He said this, holding her thin old hand very kindly, for he was by no means without good-nature. So sending the promised attendant, he and Longcluse proceeded to the billiard-room, where, having got the lamps lighted, they began to enjoy their smoke. Each, I fancy, was thinking of the little incident in the housekeeper's room. There was a long silence.
"Poor old Tansey! She looked awfully ill," said Richard Arden at last.
"By Jove! she did. Is that her name? She rather frightened me," said Mr. Longcluse. "I thought we had stumbled on a mad woman--she stared so. Has she ever had any kind of fit, poor thing?"
"No. She grumbles a good deal, but I really think she's a healthy old woman enough. She says she was frightened."
"No, that wasn't it, for I knocked first," said Arden.
"Ah, yes, so you did. I only know she frightened me. I really thought she was out of her mind, and that she was going to stick me with a knife, perhaps," said Mr. Longcluse, with a little laugh and a shrug.
Arden laughed, and puffed away at his cigar till he had it in a glow again. Was this explanation of what he had seen in Longcluse's countenance--a picture presented but for a fraction of a second, but thenceforward ineffaceable--quite satisfactory?
In a short time Mr. Longcluse asked whether he could have a little brandy and water, which accordingly was furnished. In his first glass there was a great deal of brandy, and very little water indeed; and his second, sipped more at his leisure, was but little more diluted. A very faint flush tinged his pallid cheeks.
Richard Arden was, by this time, thinking of his own debts and ill-luck, and at last he said, "I wonder what the art of getting on in the world is. Is it communicable? or is it no art at all, but a simple run of luck?"
Mr. Longcluse smiled scornfully. "There are men who have immense faith in themselves," said he, "who have indomitable will, and who are provided with craft and pliancy for any situation. Those men are giants from the first to the last hour of action, unless, as happened to Napoleon, success enervates them. In the cradle, they strangle serpents; blind, they pull down palaces; old as Dandolo, they burn fleets and capture cities. It is only when they have taken to bragging that the _lues Napoleonica_ has set in. Now I have been, in a sense, a successful man--I am worth some money. If I were the sort of man I describe, I should be worth, if I cared for it, ten times what I have in as many years. But I don't care to confess I made my money by flukes. If, having no tenderness, you have two attributes--profound cunning and perfect audacity--nothing can keep you back. I'm a common-place man, I say; but I know what constitutes power. Life is a battle, and the general's qualities win."