Hatter's Castle

by A. J. Cronin

  Renwick was silent, conscious of Gibson’s slightly satiric eye upon him, yet although he felt the weak, evasive answers of this timid child to be as unreliable as the opinion of his pompous colleague, just quoted, his impression of Nessie’s strained and over-driven nerves was further strengthened by her bearing.

  ‘I hear you’re going up for the Latta,’ he at length remarked, ‘Would you not like to wait another year?’

  ‘Oh! no, sir! I couldn’t do that,’ she replied quickly. ‘I must take it this year. My father has said –’ a shadow fell and deepened upon her brow; she added more reticently, ‘He would like me to win it – and it’s a great thing for a girl to win the Latta. It’s never been done, but I think I can do it!’ She again blushed slightly, not at this sudden exhibition of her own small self-complacency, but at her hardihood in making such a long speech before them.

  ‘Don’t work too hard, then,’ replied Renwick finally, turning towards Gibson to indicate that he had concluded his observations.

  ‘That’s right then, Nessie,’ said the head master, dismissing her with a cheerful glance. ‘Run away back to your form now! And remember what Dr Renwick here has said. The willing horse never needs the spur. Don’t overdo the homework.’

  ‘Thank you, sir,’ replied Nessie humbly, as she slipped out of the room, wondering vaguely in her mind what it had all been about, feeling, despite her uncertainty, that it had been a mark of honour for her to be singled out for attention like this, and – remembering warmly the encouraging look in his omnipotent eye – that she must stand high in the Rector’s favour. It would, she considered, as she re-entered her classroom with a conscious air, give that impertinent and inquisitive young Grierson something to think about when he knew she had been hobnobbing with the Rector himself.

  ‘I hope I didn’t keep her too long,’ said Renwick, looking at his friend. ‘ It was enough for me to see her.’

  ‘You were the epitome of discretion,’ replied Gibson lightly; ‘the governors will not throw me out for allowing my discipline to be tampered with.’ He paused, then added in the same tone: ‘She gave you a shrewd one about Lawrie.’

  ‘Pshaw!’ replied Renwick. ‘To put it bluntly. “It doesn’t do to cry stinking fish,” but as one old friend to another I don’t give a snap of the fingers for Lawrie’s opinion. He’s a pompous ass! That child is not right by a long way.’

  ‘Tuts! Renwick,’ remarked Gibson soothingly, ‘don’t get a bee in your bonnet. I could see nothing wrong with the girl to-day. She’s at a bad age and she’s got a beastly old sot of a father, but she’ll do, she’ll do. You’re exaggerating. You were always the incorrigible champion of the oppressed, even if it were an ailing, white mouse.’

  ‘That’s what she is,’ replied Renwick stubbornly. ‘A little white mouse, and it might go hard with her if she’s not watched. I don’t like that cowed look in her eye.’

  ‘I was more struck by the neglected look of her,’ replied Gibson. ‘She’s getting to be conspicuous in the school by it. Did you mark the poorness of her dress? – there’s been a difference there in the last year or so, I can assure you. Brodie can’t have a penny now but his wages, and most of that he spends on liquor. Strictly between ourselves too, I hear it rumoured that he’s behind with the interest on his mortgaged house – that amazing château of nonsense of his. What’s going to happen there, I don’t know, but the man is rushing towards his ruin.’

  ‘Poor Nessie,’ sighed Renwick; but in his mind it was Mary that he visioned amidst the poverty and degradation of her home. It was impossible to judge from Gibson’s expression if some vague glimmering of understanding, regarding his friend’s motive in the matter, had dawned upon him; and indeed it might, for in the past he had heard him speak feelingly of the strange case of Mary Brodie; but now he patted him upon the shoulder, and remarked encouragingly:

  ‘Cheer up, you miserable sawbones! It’s not going to kill anybody. I’ll see to that. I’ll keep my eye on Nessie.’

  ‘Well,’ said Renwick at length, ‘it’ll do no good to sit glooming here.’ He looked at his watch and arose from his chair. ‘ I’m keeping you back and I’ve got my own work to attend to. It’s almost four.’

  ‘Rich old ladies queueing up for you, you sly dog!’ said Gibson quizzically. ‘What they see in that ugly face of yours I can’t imagine!’

  Renwick laughed as he replied:

  ‘It’s not beauty they want, or I’d refer them to you.’ He held out his hand. ‘ You’re a good sort, Gibson! I’ll miss you more than anyone when I leave here.’

  ‘I wonder!’ said the other as he pressed his friend’s hand affectionately.

  Renwick left the room quickly, but as he went down the shallow, stone steps, worn through the years by an endless succession of careless footsteps, and passed between the two grey Russian guns, setting his course along the road for his home, his pace insensibly diminished and his thoughts again grew heavy. ‘Poor Nessie!’ He now saw the shrinking figure before him, enveloped by the soft, protecting arms of her sister who, shielding the child’s drooping form by her own soft body, looked at him with brave, enduring eyes. As he passed along the street the vision grew in intensity, oppressing him, rendering somehow unattractive the stimulating prospect which had lately filled his mind, dulling the glamour of his new work in Edinburgh, blotting out the freshness of Castle Gardens and the romantic fortress piled against the sky, blunting the ever keen savour of the wind as he felt it sweep to him from off the Carlton Hill. It was with a sombre face that he entered his own house and set himself to work.

  Chapter Seven

  The mild april day had advanced for one hour beyond its noontide and, filled by the fresh odours and soft, stirring sounds of the budding spring, lay upon the town of Levenford like a benison. But to Brodie, as at his dinner hour he walked along the road towards his home, there was no blessing in the sweet burgeoning around him. Filled with bitterness, he did not feel the caress of the gentle air or recognise in each new shoot the running sap within the trees; the yellow clumps of nodding daffodils, the white, elusive snowdrops, the glowing, mingled globes of crocuses, which ornamented the front gardens of the road, were by him unseen; the faint cawing of rooks as they circled around their new-built nest amongst the tall trees at the bend of the road was to him a jangle on his irritated ears. Indeed, as he reached these trees and the sound came to him more loudly he sent a venomous glance at the birds, muttering: ‘Damn their noise – they ring the lugs off a man. I could take a gun to them,’ when suddenly, as if in answer to his threat, a low-flying crow swept over him and with a derisive ‘caw-caw’ dropped its excrement upon his shoulder. His brow gathered like thunder as he considered that the very birds had turned against him and defiled him; for a moment he looked as though he could have felled each tree, torn apart the nests, and destroyed every bird in the rookery; but with a wry twist of his lips he cleansed his coat with his handkerchief and, his mood set more bitterly, continued upon his homeward way.

  The better conditions of his living since the return of Mary had made little difference in his appearance, for although she sponged and pressed his clothing, washed and starched his linen, and brushed his boots to a fine polish, he had now abandoned himself utterly at nights to the bottle with the result that his face had grown more veined, more sallow and sunken, and his neater dress hung upon his gaunt frame with the incongruity of a new suit upon a scarecrow. He looked, although he knew it not, a broken man, and since he had lost Nancy his disintegration had progressed at a more rapid pace. At first he had told himself fiercely that there were other fish in the sea as good as, and indeed better than she, that he would quickly fill her place in his affections by another and a finer woman; but gradually, and with a cutting injury to his pride, he had been made to see that he was now too old and unattractive to compel the attention of women and, the lordly days of his overflowing purse being ended, that he had become too poor to buy their favour. He realised, too, after a short and resent
ful period of self-delusion, that it was his Nancy that he desired, that none other could replace her; she had wrapped herself around his flesh so seductively that in her absence he craved for her only, and knew that no one else would do. He drank to forget her, but could not. The whisky soaked his brain, deadened his vivid appreciation of his loss, but still, and even when he was drunk, tormenting pictures floated before his numbed mind, haunting him with visions of Nancy and Matt as they would be together in their new life. As he saw them, they were always together, and, although he cursed himself for the thought, happy, forgetful of him and of his past bearing on their lives; Nancy’s laugh, and it was the laugh of an Aphrodite, echoed in his ears, evoked, not by his but by Mart’s caresses, and as, with an agonising lucidity, he saw his son supplanting him in her affections his eyes would close, his look become helpless and livid.

  At present, however, he was engrossed by another matter, not, let it be said, the offence of the crow, which had merely thrown another coal upon the fire of his resentment, but a greater and more personal affront; and his air was less apathetic than was usual in the public street, his manner more intent as he moved with an unusual rapidity towards his house.

  He had a grievance to air and, as Nessie was the only person whom he now addressed with any freedom, and as the affair in some manner concerned her, it was she whom he now hastened to see. As he opened the front door and entered his home, his morose reticence was for the moment abandoned and he immediately called out:

  ‘Nessie! Nessie!’ He was in the kitchen before she could reply, and sternly regarded the startled eye that looked back at him from her half-turned head as she sat at table, a spoonful of her broth arrested in mid air, her whole attitude indicative of sudden apprehension. ‘ Has that young whelp o’ Grierson’s said anything to you about the Latta?’ he shot at her fiercely. She let the spoonful of soup splash back into her plate, as, thinking that mercifully his question was not so bad as she had expected, she shook her head nervously, and replied:

  ‘No, father. At least nothing much.’

  ‘Think,’ he cried. ‘Think hard. What does nothing much mean?’

  ‘Well, father,’ she quavered, ‘he’s always saying something or another that’s not nice about – about us. He sometimes sneers about me and the Latta.’

  ‘Did he ever tell you that you shouldna go in for it?’ he demanded. ‘Answer me!’

  ‘Oh! he would like me not to try for it, father,’ she replied, compressing her small lips. ‘I know that as well as anything. I suppose he thinks it would give him some small chance of it – not that he’s got any.’

  His discoloured teeth came together, and he displayed them as his lips parted in a grin of wrath.

  ‘So that’s it!’ he exclaimed. ‘I was sure o’t. Ay, I was right!’ He seated himself at table and, ignoring the steaming bowl which Mary silently placed before him, thrust his face close to Nessie’s. ‘Say that again,’ he muttered.

  ‘What, father?’

  ‘About that pup o’ Grierson’s.’

  ‘That he’s got no chance of the Latta?’ she queried timidly; then seeing that she was pleasing him, she harmonised her mood to his and sniffed indignantly: ‘ No! I should think not. He hasn’t a ghost of a chance. Even if I didn’t go in for it, there’s others have as good a chance as he has. But he’ll never get it while I’m about.’

  ‘You’re the stumblin’ block to him.’

  ‘Yes, indeed, father!’

  ‘That’s fine! That’s fine!’ he muttered, looking at her with dilated eyes. ‘God! it does me good to hear that’ He paused. ‘Do ye know what happened to me as I was coming home to-day, like any other respectable townsman?’ His nostrils quivered at the memory and his voice rose as he cried: ‘Yes, comin’ home quietly and decently, when that blasted swine came up to me – Provost Grierson – our braw new provost – God! what they made a thing like him provost for beats me, he must have sneaked himself into the position – it’s– it’s a disgrace to the town. I suppose because he’s the provost now he thinks he can do anything, for he had the damned insolence to accost me in the open daylight and tell me not to put you in for the Latta.’ He looked at her as though he expected her to swell visibly with indignation, and, feeling that some response was expected of her she replied, feebly:

  ‘It was just jealousy, father, that was all!’

  ‘Did I not tax him with that?’ he cried. ‘I should think I did. I told him you had always beaten his measly pup and that you would do it again – and again – and again.’ He repeated the words in an exultant shout. ‘The damned cheek of the man to try and cadge the thing for his own son by askin’ me to keep you back for another year. And when I flung that in his face he had the impudence to turn round and mealy-mouth me with talk of the dignity of his position, and about him bein’ the spokesman of the Borough, saying that he had been told ye werena fit to go up–that you were not strong enough – that he was speakin’ in your interests and not in his. But I had him.’ He clenched his fist in something of his old manner, as he exclaimed: ‘I had him on all points. I threw Lawrie’s own words at his sleekit head. I had the whip hand o’ him at every turn!’ He laughed exultantly, but after a moment his face darkened and he muttered: ‘By God! I’ll make him pay for it – ay, and for the other things he said to me as well. Why I didna level him to the street I canna think: But never mind – you and me will make him pay for’t in other ways. Will ye not, Nessie?’ He gazed at her wheedlingly. ‘ You’ll knock that brat o’ his into a cocked hat – will ye not, Nessie? and then we’ll look at the grand, chawed look on his face. You’ll do it – won’t ye, woman?’

  ‘Yes, father,’ she replied obediently, ‘I’ll do it for ye.’

  ‘That’s fine. That’s real fine,’ he murmured, rubbing his veined hands together in suppressed elation. Then suddenly, at some secret thought his expression grew black, and again thrusting his face into hers he exclaimed: ‘You better do it. By God! you better beat him. If you don’t I’ll – I’ll grip that thin neck o’ yours and fair strangle ye. You’ve got to win that Latta or it’ll be the waur o’ ye.’

  ‘I’ll do it, father! I’ll do it!’ she whimpered.

  ‘Yes, you’ll do it, or I’ll know why,’ he cried wildly. ‘I tell you there’s a conspiracy in this town against me. Every man’s hand is turned against me. They hate me for what I am. They’re jealous. They know that I’m away and above them – that if I had my rights I would wipe my dirty boots on the smug faces o’ the lot of them. But never mind,’ he nodded his head to himself in a wild burst of unreason, ‘I’ll show them yet. I’ll put the fear o’ me into them! The Latta will be the start o’ it. That’ll put a spoke in the Lord High Provost’s wheel – then we’ll begin in real earnest.’

  At this point Mary, who had been standing in the background, observing her father’s paroxysm and his manner towards Nessie with an expression of acute anxiety, came forward and said coaxingly:

  ‘Will you not take your broth before it gets cold, father? I took such pains with it. Let Nessie get hers too – she must eat up if she’s going to study as hard as she does.’

  His exaltation was suddenly arrested at her words. His expression changed, as though something withdrew from it, retired quickly from open view into the hidden recesses of his mind, and he exclaimed angrily:

  ‘What do you want to interfere for? Can you not leave us alone? When we want your advice we’ll ask for it.’ He picked up his spoon and sullenly began his soup; then, after a while, as though he had been brooding on her effrontery in speaking, he exclaimed: ‘Keep your remarks about Nessie to yourself. I’ll manage her my own way.’

  The meal proceeded for some time in silence, but, when they were partaking of the next simple course Brodie again turned to his younger daughter, and staring at her sideways began, in the ingratiating tone which he invariably adopted for this rote of questions and which, from constant repetition and the manner of his address, now excited her almost to the point
of hysteria.

  ‘And how did you get on to-day, Nessie?’

  ‘Quite well, father!’

  ‘Did anybody praise my own lass to-day? Come on now, somebody said something about you. It was your French to-day, was it not?’

  She answered him mechanically, at random, anyhow – only to be rid of the nerve-racking necessity of formulating new and gratifying replies to his fatuous, yet pressing queries, of appeasing his insatiable demand for tangible evidence of her prowess, of the attention which his daughter was attracting at school. At length, when he had satisfied himself, although she on her part hardly knew what she had said, he lay back in his chair and, regarding her with a bland, proprietary eye, remarked:

  ‘Good enough! Good enough for the Brodies! That was high praise for them to give us. You’re doin’ not so badly, woman! But ye maun do better. Better and better. Ye’ve got to make as sure o’ that Latta as if it was lying on that plate in front o’ ye. Guidsakes! just think on it. Thirty guineas every year for three years – that makes ninety guineas – or near enough to a hundred, golden sovereigns. There’s a hundred, golden sovereigns lying there on that plate o’ yours waiting to be picked up. Ye havena got to scramble for them, or stoop for them, you’ve just got to gather them up! God! If ye don’t put these wee hands o’ yours out to lift them I’ll twist the heid off ye!’ He looked at the empty plate before her, seeing it piled high with sovereigns, gleaming with the rich lustre of heaped gold, filled with a sum which in his reduced circumstances, seemed to him enormous. ‘It’s a rich, rich prize,’ he murmured, ‘and it’s yours! I could see it makes the greedy eyes o’ that snipe Grierson drop out o’ their sockets to think on it comin’ into this house. I’ll learn him to affront me in the main street of the town!’ He was moved by a short, silent laugh that was like a sneer, then, looking again at Nessie, he lifted his eyebrows and, with a resumption of his absurdly arch manner, said in a tone of high confidence: ‘I’ll be home early to-night, Nessie! We’ll make a bend the minute we’ve finished our tea. Not a minute will we waste! We’ll be on with our lessons before we’ve swallowed the last bite.’ He looked at her slyly, as he remarked: ‘You can be at it in the parlour, and I’ll bide in here to see that not a soul disturbs ye. Quiet! Quiet! That’s what ye want, and I’ll see that ye have it. Ye’ll have the quieto’ the grave!’ He seemed pleased with the force of this comparison and repeated the last words impressively and sonorously. Then in a harder tone he added: ‘Ye maun stick to it! Stick in hard. Put your back into it. What ye do, do well. Remember you’re a Brodie and set your teeth to win through with it.’ His task of exhortation for the moment completed, filled too, by a consciousness of worthy effort accomplished, he removed his eye from Nessie and allowed it to rest oppressively upon the face of his other, daughter, daring her to interfere.