“I think you flurry him, sir,” said David, “and-”
“I know I do,” grinned Mr. Mottisfont.
Young Edward Mottisfont came into the room and shut the door.
Old Mr. Mottisfont watched him with black, malicious eyes.
For as many years as Edward could remember anything, he could remember just that look upon his uncle's face. It made him uneasy now, as it had made him uneasy when he was only five years old.
Once when he was fifteen he said to David Blake: “You cheek him, David, and he likes you for it. How on earth do you manage it? Does n't he make you feel beastly?”
And David stared and said: “Beastly? Rats! Why should I feel beastly? He 's jolly amusing. He makes me laugh.”
At thirty, Edward no longer employed quite the same ingenuous slang, but there was no doubt that he still experienced the same sensations, which fifteen years earlier he had characterized as beastly.
Old Mr. Edward Mottisfont lay in bed with his hands folded on his chest. He watched his nephew with considerable amusement, and waited for him to speak.
Edward took a chair beside the bed. Then he said that it was a fine day, and old Mr. Mottisfont nodded twice with much solemnity.
“Yes, Edward,” he said.
There was a pause.
“I hope you are feeling pretty well,” was the unfortunate Edward's next attempt at conversation.
Old Mr. Edward Mottisfont looked across at David Blake. “Am I feeling pretty well-eh, David?”
David laughed. He had moved when Edward came into the room, and was standing by the window looking out. A little square pane was open. Through it came the drowsy murmur of a drowsy, old-fashioned town. Mr. Mottisfont's house stood a few yards back from the road, just at the head of the High Street. Market Harford was a very old town, and the house was a very old house. There was a staircase which was admired by American visitors, and a front door for which they occasionally made bids. From where Mr. Mottisfont lay in bed he could see a narrow lane hedged in by high old houses with red tiles. Beyond, the ground fell sharply away, and there was a prospect of many red roofs. Farther still, beyond the river, he could see the great black chimneys of his foundry, and the smoke that came from them. It was the sight that he loved best in the world. David looked down into the High Street and watched one lamp after another spring into brightness. He could see a long ribbon of light go down to the river and then rise again. He turned back into the room when he was appealed to, and said:
“Why, you know best how you feel, sir.”
“Oh, no,” said old Mr. Mottisfont in a smooth, resigned voice. “Oh, no, David. In a private and unofficial sort of way, yes; but in a public and official sense, oh, dear, no. Edward wants to know when to order his mourning, and how to arrange his holiday so as not to clash with my funeral, so it is for my medical adviser to reply, ain't it, Edward?”
The colour ran to the roots of Edward Mottisfont's fair hair. He cast an appealing glance in David's direction, and did not speak.
“I don't think any of us will order our mourning till you 're dead, sir,” said David with a chuckle. He commiserated Edward, but, after all, Edward was a lucky dog-and to see one's successful rival at a disadvantage is not an altogether unpleasant experience. “You 'll outlive some of us young ones yet,” he added, but old Mr. Mottisfont was frowning.
“Seen any more of young Stevenson, Edward?” he said, with an abrupt change of manner.
Edward shook his head rather ruefully.
“No, sir, I have n't.”
“No, and you ain't likely to,” said old Mr. Mottisfont. “There, you 'd best be gone. I 've talked enough.”
“Then good-night, sir,” said Edward Mottisfont, getting up with some show of cheerfulness.
The tone of Mr. Mottisfont's good-night was not nearly such a pleasant one, and as soon as the door had closed upon Edward he flung round towards David Blake with an angry “What 's the good of him? What 's the good of the fellow? He 's not a business man. He 's not a man at all; he 's an entomologiac-a lepidoptofool-a damn lepidoptofool.”
These remarkable epithets followed one another with an extraordinary rapidity.
When the old gentleman paused for breath David inquired, “What 's the trouble, sir?”
“Oh, he 's muddled the new contract with Stevenson. Thinking of butterflies, I expect. Pretty things, butterflies-but there-I don't see that I need distress myself. It ain't me it 's going to touch. It 's Edward's own look-out. My income ain't going to concern me for very much longer.”
He was silent for a moment. Then he made a restless movement with his hand.
“It won't, will it-eh, David? You did n't mean what you said just now? It was just a flam? I ain't going to live, am I?”
David hesitated and the old man broke in with an extraordinary energy.
“Oh, for the Lord's sake, David, I 'm not a girl-out with it! How long d' ye give me?”
David sat down on the bed again. His movements had a surprising gentleness for so large a man. His odd, humorous face was quite serious.
“Really, sir, I don't know,” he said, “I really don't. There 's no more to be done if you won't let me operate. No, we won't go over all that again. I know you 've made up your mind. And no one can possibly say how long it may be. You might have died this week, or you may die in a month, or it may go on for a year-or two-or three. You 've the sort of constitution they don't make nowadays.”
“Three years,” said old Mr. Edward Mottisfont-“three years, David-and this damn pain all along-all the time-getting worse-”
“Oh, I think we can relieve the pain, sir,” said David cheerfully.
“Much obliged, David. Some beastly drug that 'll turn me into an idiot. No, thank ye, I 'll keep my wits if it 's all the same to you. Well, well, it 's all in the day's work, and I 'm not complaining, but Edward 'll get mortal tired of waiting for my shoes if I last three years. I doubt his patience holding out. He 'll be bound to hasten matters on. Think of the bad example I shall be for the baby-when it comes. Lord, David, what d' ye want to look like that for? I suppose they 'll have babies like other folk, and I 'll be a bad example for 'em. Edward 'll think of that. When he 's thought of it enough, and I 've got on his nerves a bit more than usual, he 'll put strychnine or arsenic into my soup. Oh, Edward 'll poison me yet. You 'll see.'
“Poor old Edward, it 's not much in his line,” said David with half a laugh.
“Eh? What about Pellico's dog then?”
“Pellico's dog, sir?”
“What an innocent young man you are, David-never heard of Pellico's dog before, did you? Pellico's dog that got on Edward's nerves same as I get on his nerves, and you never knew that Edward dosed the poor brute with some of his bug-curing stuff, eh? To be sure you did n't think I knew, nor did Edward. I don't tell everything I know, and how I know it is my affair and none of yours, Master David Blake, but you see Edward 's not so unhandy with a little job in the poisoning line.”
David's face darkened. The incident of Pellico's dog had occurred when he and Edward were schoolboys of fifteen. He remembered it very well, but he did not very much care being reminded of it. Every day of his life he passed the narrow turning, down which, in defiance of parental prohibitions, he and Edward used to race each other to school. Old Pellico's dirty, evil-smelling shop still jutted out of the farther end, and the grimy door-step upon which his dog used to lie in wait for their ankles was still as grimy as ever. Sometimes it was a trouser-leg that suffered. Sometimes an ankle was nipped, and if Pellico's dog occasionally got a kick in return, it was not more than his due. David remembered his own surprise when it first dawned upon him that Edward minded-yes, actually minded these encounters. He recalled the occasion when Edward, his face of a suspicious pallor, had denied angrily that he was afraid of any beastly dog, and then his sudden wincing confession that he did mind-that he minded horribly-not because he was afraid of being bitten-Edward explained this point very carefully-but because the dog made such a beastly row, and because Edward dreamed of him at night, only in his dreams, Pellico's dog was rather larger than Pellico himself, and the lane was a cul-de-sac with a wall at the end of it, against which he crouched in his dream whilst the dog came nearer and nearer.