The Romance of Giovanni Calvotti | Page 6

Signor Calvotti, what do you want for the lot?'
I entered into his business humour as well as I could.
'Permit me to ask what you are prepared to give?'
'Oh,' he said emphatically, 'I can't be buyer and seller. How much for
the lot?'
I thought it over. I knew the pictures were good--that they were better
than many I had seen sold for high prices. I spoke quietly, but with
inward desperation.
'A hundred pounds.'
My landlady clasped her hands.
'What?' said the stranger sharply. 'Say seventy-five.'
My landlady absolutely curtsied, with her hands clasped.

'If you think that is a fair price,' I said.
The stranger looked at me for a minute, then turned to my landlady.
'Pardon me a minute,' he said, waving a backward hand to me. Then to
the landlady; 'What sort of gentleman is this? Dissipated dog, eh?'
'Lord bless you, no, sir,' said the landlady; 'the steadiest gentleman I
ever had in the house.'
'H'm,' said the stranger, facing round on me. 'Want a hundred pounds
for 'em, eh? Very well. If I can't get 'em for less. Pen and ink anywhere?
Ah, I see.'
He wrote a cheque standing at the table. Then he produced a card.
'That's my address. Glad to see you, if you'll call. Any Friday evening
after eight. I've got a cab at the door, and I'll take these away at once.'
I was embarrassed by a terrible suspicion. I had read and heard much of
London fraud.
'You will pardon me, sir. You are too much a man of the world not to
forgive a little caution in a man who is selling all he has.' Then I
stumbled and could not go on.
'Ah!' he said, 'quite right. Stupid of me, to be sure. Wait a minute.'
He seized the cheque and his hat, and went heavily downstairs. When
he was at the bottom of the first flight he shouted, 'Back directly,' and
so went down the other three flights, and out-of-doors.
My landlady opened the window, and looked out.
'He's gone into the bank, sir,' she said; then ran to the head of the stairs
and screamed for somebody to open the door.
'He's coming out of the bank, sir,' said the landlady after an interval of
renewed observation. He came upstairs, solidly, and into the room.

'Count that,' he said, and placed a small bag on the table.
I counted the contents of the bag, but my fingers trembled, and I was
confused. I made out one hundred and six pounds.
'No,' he said, 'make no mistakes at the bank?
He counted the money rapidly.
'One hundred and five.'
'We agreed for one hundred, sir,' I said pushing five pounds across the
table.
'Guineas,' he said brusquely. 'Always guineas in art. Don't know why,
but always is. Oblige me, ma'am, by carrying these downstairs.'
My landlady took the pictures in her arms.
They were defended from each other by strips of thin cork at the
corners, and they made a clumsy bundle. I had not looked at my client's
card until now. Whilst he gave his directions to the landlady I took it up,
and learned that his name was John Gregory; and that he lived in
Westbourne Terrace. When my landlady had gone, he spoke to me,
with another glance round the room.
'Been hard up?' he asked.
'I have been totally without money,' I answered him frankly, for I began
to understand him.
'These things belong to you?' he asked again, waving his hand at the
piano and the violin and the violoncello.
'Yes,' I answered.
'Why didn't you sell 'em? Better than starving.'
'I would sooner starve than part with any of them,' I told him.

He turned sharply upon me.
'Why?'
'My mother played them.' There seemed no reason, for all his
brusquerie, why I should not tell him this.
'Didn't play the fiddle, did she?' 'Divinely,' I told him.
'And the 'cello?' 'Yes.'
'Singular,' he said. 'Oh, ah, foreign lady. Yes, of course. Not at all
remarkable. Good morning. Don't forget the Fridays. Glad to see you.'
As he was going out he caught sight of the portfolio of sketches. He
stopped and turned them over without remark or apology until he came
to one which pleased him. It was a large sketch, sixteen inches by
twelve, in water-colour, and had some little finish. He held it up and
took it to the light.
'I meant to say just now, but I forgot it, he said, turning the picture
upside down and looking at it so--'I meant to tell you that you're
making a mistake in painting so small. A larger canvas would suit your
style. Let me have this, now, in oil. Say eighty by sixty. Give you fifty
pounds