by A. J. Cronin
‘No?’ he said affably, ‘well! I winna drive ye, woman. You’re a mare that needs gentle guidin’ – as I’ve proved to my cost. Ye maun be humoured – not driven.’ A short laugh broke from him as he uncorked the bottle, and holding the glass to the level of his eye, which glittered at the first sight of the trickling liquor, slowly poured out a large measure, raised the bottle, paused, moistened his lips with his tongue, then quickly added a further quantity of the spirit ‘ I may as well take a decent glass to begin with. It saves goin’ back and back. And I can stand it onyway,’ he muttered, keeping his head down and away from her, as he placed the bottle upon the dresser and transferred the glass of whisky to his right hand. Then, stretching out his arm he cried:
‘Here’s a toast to the heir to the house o’ Brodie – the last I’ll ever drink to him. May he go to his grand job and may he stay there! Let him get out o’ my sight and keep out o’ it. Let him go how he likes and where he likes, but let him never come back, and if ever he tries to get on to that horse he was speakin’ about, may he fall off and break his useless neck like the man that had the place before him!’ He threw back his head and, with a tilt of his wrist drained the glass at a gulp, then, surveying Matthew with a sardonic grin, he added: ‘That’s my last good-bye to ye. I don’t know where ye’re goin’ – I don’t even want to know. Whatever happens to ye makes no odds now, for it’ll never reach my ears!’ And with these words he ceased to regard his son, ignored him utterly. Now that he had swallowed the whisky he felt more vigorous. Lifting his eye again to the bottle on the dresser, he considered it speculatively for a moment, cleared his throat, straightened himself up and, his head averted from Nancy, remarked solemnly: ‘But I canna drink a toast to a thing like him and pass over a braw lass like my Nancy.’ He shook his head at the injustice of the thought as, with the empty tumbler still in his hand, he approached the table. ‘No! that would not be fair!’ he continued, pouring himself out another portion. ‘I couldna do that in all conscience – we must give the girl her due. There’s nothing I wouldna do for her, she means so much to me. Here, Nancy!’ he cried, wheedlingly, turning to her: ‘This is a wee salute to the bonniest lass in Levenford.’
She had controlled her temper so long that now it seemed impossible for her to contain herself further, and her veiled eyes sparkled and a faint colour ran into her cheeks as though she might immediately stamp her foot and assail him furiously with her tongue. But instead, she stifled the words she wished to utter behind her tight lips, and, turning on her heel, marched into the scullery where she began noisily to wash the dishes. With a chastened expression Brodie stood, his head slightly on one side, listening to the clatter of china; he heard in it some suggestion of her exasperation, but soon, returning his eyes again to the glass in his hand, he slowly raised it to his lips and slowly drained it; then, advancing to his chair he lowered himself heavily into it.
Matt, who had remained at the place by the fireplace where he had been thrust by Nancy, a silent and dismayed spectator of his father’s recent actions, now moved uneasily upon his feet, subdued more abjectly by the closer proximity of the other as he sat brooding in his chair. He moved his eyes restlessly round the room, bit his pale lips, rubbed his soft, damp hands together, wishing fervently to leave the room but, thinking his father’s eye to be upon him, was afraid to stir. At length, emboldened by the continued silence in the room, he widened the scope of the sweeping circles of his eye and allowed his flickering glance to touch for a swift second upon the face of the other beside him. Immediately he saw that Brodie was not, as he had feared, contemplating him but instead gazing earnestly towards the open doorway of the scullery and, reassured by the other’s abstraction, he ventured one tentative foot in front of him, was not observed, and, continuing his stealthy progress – slid quietly out of the kitchen.
His intention had been to escape from the house as quickly as possible, resigning himself to an interminable wait in the streets outside until his father had gone to bed, but he was arrested, in the dimness of the hall, by a segment of light striking out from the parlour. As he paused, suddenly it occurred to him that since Nessie was within, he might spend a few moments more comfortably with her before departing into the frosty night outside. He felt too, unconsciously, the pressing need for the opportunity to declaim upon the merit of the attainment of his new post, and the desire for some approving tribute to restore the damage inflicted upon his self-esteem. Consequently he opened the door and looked into the room.
Nessie, seated at the table, surrounded by the inevitable accompaniment of her books, did not look up at his entry but remained with folded arms, hunched shoulders, and bent head. But when he spoke, with a sudden quick start she flinched as though the unexpected waves of speech had struck her across the stillness of the room.
‘I’m coming in a minute,’ was all that he had said.
‘Oh! Matt,’ she cried, pressing her small closed hand into her left side, ‘what a start you gave me! I didn’t hear you come in. I seem to jump at anything these days.’
As he observed her present attitude, the inclination of her head, the mild and limpid eyes, filled with a mute apology for her weakness, a striking memory presented itself to him, making him for the moment forget his own concerns.
‘My goodness, Nessie,’ he exclaimed, staring at her. ‘You’re getting as like Mamma as life. I can almost see her looking out of your face the now!’
‘Do you think so, Matt,’ she replied, flattered in some degree to be the object of his interest. ‘What makes you say that?’
He seemed to consider.
‘I think it’s your eyes; there’s the same look about them as though you thought something was going to happen to you and were looking ahead for it.’
At his words she was hurt and immediately lowered these betraying eyes, keeping them fixed upon the table as he continued:
‘What’s come over you lately? – you don’t seem the same to me at all. Is there anything wrong with you that’s making you like that?’
‘Everything’s wrong,’ she answered slowly. ‘Since Mamma died I’ve been so miserable as could be and I haven’t had a soul to speak to about it. I can’t suffer to be near to – to Nancy. She doesn’t like me. She’s always at me for something. Everything is different. The house has been so different that it’s not like the same place – father’s different, too.’
‘You’ve nothing to be feared of from him. You were always his pet,’ he retorted. ‘He’s always sucking round you in some way.’
‘I wish he would leave me alone,’ she replied dully; ‘He’s just driving me on all the time with this work. I can’t stand it I don’t feel well in myself.’
‘Tuts! Nessie,’ he exclaimed reprovingly, ‘that’s Mamma all over again. Ye should pull yourself together. What’s the matter with you?’
‘I’ve always got a headache! I wake up with it in the morning and it never leaves me all day. It makes me so stupid that I don’t know what I’m doing. Besides, I can’t eat the food we get now and I’m always tired. I’m tired at this very minute.’
‘You’ll be all right when you’ve got this exam over. You’ll win the Latta all right.’
‘I’ll win it all right,’ she exclaimed wildly. ‘But what’s going to become of me then! What is he going to do with me after? Tell me that! Am I to be shoved on like this all the time and never know what’s going to come of it? He’ll never say when I ask him. He doesn’t know himself.’
‘You’ll be a teacher – that’s the thing for you.’
She shook her head.
‘No! that wouldn’t be good enough for him. I wanted to do that myself – to put down my name to go on to the Normal, but he wouldn’t allow it. Oh! Matt,’ she cried, ‘I wish I had somebody to put in a word for me. I’m so downright wretched about it and about everything else – I wish sometimes I had never been born!’
He shifted his gaze uncomfortably from her appealing face which, stamped by a forlorn wistfu
lness, seemed to implore him to help her.
‘You should get out of the house and play with the other girls,’ he advanced, somewhat uncertainly. ‘ That would take your mind off things a bit.’
‘How can I?’ she exclaimed frantically. ‘Ever since I was a wee thing I’ve been kept in at these lessons, and now I’m flung in here every night, and will be, too, for the whole of the next six months. And if I dared to go out he would leather me. You wouldn’t believe it, Matt, but I sometimes think I’ll go out of my mind the way I’m kept grindin’ at it.’
‘I go out,’ he exclaimed valiantly. ‘He didn’t stop me goin’ out.’
‘You’re different,’ she replied sadly, her puny outburst subsiding and leaving her more dejected than before. ‘And even if I did go out what good would it do? None of the other girls would play with me. They’ll hardly speak to me as it is. One of them said the other day that her father said she was to have nothing to do with anyone that came out of this house. Oh! I do wish you could help me, Matt!’
‘How can I help you?’ he replied roughly, irritated at her entreaties. ‘Don’t you know I’m goin’ away next week?’
She gazed at him with a slight wrinkling of her brow and repeated, without apparently comprehending:
‘Going away next week?’
‘To South America,’ he replied grandly; ‘to a splendid new position I’ve got out there. Miles and miles away from this sink of a town.’
Then she understood, and in the sudden perception that he was leaving immediately for a far-distant land, that she, of all the Brodie children, would be left in a solitary, unprotected state to face the dreadful unhappiness of her present existence in the home, she paled. Matt had never helped her much, and during these latter months had, indeed, comforted her still less, but he was her brother, a companion in her distress, and she had only a moment ago appealed to him for assistance. Her lips quivered, her eyes became blurred, she burst into tears.
‘Don’t go, Matt,’ she sobbed. ‘I’ll be left all alone if ye go. I’ll have nobody at all in this terrible house.’
‘What are ye talking about,’ he retorted savagely. ‘ You can’t know what you’re saying. Am I going to give up the chance of a lifetime – money and freedom and – and everything for the likes of you? You’re mad!’
‘I’ll be mad if you go,’ she cried. ‘What chance will I have here all by myself? – Mary away, and you away, and only me left! What’ll become of me?’
‘Stop your howling,’ he shot at her, with a quick glance towards the door. ‘Do you want everybody to hear you with that bawling? He’ll be in at us in a minute if you’re not careful. I’ve got to go and that’s all about it.’
‘Could ye not take me with you then, Matt,’ she gulped, stifling her sobs with difficulty. ‘I know I’m young but I could keep the house for ye. That’s always the sort of thing I’ve wanted to do – and not these miserable lessons. I would do everything for you, Matt.’ Her attitude apprised him that she would serve him like a slave, her eyes implored him not to leave her desolate and forsaken.
‘They would never hear of ye going out. The sooner you get it out of your head the better. Can you not look pleased at your brother getting a fine job like this instead of moaning and groaning about it.’
‘I am pleased for your sake, Matt,’ she sniffed, wiping her eyes with her saturated handkerchief. ‘ I – I was just thinking about myself.’
‘That’s it,’ he shot out. ‘ You can’t think of anybody else. Try to have some consideration for other people. Don’t be so selfish!’
‘All right, Matt,’ she said, with a last convulsive sigh. ‘I’ll try. Anyway, I’m sorry.’
‘That’s better,’ he replied largely, in a more affable tone; but even as he spoke he shivered, and, changing his tone to one of complaint he cried: ‘Gosh! it’s cold in here! How do you expect a man to stand talking to you if you haven’t got a fire? If your circulation can stand this, mine can’t. I’ll need to put my coat on and away out to walk up my circulation.’ He stamped his feet then turned abruptly, calling to her: ‘I’m away out then, Nessie.’
When he had gone she remained rigid, the small, wet ball of the handkerchief clutched tightly in her hand, her red-lidded eyes fixed upon the door, which had closed upon her like the door of a prison. The avenue of the future down which she gazed was gloomy, and amidst the dark, forbidding shadows she saw the figure of Nessie Brodie pass fearfully and alone. No one could now come between her and her father, no one interpose between her frailty and the strength of his unknown purpose. Matthew would go as Mary had gone. Mary! She had thought so much of her lately that she longed now for the comfort of her sister’s arm around her, for the solace of her quiet smile, the sustaining courage that lay within her steady eyes. She needed someone to whom she might unburden her weary mind, in whom she could confide her sorrows, and the thought of her sister’s tranquil fortitude drew her. ‘Mary!’ she whispered, like an entreaty, ‘Mary, dear! I didn’t love you as you deserved when you were here, but oh! I wish I had you near me now!’
As the almost incredible words left her lips the expression on her pinched, tear-stained face grew suddenly transfigured, illuminated as from a sudden light within. Hope again shone in the sorrowful eyes mingled by a purpose so rash that only her present despair could have induced her to consider it. Why, she thought, should she not write to her sister? – A terrible consideration, but her only chance of succour! Upstairs, hidden in a secret corner of her bedroom, lay the letter which Mamma had given her some days before she died and which bore the address in London where Mary lived. If she acted carefully her father would never know; she knew, too, that Mary would never betray her, and with the renewed consciousness of her sister’s love she got up from her chair, and, as though walking in a dream, went out of the room and tiptoed silently upstairs. After a moment she returned and shutting the door, listened attentively, trembling violently in all her limbs. She had the letter, but she was terrified at what she had done, at what she proposed to do. Nevertheless she persisted in her purpose. At the table she tore out a leaf from one of her copybooks and hurriedly composed a short note of pathetic entreaty, telling Mary in a few words how she was situated and imploring her assistance, entreating her to come to her if she could. As she wrote, she looked up from time to time with agitated glances, as though expecting her father to enter, but soon the few scribbled lines, blotted by haste and the fall of an irrepressible tear, were completed. She folded the ragged-edged sheet and thrust it in the envelope she had brought from upstairs. Then she addressed the envelope, copying each word carefully, and thrust it into the bosom of her dress; finally, with a pale face and palpitating heart she resumed her bent position over her books and made pretence to study. But her precaution was unnecessary. No one entered the room during the whole evening. She was undiscovered and, early next morning, on her way to school, she posted the letter.
Chapter Four
James Brodie was awakening. No sun streamed through his window to stimulate gently his recumbent figure, or set the golden motes swimming through straight rivers of light across his sleep-filled gaze. Instead, a cold fine rain smirred the dripping panes, dulling the interior of the room to one drab monotone and meeting his half-opened, glutinous eye like a melancholy reminder of his altered condition. He marked the unhappy aspect of the weather moodily, then from the window, his visible eye, now more fully opened to reveal the sticky, white coagulum at its corner, turned to the clock, and, observing that the dim hands pointed to ten minutes past eight, ten minutes beyond his appointed but unkept hour of rising, grew more gloomy. To-day he would, he realised, be late at the office once again, would suffer another sharp rebuke from the upstart chief clerk who now attempted to control his working hours, who had threatened even to report him to the under manager should he fail to observe a more constant punctuality.
At this reflection his face, against the lighter background of the pillow, seemed to darken, the lines that mark
ed it deepened like sharp incisions, and the eyes, losing their innate melancholy, were filled instead by a dull, morose obstinacy. Be damned to them all, he thought, they would not order him about; he would have another five minutes in bed in spite of the whole board of directors of the Latta Shipyard! He would, of course, make up the time by omitting to shave which struck him now, as it frequently did, as a cunning way of defeating the powers which sought to move him to their rule and pattern of life. Such a ruse as this suited him, too, in his own inclination, for he was now averse to shaving in the mornings when his unsteady hand so often behaved erratically, trying his temper to control it, and on occasions making him gash his cheek. The early hours of the day never found him at his best, for not only did his hand refuse to obey him, but his head ached, or his tongue felt like dry wood, or his stomach turned within him at the mere consideration of his breakfast. It was, he was well aware, the whisky which was responsible for these unwelcome visitations, and in this grey morning’s light he felt, with a gloomy insight, that he must cut down his allowance. When he had made such resolutions in the past he had never, he told himself, been really serious, but now he must definitely make up his mind to take himself in hand, to drink nothing before dinner and thereafter to abstain until the evening, when he would be moderate, when indeed, he must be moderate if he were to please Nancy, whose favour was now of such vital necessity to him. Certainly she had been better disposed towards him during the last two days and he reflected, with a more equable turn of mind that, although she had not come back to his room since their quarrel on the night of her visit to the aunt at Overton, the obvious reason which she had advanced in excuse must surely be correct in view of her recent kindness and more tolerant treatment to him. He could not do without Nancy! She had become as necessary to him and as indispensable as breath to his body, and for this reason alone he must be careful how he addressed himself to the bottle in future. Impossible that he should ever live without her! She would come to him again tonight, the fresher for his enforced abstinence, or he would know the reason why!
