Page:Braddon--The Trail of the Serpent.djvu/224

220 "Should you know him again?" inquired the student.

"Anywhere, sahib. He was a handsome young man, with dark hazel eyes and a bright smile. He did not look like a murderer."

"That is scarcely a sure rule to go by, is it, Laurent?" asks the Captain, with a bitter smile.

"I don't know. A black heart will make strange lines in the handsomest face, which are translatable to the close observer."

"Now," says the officer, rising, and surrendering his pipe to the hands of his watchful attendant—"now for my morning's ride, and you will have the place to yourself for your scientific visitors, Laurent."

"You will not go where you are likely to meet"

"Anyone I know? No, Blurosset. The lonelier the road the better I like it. I miss the deep jungle and the tiger-hunt, eh, Mujeebez?—we miss them, do we not?"

The Hindoo's eyes brightened, as he answered eagerly, "Yes, indeed, sahib."

Captain Lansdown (that is the name of the officer) is of French extraction; he speaks English perfectly, but still with a slightly foreign accent. He has distinguished himself by his marvellous courage and military genius in the Punjaub, and is over in England on leave of absence. It is singular that so great a friendship should exist between this impetuous, danger-loving soldier, and the studious French chemist and pseudo-magician, Laurent Blurosset; but that a very firm friendship does exist between them is evident. They live in the same house; are both waited upon by Egerton Lansdown's Indian servant, and are constantly together.

Laurent Blurosset, after becoming the fashion in Paris, is now the rage in London. But he rarely stirs beyond the threshold of his own door, though his presence is eagerly sought for in scientific coteries, where opinion is still, however, divided as to whether he is a charlatan or a great man. The materialists sneer—the spiritualists believe. His disinterestedness, at any rate, speaks in favour of his truth. He will receive no money from any of his numerous visitors. He will serve them, he says, if he can, but he will not sell the wisdom of the mighty dead; for that is something too grand and solemn to be made a thing of barter. His discoveries in chemistry have made him sufficiently rich; and he can afford to devote himself to science, in the hope of finding truth for his reward. He asks no better recompense than the glory of the light he seeks. We leave him, then, to his eager and inquisitive visitors, while the Captain rides slowly through Oxford Street, on his way to the Edgware Road, through which he emerges into the country.