The more a poor and sensitive man confines himself within doors, the
more he troubles himself with the fancy that everyone he meets is
staring at and watching him when he stirs out; and this fancy was very
strong on Septimus Hardon one day--one very miserable sloppy wet day, as
he made his way towards Lower Series-place, on account of dilapidations
in his boots.
Now experience has taught that holes or seediness generally of the other
apparel may to a certain extent be managed, and something like a decent
appearance made; the hat may be sponged and ironed, while the brown
napless spots are inked, and the bruises, to a certain extent, rubbed
out; holes in the coat may be fine-drawn, and a vigorous brushing will
always do something towards renovating the nap, even as soap and flannel
will remove the grease; then, too, a good button-up, and a paper collar
neatly arranged beneath a clean face and shortly-cut hair, give a finish
to a costume by no means rare in London streets. It is only when in
company with dirt and squalor that long hair shows to its greatest
advantage; and if the hair be long, vain are the efforts made to reform
a shabby garb. Your artist may fancy he paints the better by saving the
sixpences that should by rights find their way into the pocket of the
man of the long tongue and sharp scissors; your poet with rolling eye
may also find some hidden advantage, some Samson-like strength in
flowing locks; and no doubt Italian liberty would suffer, and Vaterland
be blotted and wiped out, if from foreign heads much of the
collar-greasing, eye-offending, cheek-tickling appendage were shorn off.
We know how the strength of the old judge lay in his locks, and when we
meet some brawny hirsute fellow, we are apt to consider him a very
Hercules of strength; but when we encounter long hair in a state of
wealth, petted, perfumed, and glossed, after the fashion of the dandies
of the Merry Monarch's time, how the mind will feel disposed to look
upon the owner of the flowing locks, not as a star of the intellectual
sphere, but as a comet of weak intensity; while, when the same lengthy
locks are met with in a state of poverty, even the short prison-barber
coiffure of the Jarker kind seems preferable.
Taught by adversity, Septimus Hardon had learned to contend with the
dilapidations in his clothes,--at times quite ingeniously,--but, like
far better men, he had not been able to control his boots. Custom has
so much to do with matters of dress, that though shabbiness will pass
unnoticed in the throng, any departure from the ordinary laws will draw
as much attention to the offender as if he were a visitor from some
foreign clime. Sandal-shoon were of course once the correct thing for
promenading the crust of the earth; but who now, unless he were an
extreme Ritualist, would think of traversing our muddy streets with bare
feet strapped to a sole, and great-toes working in a most obtrusive
manner? Certainly not a man of Septimus Hardon's retiring disposition,
though, had he felt so disposed, he could not have done so in the
present instance, since his boots almost lacked soles. Their decay had
been so rapid, that scarcely anything remained but the uppers. He had
even taken to wearing his wife's goloshes, until the policeman became
more attentive to his quiet footfall than was agreeable. But there is a
stretch beyond which even the elasticity of indiarubber will not extend;
and now, after putting up with much hard usage, the goloshes had
succumbed, and, suffering under a complete reverse of circumstances, the
indiarubber was itself completely rubbed out.
As before said, there are many little contrivances for bettering worn
costume; but somehow or another a boot bothers the cleverest. String is
a wonderful adjunct to garments generally, often acting as a substitute
for buttons or braces; in fact, for a man wrecked on a desert island,
there would not be the slightest cause for despair so long as he had
string; but even it falls powerless before boots; glue is useless from
the damp; while as to paste, it is no better than sealing-wax or grim.
Taken altogether, boots are a great nuisance to a poor man; and when
they have arrived at such a pitch that they are not worth mending, the
best plan to adopt is not to throw them away, or offer them up as an
odorous sacrifice to the goddess of poverty upon your household fire,
watching their life-like contortions as the leather twists and turns in
the hot blaze, but to do as Septimus Hardon did, with many a sigh, as
though they had been old friends--sell them.
Septimus sold his boots to Isaac Gross, in Lower Series--place, after
trying hard to get another day's wear out of them. It had been a fierce
battle, and he had found the arguments adduced by his leather friends
too strong to be resisted. He parted from them with regret, although
they had never been to him the friends he tried to believe. To begin
with, they had always pinched him terribly, raising blisters upon his
heels, painfully chafing his toes, bringing a tender place upon one
foot, and fostering a corn upon the other; but now they had been parted
with in exchange, with so much current coin added, for a pair of Isaac
Gross's translations.
It might reasonably be supposed that old Matt had introduced Septimus as
a customer; but no, this would have been introducing him to the abode of
which he was ashamed; and Septimus had long since discovered the spot
for himself, and come to the conclusion that it was a place where he
could well suit himself, or rather the requirements of his pocket.
Isaac was smoking away as usual, and giving the finishing touch to a
boot-sole by means of a piece of broken glass, whose keen edge took off
minute shavings of the leather. Mrs Slagg was busily carrying on
trading transactions with a dirty man, and giving the best price for a
barrowful of old newspapers; but both Isaac and Mrs Slagg seemed out of
spirits, and when a customer presented himself in the shape of Septimus
Hardon, the translator put down his work slowly, sighed, laid his pipe
upon a shelf, and seemed to carry out his bargain with more than his
usual heaviness. As a rule, Isaac was a man given to smiling--smiling
very slowly, and bringing his visage back to its normal state, a solid
aspect; but there was no smile visible now; and when his visitor for
"three-and-nine and the old uns," became the lucky possessor of a pair--
no, not a pair--of two Oxonian shoes, Isaac took the money with another
sigh, put it in an old blacking-bottle upon the shelf, which he used as
a till, dropped the old boots upon a heap close by, took up his pipe,
smoked, sighed, and then scraped away at his boot-sole without taking a
single peep at his neighbour.
For Isaac Gross was sore at heart concerning the state of his old friend
Matt, as sore at heart as was his customer; and when, slightly limping
and pinched, Septimus creaked away in his new shoes, Mrs Slagg having
finished her paper purchases, and retaken her seat inside her door,--a
seat she seldom quitted, making her customers perform the weighing and
lifting when practicable,--she peeped round the door-jamb twice in vain;
and though trade was prosperous as her love, in spite of its being
enshrined so softly in fat, Mrs Keziah Slagg's heart was also sore, and
she too sighed.
The feeling that everyone was watching him was stronger than ever upon
Septimus Hardon that morning as he made his way along the big streets
and alleys on his way towards one of the hospitals, and after letting
the matter sleep as it were for some time, he had now awakened to the
fact that he should like to prosecute his claim; though he told himself
frequently that he was too weak and wanting in decision to go on without
help--the help he could not now obtain. He knew that Mr Sterne would
willingly assist him, but his was not the required help; and he shrank
from making him his confidant, while he eagerly sought the aid of the
old printer now it was not forthcoming.
There are some strange contradictions in the human heart; and at the
present time, had old Matt presented himself to go on with the search in
the unbusiness-like way already followed, the chances are that Septimus
Hardon would have shrunk from it, or allowed himself unwillingly to be
dragged into farther proceedings.
But old Matt was not present; and now, with the idea troubling him that
much time had been wasted, and the matter must be at once seen to,
Septimus Hardon made his way towards the hospital; not that he was ill
in body, though troubled greatly in mind concerning the man who had been
his friend in the hardest struggle of his life. For there were strong
passions in the vacillating soul of Septimus Hardon, and he had been
greatly moved when, after another long absence, during which he had
anxiously waited for the old man, a letter had been delivered, telling
how that Matthew Space lay seriously ill in a hospital-ward.
For the first few days after their parting, Matt's last words had
strangely haunted Septimus, and he could not rest for thinking of them;
but they grew fainter with the lapse of time; Matt came not to spur him
once more to his task, and he sank lower and lower, while Doctor Hardon
of Somesham, portly and smiling, grew great in the estimation of the
people of the little town.
Septimus had tried more than once in his unbusiness-like, haphazard way
to find out the residence of old Matt, at such times as the thoughts of
his last words were strong upon him. "He said he was ill, and then
talked of medicine and attendance. He was wandering," said Septimus.
"I remember I had great difficulty in getting him along. Perhaps he is
dead. Well, well; so with all of us. Let it rest, for I'll take no
farther steps."
A rash promise to make, as he felt himself when one day came the few
lines written in a strange hand, asking his attendance at the hospital.
Only a few lines in a crabbed hand, without a reference to the search;
but now the desire had risen strong in him once more, though he called
himself selfish to think of his own affairs at such a time.
Septimus was not long in responding to the note, but he found the old
man delirious. The second time, Lucy begged to go and see her old
friend, and wept bitterly over his shrivelled hand; but the old man was
incoherent, and knew them not.
And now for the third visit Septimus made his way to the hospital, where
he found the old man apparently sinking from the effects of some
operation. The doctor had just left, when one of the nurses, a great,
gaunt, bony woman, with a catlike smile, and a fine high colour in her
cheeks, ushered the visitor to the bedside--a bed, one of many in the
light, clean, airy ward.
Septimus Hardon was shocked at the change which had taken place in the
old man, as he lay with his hands spread out upon the white coverlet of
the bed, pale and glassy-eyed, and rather disposed to wander in his
speech; but his face seemed to light up when he heard his visitor's
voice.
"No; no better," he whispered. "Let's see, I told you, didn't I? Mrs
Hardon, medicine and attendance, wasn't it? To be sure it was. Yes,
medicine and shocking bad attendance here. That's it; and I can't tell
you any more. I'm falling out of the forme, sir, unless some of these
doctors precious soon tighten up the quoins."
"No, no," said Septimus cheerily, "not so bad as that; a good heart is
half the battle."
"Yes, yes, yes, so it is," whispered the old man feebly; "but, I say, is
she gone?"
Septimus told him the nurse had left the room, and the old man
continued:
"You can't keep a good heart here, sir, nohow. I wouldn't have come if
I'd known all I know now. You saw her, didn't you?"
"The nurse?" said Septimus.
"Yes, her," replied the old man, shuddering; "she's a wretch, with no
more feeling in her than a post. She'll do what the porters shrink
from, sir. They have to carry the--you know what I mean, sir--down to
the deadhouse; and I've known her laugh at the young one, and do it
herself in a way that makes your blood run cold. Just wink, sir, if you
see her coming. She'll be here directly with my wine or jelly: says I'm
to have some on the little board, don't it?"
Septimus looked at the board above his head, and found that wine was
ordered.
"Yes," said the old man, "the doctors are trumps, sir, everyone of them;
and no poor fellow out of the place could get the care and attention
I've done here. My doctor couldn't do more if I paid him ten pound a
day; and I always feel wonderful after he's gone; seems to understand my
chronics, sir, as you wouldn't believe in. But those nurses, sir--don't
tell 'em I said so, but they're devils, sir, devils. Medicine and
attendance, sir; it's all the first and none of the last."
"Hush," said his visitor, seeing as he thought that the old man was
beginning to wander, "Mrs Hardon would have liked to see you, and Lucy;
but she could not leave her mother to-day."
"God bless her!" said the old man fervently. "He asleep in the bed
there told me she came the other day, looking like an angel of comfort
in this dreary place, sir. God bless her! Tell her, sir, that the old
man's true as steel, sir; the old blade's notched and rusty, but he's
true as steel, sir. Do you hear? tell her that old Matt's true as
steel. But these nurses, sir," he whispered, holding by his visitor's
coat, and drawing him nearer, "they're devils, sir, regular devils!"
"Not quite so bad as that," said Septimus, smiling.
"Not so bad, sir? Worse, sir, worse; ever so much worse. They'd do
anything. There's no Sisters of Mercy here, sir, like they're talking
of having at some places; they're sisters of something else--she-demons,
sir, and one daren't complain or say a word. They'd kill a poor fellow
as soon as look at him, and do, too,--dozens."
"Nonsense," said Septimus, smiling, "don't be too hard, Matt."
"'Tain't nonsense, sir," whispered the old man eagerly. "I ain't
wandering now, though I have been sending up some queer proofs--been
touched in the head, you know, and thought I was going; but it didn't
seem to matter much if I could only have been easy in my mind, for I
wanted to be out of my misery. But I couldn't be comfortable on account
of the medicine and attendance, and your uncle. What business has he to
get himself made head doctor here, sir, just because I came; and then to
set the nurses against me to get me out of the way? He knows I'm
against him, and mean you to have your rights, and he's trying with
medicine and attendance to--no, stop, that's not it," whispered the old
man, "I've got wrong sorts in my case, and that's not what I wanted to
say." And then for a few moments it was pitiable to witness the
struggle going on against the wandering thoughts that oppressed him; but
he seemed to get the better of his weakness, and went on again.
"There, that's better, sir; your coming has seemed to do me good, and
brightened me up. I get like that sometimes, and it seems that I've no
power over my tongue, and it says just what it likes. Tell Miss Lucy
I'm getting better, and that I want to get out of this place. I know
what I'm saying now, sir, though I can't make it quite right about that
medicine and attendance that we wanted to know about; for it bothers me,
and makes my head hot, and gets mixed up with the medicine and
attendance here. But I shall have it right one of these days; I did
nearly, once, but it got away again."
In his anxiety now to know more, Septimus drew out paper and pencil.
"Don't think about it now," he said; "but keep these under your pillow,
and put it down the next time you think anything."
Old Matt smiled feebly, and drew forth his old memorandum-book, and
slowly opening it, showed the worn stumpy piece of pencil inside.
"I'd thought of that, sir, and should have done so before, only I was
afraid that I might put down the wrong thing--something about the
nurses, you know, when they would have read it, and then, perhaps, I
shouldn't have had a chance to say any more. And 'tisn't really, sir,
it isn't nonsense about them. You think I'm wandering, and don't
believe it; and it's just the same with the doctors--they don't believe
it neither. There was one poor chap on the other side of the ward, down
at the bottom there--he told the doctor his nurse neglected him, and
drank his wine, putting in water instead, beside not giving him his
medicine regular; so the old doctor called for the nurse, and--"
"But you must not talk any more," said Septimus kindly, "you are getting
exhausted."
"I ain't," said the old man angrily; "it does me good, revives me; and
you don't believe me, that's what it is."
"Yes, I do, indeed," cried Septimus. "Then let me finish," whispered
the old man. "Doctor Hardon called and asked her where she saw the
entry. There, now, there," whimpered Matt, "see what you've done: you
made me upset a stickful of matter, and got me all in a pye again. No;
all right, sir, I see, I see--he asked her about it before the patient,
speaking very sharply, for the doctors mean well, sir. And then what
did the old crocodile do, sir, but just turn her eyes towards the
whitewash, smooth her apron, raise her hands a bit, and then, half
smiling, looks at the doctor like so much pickled innocence, but never
says a word; while he, just to comfort the poor fellow, told him to keep
up, and it should all be seen to; and then there was a bit of whispering
between the doctor and the nurse, and then he went off. But I could see
who was believed, for I heard the doctor mutter something about sick
man's fancies as he came across to me. That poor chap died, sir!"
Just then, Septimus gave the old man a meaning look, for one of the
nurses came up with a glass of wine, and smiled and curtsied to the
visitor.
"I hope he ain't been talking, sir?" said the woman, in a harsh grating
voice with the corners a little rubbed down; "getting on charming, ain't
he, sir? only he will talk too much.--Now drink your wine up, there's a
good soul. Don't sip it, but toss it down, and it will do you twice as
much good;" and while the old man, with the assistance of his visitor,
raised himself a little, she gave his pillow two or three vengeful
punches and shakes as she snatched it off the bed, the result of her
efforts being visible in a slit across the middle, which she placed
undermost.
"Yes," muttered Matt when the woman had gone. "Yes; toss it down, so as
not to taste it. Why, that was half water--beautiful wines and spirits
as they have here, sir. That's the very one herself, sir. She killed
him."
"Killed who?" exclaimed Septimus, horrified.
"Don't shout, sir; leastwise, not if you want to see me again," said
Matt grimly. "Killed that poor fellow I was telling you about. She
never forgave him, and a week afterwards and there was the screen round
his bed, and the porters came and carried him away. She killed him,
sure enough, and I ain't agoing to tell you about the bother there was
with his friends about the doctors, and what they did to him afterwards,
it might upset you. It almost does me; not that I care much, for it
don't matter when you're gone, and I've got no friends."
"Hush, pray; it can't be so," exclaimed Septimus, shuddering.
"No, of course not," chuckled the old man, brightening up from the
effects of his stimulant, "O, no; sick man's fancies, sir, ain't they?
Just what everyone would say; but she killed him all the same, just as
dozens more have been killed here. It don't take much to kill a poor
fellow hanging in the balance--him in one scale, and his complaint in
the other. The doctor comes and gets in the same scale with him, and
bears him down a bit right way; but then as soon as the doctor's gone,
the nurse goes and sits in the other scale, and sends him wrong way
again. Good nursing's of more consequence sometimes than the doctoring,
I can tell you, sir, and if I'd had good nursing I shouldn't have been
here at all. Ikey means well, you know, sir; and so does Mother Slagg,
eh? but you don't know them, sir, and it don't matter."
"But had you not better be silent now?" hinted Septimus.
"No," said the old man testily; "being so quiet, and having no one to
talk to has half-killed me as it is. I don't want to be killed, I want
to get out, sir. And, mind you, I don't say about that poor fellow that
she poisoned him, or choked him, or played at she-Othello with the
pillow, sir; but there's plenty of other ways of doing it. The doctor
knows the man's condition, and his danger, and orders him such and such
things to keep him going, and bring him round, eh?"
Septimus nodded, for the old man paused for breath; though the wine he
had taken made him talk in a voluble and excited manner, but still with
perfect coherence.
"Well, sir; and who's got to carry out the doctor's orders? Why, the
nurse, to be sure. Just push the pillow a little more under my head,
sir; she's made it uncomfortable. That's it; thanky, sir. Well, you
nor no one else won't believe that a nurse here would do anything wrong.
But now, look here: suppose you see that a lamp wants trimming, what do
you do? You give orders for it to be trimmed, sir, don't you?"
Septimus nodded again.
"Well, then," whispered the old man, hooking one of his long fingers in
a buttonhole of his visitor's coat; "suppose they don't trim the lamp;
suppose it isn't trimmed, eh? what then?"
"It goes out!" said Septimus.
"To be sure--exactly, sir; and there have been lots of lamps go out
here. They won't trim them, or forget to trim them, and tell themselves
they're only sparing the poor creatures misery, while no one dares to
speak about it. Talk of death, sir, they think no more of it here, sir,
than one does of snuffing out a candle. You see, decent women won't
come to a place like this to do the work these nurses do. It's only to
be done for money or love. Now it's done for money, and while it's done
for money it can only be done by hard, heartless, drinking creatures
who've got women's shapes and devils' hearts, sir. But the doctors are
all right, sir, only that they don't see all we poor patients see. If
skill and doctoring will put me right, sir, I shall be put right, sir.
But I'm scared about it sometimes, and half afraid that some of those
beauties will weight the wrong scale so heavily that the doctors won't
pull me square. Sick man's fancies, sir, eh? Wanderings, ain't they?"
Septimus Hardon knew not what to say, but whispered such comfort as he
could.
"Something ought to be done, you know," said the old man feebly; "but
don't hint a word of what I've said, sir, to a soul--please don't," he
said pitifully. "You see that all these goings on prey upon a poor
fellow's mind; and if he isn't low-spirited lying in a hospital-ward,
when is he likely to be? One wants sympathy and comfort, sir, and to
feel that there's someone belonging to you who cares for you, and is
ready to smooth your pillow, and lay a cold hand upon your hot forehead,
and say `God bless you!' and I've no one, no one;" and the old man's
voice grew weak and quavering.
"Come, come," whispered Septimus, "take heart, Matt; we'll come as often
as they will let us. And you are getting better; see how you have
chatted. You are only low now from the reaction. Try and rest a bit,
and get rid of some of these fancies."
Old Matt's eyes turned angrily upon his visitor as he exclaimed, "I tell
you they are not fancies, sir, but truth. I wouldn't have come if I'd
known, for I've seen men drink, and women drink; but never anyone like
these she-wolves. Would you trust anyone you loved to the care of a
woman who drank, sir?"
"No!"
"They say they must have support, and I suppose they must; but it's
hard, hard, hard!" groaned the old man, and he shut his eyes, seeking
out the hand of his visitor, and holding it tightly, until, by the rules
of the place, he was obliged to leave.
Volume Two, Chapter XIII.