redundancy; when he withdrew it from the lock he looked at it senselessly as it lay in his palm, then suddenly drew back and hurled it far over the top of the building listening intently until he heard the faint splash as it dropped into the river behind. They could get into the place how they liked, he thought bitterly; he, at any rate, was finished with it.
On his way home he still could not, or at least refused to think, remaining without even a remote idea as to the conduct of his future. He had a fine stone house, heavily mortgaged, to maintain; an old decrepit mother, an invalid wife and a useless son to support, and a young daughter who must be educated, but beyond the fact that he was strong with a physique powerful enough to uproot a fair-sized tree, his assets towards these responsibilities were negligible. He did not actively consider in this fashion but, the abandon of his recent mood subsided, he felt dimly the uncertainty of his position and it weighed upon him heavily. He was affected chiefly by the lack of money in his pocket, and as he neared his house and saw standing outside a familiar high gig and bay gelding, his brow darkened.
'Damn it all,' he muttered, 'is he in, again? How does he expect me to pay the blasted long bill he's runnin' up?' It pricked him with an irritating reminder of his circumstances to see Doctor Lawrie's equipage at his gate and, thinking to spare himself the necessity of a tedious encounter by entering the house unobserved, he was more deeply annoyed to meet Lawrie face to face at the front door.
'Just been having a peep at the good wife, Mr. Brodie,' said the doctor, with an affectation of heartiness. He was a pompous, portly man with blown-out cheeks, a small, red mouth and an insufficient chin inadequately strengthened by a grey, imperial beard, 'Trying to keep her spirits up, you know; we must do all we can.'
Brodie looked at the other silently, his saturnine eyes saying, more cuttingly than words, 'And much good ye have done her, ye empty windbag.'
'Not much change for the better, I'm afraid,' continued Lawrie hurriedly, becoming a trifle more florid under Brodie's rude stare. 'Not much improvement. We're nearing the end of the chapter, I fear.' This was his usual stereotyped banality to indicate the nearness of death, and now he shook his head profoundly, sighed, and smoothed the small tuft on his chin with an air of melancholy resignation.
Brodie gazed with aversion at the finicking gestures of this pompous wiseacre and, though he did not regret having brought him into his house to spite Renwick, he was not deceived by his bluff manner or by his great display of sympathy.
'Ye've been tellin' me that for a long time,' he growled. 'You and your chapters! I believe ye know less than onybody what's goin' to happen. I'm gettin' tired of it.'
'I know! I know! Mr. Brodie,' said Lawrie, making little soothing gestures with his hands; 'your distress is very natural very natural! We cannot say definitely when the unhappy event will occur. It depends so much on the reaction of the blood that is the crux of the question the reaction of the blood with regard to the behaviour of the corpuscles! The corpuscles are sometimes stronger than we expect. Yes! The corpuscles are sometimes marvellous in their activities,' and satisfied with his show of erudition, he again stroked his moustache and looked learnedly at Brodie.
'You can take your corpuscles to hell,' replied Brodie contemptuously. 'You've done her as much good as my foot.'
'Come now, Mr. Brodie,' said Lawrie in a half -expostulating, half- placating tone, 'don't be unreasonable. I'm here every day. I'm doing my best.'
'Do better then! Finish her and be done wi't,' retorted Brodie bitterly, and turning abruptly, he walked away and entered the house, leaving the other standing aghast, his eyes wide, his small mouth pursed into an indignant orb.
Inside his home, a further wave of disgust swept over Brodie as, making no allowance for the fact that he was earlier than usual, he observed that his dinner was not ready, and he cursed the bent figure of his mother amongst the disarray of dishes, dirty water, pots and potato peelings in the scullery.
'I'm gettin' ower auld for this game, James,' she quavered in reply. 'I'm not as nimble as I used to be and forbye the doctor keepit me back.'
'Move your auld bones then,' he snarled. 'I'm hungry.' He could not sit down amongst such chaos, and, with a sudden turn of his black mood, he decided that he would fill in the time before his meal by visiting his wife the good wife, as Lawrie had called her and give her the grand news of the business.
'She maun hear some time,' he muttered, 'and the sooner the better. It's news that'll not stand the keepin’” He had lately fallen into the habit of avoiding her room, and as he had not seen her during the last two days, she would no doubt find the unexpectedness of his visit the more delightful.
'Well!' he remarked softly, as he went into the bedroom. 'You're still here, I see. I met the doctor on my way in and he was gi'en us a great account o' your corpuscles o' the blood they're uncommon strong, by his report.'
She did not move at his entry, but lay passive, only the flicker of her eyes showing that she lived. In the six months that had elapsed since she had been forced to take to her bed she had altered terrifyingly, and one who had not marked the imperceptible, day-by-day decline, the gradual shrinking of her flesh, would now have found her unrecognisable, even as the ailing woman she had then appeared.
Her form, beneath the light covering of the sheet, was that of a skeleton with hip bones which stuck out in a high, ridiculous protuberance; only a flaccid envelope of sagging skin covered the thin, long bones of her legs and arms, while over the framework of her face a tight, dry parchment was drawn, with cavities for eyes, nose and mouth. Her lips were pale, dry, cracked, with little brown desiccated flakes clinging to them like scales, and above the sunken features her bony forehead seemed to bulge into unnatural, disproportioned relief. A few strartds of grey hair, withered, lifeless as the face itself, straggled over the pillow to frame this ghastly visage. Her weakness was so apparent that it seemed an impossible effort for her to breathe, and from this very weakness she made no reply to his remark, but looked at him with an expression he could not read. It seemed to her that there was nothing more for him to say to wound her.
'Have ye everything ye want?' he continued, in a low tone of assumed solicitude. 'Everything that might be necessary for these corpuscles o' yours ? Ye've plenty of medicine, anyway plenty of choice, I see. One, two, three, four,' he counted; 'four different bottles o' pheesic. There's merit in variety, apparently. But woman, if ye go on drinkin' it at this rate, we'll have to raise another loan frae your braw friends in Glasgow to pay for it a'.'
Deep in her living eyes, which alone of her wasted features indicated her emotions, a faint wound reopened, and they filled with a look of dull pleading. Five months ago she had, in desperation, been forced to confess to him her obligation to the money-lenders and though he had paid the money in full, since then he had not for a moment let her forget the wretched matter, and in a hundred different ways, on the most absurd pretexts, he would introduce it into the conversation. Not even her present look moved him, for he was now entirely without sympathy for her, feeling that she would linger on for ever, a useless encumbrance to him.
'Ay,' he continued pleasantly, 'ye've proved yourself a great hand at drinkin* the medicine. You're as gleg at that as ye are at spendin' other folks' money.' Then abruptly he changed the subject and queried gravely, 'Have ye seen your big, braw son the day? Oh! Ye have, indeed,' he continued, after reading her unspoken reply. 'I'm real glad to hear it. I thocht he michtna have been up yet,
but I see I'm wrong. He's not downstairs though. I never seem to be fortunate enough to see him these days.'
At his words she spoke at last, moulding her stiff lips to utter, in a weak whisper:
'Matt's been a good son to me lately.'
'Well, that's only a fair return,' he exclaimed judiciously. 'You've been a graund mother to him. The result o' your upbringing o' him is a positive credit to you both.' He paused, recognising her weakness, hardly knowing why he spoke to her thus; yet, unable to discard
the habit of years, impelled somehow by his own bitterness, by his own misfortunes, he continued in a low voice, 'Ye've brocht up a’ your children bonnie, bonnie. There's Mary now what more could ye wish for than the way she's turned out? I don't know where she is exactly, but I'm sure she'll be doin' ye credit nobly.' Then, observing that his wife was attempting to speak, he waited on her words.
'I know where she is,' she whispered slowly.
He gazed at her.
'Ay!' he answered. 'Ye know she's in London and that's as much as we a' ken as much as ye'll ever know.'
