.”
“Yes,” I said, “it is a great trouble to me, this twist of mine, especially when I am hard up.”
He almost jumped out of his chair.
“Why, there,” he cried, “what is the use of words? We are agreed already. Nothing could be more fortunate. Let us have no more beating about the bush. Young man, I will rid you of this nuisance; I will buy your appetite of you.”
I only stared. Was the old gentleman mad?
“It is a strange offer, I know,” he went on, “a strange offer, and you have probably never heard a more remarkable one. But it is genuine. I will buy your appetite of you.”
“Buy my—buy my appetite?”
“Nothing easier. Read this.”
He gave me the paper which he had laid on the table, prepared in readiness, I suppose, for me. It was as follows:
“I, Luke Lucraft, being in sound mind and in good health, and of the mature age of twenty-four, do voluntarily and of my own free will and accord agree and promise to resign my appetite entirely and altogether for the use of Ebenezer Grumbelow from the day and hour of the execution of this deed. In return whereof I agree to accept a monthly allowance of £30, also to date from the moment of signature, with a sum of £50, to be placed in my hands. I promise also that I will carefully study to preserve by regular habits and exercise the gift of a generous appetite; that I will not work immoderately, sit up late, practise vicious courses, or do anything that may tend to impair the regular recurrence of a healthy and vigorous hunger.”
Then followed a place for the signature and one for the witnesses.
“You see,” he went on, “I ask for no unpleasant condition. I give you a free life, coupled with the simple condition of ordinary care. Do you agree?”
“I hardly know; it is so sudden.”
“Come, come”—he spoke with a harshness quite new—”come, let us have no nonsense of that sort. Do you agree?”
I read it over again.
“Give me a little time,” I said. “Let me reflect till tomorrow morning.”
“Reflect!” His face flushed purple, and his bloodshot eyes literally glared. “Reflect! what the devil does the boy want to reflect about? Has he got a penny, a friend, or a chance in the whole world? I will give you five minutes—come.” He rose up and stood before me. As I looked in his face a curious dimness came over my eyes; he seemed to recede before me; he disappeared altogether. When I heard him speak again his voice sounded far, far off, but thin and clear, as if it came through some long tube. “Luke Lucraft,” it said, “see yourself.”
Yes; I saw myself, and though outside of what I saw, I felt the same emotions as if I had been the actual performer in the scenes I witnessed.
I was standing where the old gentleman met me, starving still, and suffering pangs far worse than those under which I groaned at three o’clock. The day was advanced; the diners had all gone away, and the dining-room waiters were putting up the shutters. I spoke to one of them timidly. I told him I had eaten nothing since the morning, and begged for a plate of broken victuals. He looked in my face, called a brother-servant, and they kicked me from the door. People were rougher in London fifty years ago. Then I slunk away, and wandered somewhere among the winding streets and lanes of the old city. London at night was not so empty and deserted as it is now, and the streets had people in them. Some of them were well dressed—the wealthy merchants had not, even then, all left off living in the city; some were clerks going home; some were women out for an evening’s walk. The bells rang out the hours from the city clocks, and I crept along the walls wondering what would become of me, and how I should find an end of my present misery.
Then I begged. Took off my hat and held it in my hand while I asked for something—anything—the smallest coin that would get a piece of bread.
The men passed me by with pitiless and unbelieving eyes. Heavens! If they had been hungry once, only once, in all their lives, they would never again have refused the petition of a beggar, even though he was the most lying mendicant who ever disgraced the words of charity which passed his lips. But they gave me nothing.
The women edged away from me and passed on the other side if I timidly pressed my claim. They had nothing to fear from me. At last I asked a girl. She was more unfortunate than myself, but she was not hungry, and she gave me a shilling.
Then I found a shop open, and bought a plate Of meat. That spent—I saw myself slinking ashamed and wretched again along the cold and empty street. When I could walk no more I found myself in Covent Garden Market, and threw myself under shelter of a roof at least among the stalks and leaves and straw which littered the place.
I awoke early, and hungry again. I rose and resumed my miserable walk.
Hope by this time was dead within me; I could think of nothing but my intolerable hunger; could feel nothing but the pain which would not leave me; could look at nothing but food in the window.
I begged again, and begged all day without success.
It was a rougher time, that, than the present. More than one man laid his stick across my back with an impatient admonition to get to work, you lazy rogue. But I was too feeble to retaliate or remonstrate. Was there no charity in the world? I passed other beggars in the streets who looked fat and comfortable. People gave them money, but they would give me none. The time wore on, and my craving for food became irresistible.
I passed a shop which had a tray outside of baked potatoes. The owner had his back to me. I stole one. Yes, I stole one. No one saw me. He did not see me as I slunk past him with guilty face, and swiftly sped round the nearest corner to eat the stolen morsel.
What is the use of a single baked potato? Presently I returned to the same place with the inten
tion of taking another. But they were all gone. I went on looking for another provision shop. I came to a place where hot smoking sausages were bubbling in a pan over a charcoal fire. The shop stood at a comer. There was only a girl minding it. I deliberately walked in, took a sausage from the pan, hot as it was, and stepped out again before her astonishment even prompted her to cry out.
The time seemed intolerably long. All these scenes Passed before me, not as the quick and steady flight of the rapidly falling moments, but as if the agony and the shame were deliberately lengthened out.
Then came a third time when I stole, maddened by the dream of hunger. This time I was detected, pursued, and apprehended. The misery and shame of the hour when I stood before the magistrate, in that horrible vision of a possible future, I cannot even yet forget. With this a constant sense of unsatisfied and craving hunger; a feeling as if hunger was the greatest evil in the whole world; a longing to get rid of it. Last scene of all, I was lying dead, starved to death with hunger and cold, in a miserable, bare, and naked garret.
By what black art did the old man delude my senses? It was a lie, and he knew it. I should have got some honest work, if only to wheel bricks or carry loads.
“There is your future, young man”—there came up from the distance the voice of the tempter—”a gloomy prospect: a miserable life: a wretched ending. Now look at the other side.”
The scene changed. I saw myself, but in another guise. My hunger had vanished; I felt it no more.
This time I was happy, light-hearted, and cheerful. I remembered scenes of misery through which I had just passed, and the recollection added more sweetness to my present enjoyment. It seemed as if I should never be hungry any more, and never feel the want of food. I was like a Greek god in my exemption from the common weakness of humanity. I was rich, too, and knew that I had the command, somehow, of all that money could buy.
I was sitting in a garden, and around me were troops of girls. I heard the rustle of their dresses, caught the laughter from their lips, watched the lustre of their eyes, saw the moonlight dance among their waving locks, as they ran and played among the trees and flowers. One of them sat by me and sang to a guitar:—
Life is made for love. Ah! Why
Should its sweetness e’er be marred?
List! the echoes will not die.
Still the sweet word “love” to guard.
Nought but love. Oh! Happy youth.
Free from need of baser thought.
Stay with us, and learn this truth.
Set with song, with music wrought.
Thine is love, an endless feast;
Beauty—sweeter far than wine;
Joy, from lower cares released—
Never star rose bright as thine.
I knew, somehow or other, that this was allegorical, and, as if I expressed my thought, the scene changed, and I was in real life.
Chambers in London, such as I had read of, overlooking St James’s Park. I sat in them in the midst of books and pictures. I had no business to call me away from my indolent ease; I had no anxiety about the future. I got up and strolled about the streets looking at the shops. If I fancied a thing I bought it. I went to picture galleries and saw the latest works of art; I went to the theatre and saw the performance from a comfortable box; I went riding in the park.
Then my fancy returned to my first love, and I saw myself walking in a country lane with Juliet. She was sweeter to look upon than ever, and more delightful in her frank and innocent love for me. We rambled along under the hedges while I gathered flowers for her, and talked of the happy, happy days when we should be one, soon now to arrive, and of the sweet, loving life which should be ours far away from the troubles of the world.
Dreams, idle dreams; but sweet to me, after the agony of the last, as a draught of water to a parched traveller on Sahara.
The pictures changed as fast as my fancy wandered from one thing to another. In all I was the same—free from the downward and earthly pressure of want and hunger, relieved from anxiety, with plenty of money, and full of all sweet and innocent fancies.
Lies again. But by what power could this necromancer so cheat and gull my brain?
“Very different scenes these, my dear young friend,” he said in a winning voice, “are they not? Now,” he went on, and his voice was quite close to me, “you have had your five minutes.”
The cloud passed from my eyes. I was sitting again in the octagonal room, the old man before me, watch in hand, as if he was counting the seconds.
“Five minutes and a quarter,” he growled. “Now choose.”
“I have chosen,” I replied. “I accept your offer.”
The influence of the things I had seen was too strong upon me. I could neither reason nor reflect.
“I accept your offer.”
“Why, that’s brave,” he said, with a gigantic sigh of relief. “That’s what I expected of you. Boule-de-neige—Boule-de-neige!”
He clapped his hands.
Instantly the horrible old negro appeared behind his master’s chair, as if he had sprung up from the ground. I believe he had. He looked more like a devil than ever, grinning from ear to ear, and his two eyes glowing in the candlelight like two great coals. The light fell, too, upon the seams and wrinkles of his face, bringing them out like the hills and valleys in a raised map. Strange as it all was to me, this ancient servitor produced the strangest effect upon me of anything.
“Boule-de-neige is witness for us,” said the old gentleman.
“Boule-de-neige, this young gentleman, Mr. Luke Lucraft, is about to sign a little deed, to which, as a matter of form, we require your signature too as witness.”
“Cluck!” said the negro. “Dis young gegleman berry lucky—him berry lucky. What time massa take him dinner?”
“When do you think you shall be fairly hungry again?” he asked me. “Now, no boastings—no false pretence and pride—because it will be the worse for you. Answer truthfully. It is now six.”
“I should say that at nine I should be able to take some supper, and at ten I shall certainly be hungry again. As an ordinary rule I should be ready a great deal earlier, but I have taken such an immense dinner.”
“Good.” He turned to Boule-de-neige. “You see the young man is modest and promises fairly. I shall have supper—a plentiful supper—at ten punctually. Mr. Lucraft will now sign.”
I advanced to the table and took up the pen, but there was no ink.
“Cluck!” said the infernal negro, with another grin—”cluck! Massa wait lilly bit.”
He took my left hand in his soft and cold paw. I felt a sharp prick at my wrist.
“You will dip the pen,” said the old gentleman, “in the blood. It is a mere form.”
“Cluck!” said Boule-de-neige.
“A mere form because we have no ink handy.”
“Cluck-cluck!”
I signed my name as desired, and, following the directions of the old gentleman, placed my finger on the red wafer at the margin, saying, “I declare this my act and deed.”
Then I gave the pen to Boule-de-neige. He signed after me, in a firm flowing hand, “Boule-de-neige.” As I looked, the letters seemed somehow to shape themselves into “Beezlebub.” I looked at him with a kind of terror. The creature grinned in my face as if he divined my thought, and gave utterance to one of his hideous “clucks”.
Then I began to feel the same faintness which I had at first experienced. It mounted upwards from my feet slowly, so that I heard the old gentleman’s voice, though I saw nothing. It grew gradually fainter.
“Supper at ten, Boule-de-neige,” he was saying; “I feel getting hungry already. What shall I do with myself till ten o’clock? I am certainly getting hungry. I think I can have it served at half-past nine. Oh, blessed
day! Oh, thankful, blessed day! Boule-de-neige, it must be supper for three—for four—for five. I shall have champagne—the Perrier Jouet—the curaçoa punch afterwards. Curaçoa punch—I haven’t tasted it for three months and more. Oh, what a blessed—blessed—blessed—”
I heard no more because my senses failed me altogether, and his voice died away in my ears.
When I came to myself I was leaning against the post in Bucklersbury, where I had met the old man.
A whiff of stale cooked meat from the cook-shop, which caught me as I opened my eyes, produced a singular feeling of disgust.
“Pah,” I muttered, “roast mutton!” and moved from the spot, my hunger was gone, that was quite certain. I felt a quietness about those regions, wherever they may be, which belong to appetite. I was almost dreamy in the repose which followed a morning so stormy. I walked quietly away homewards in a kind of daze, trying to make out something of what had happened. The first thing I found I could not remember was the name of the old gentleman. When that came back to me and under what circumstances I will tell you as we get along. Bit by bit I recalled the whole events of the afternoon, one after the other. I saw the old man, with his purple face and bloodshot eyes and white hair; I saw the wrinkled and seamed old negro; I saw the octagonal room without doors or windows; the splendid dinner; the host watching my every gesture; I remembered everything except the name of the man to whom I had sold—my appetite.
It was so strange that I laughed when I thought of it. I must have been drunk; he gave me a good dinner and I took too much wine; but, then, how was it that I remembered clearly every, even the smallest, detail?
The Devils & Demons MEGAPACK ®: 25 Modern and Classic Tales Page 48