Any hopes which Hardy might have entertained as to the attitude of Miss
Nugent were dispelled the first time he saw her, that dutiful daughter
of a strong-willed sire favouring him with a bow which was exactly half
an inch in depth and then promptly bestowing her gaze elsewhere. He
passed Captain Nugent next day, and for a week afterwards he had only
to close his eyes to see in all its appalling virulence the glare with
which that gentleman had acknowledged his attempt at recognition.
He fared no better in Fullalove Alley, a visit to Mr. Wilks eliciting
the fact that that delectable thoroughfare had been put out of bounds
for Miss Nugent. Moreover, Mr. Wilks was full of his own troubles and
anxious for any comfort and advice that could be given to him. All the
alley knew that Mrs. Silk had quarrelled with her son over the steward,
and, without knowing the facts, spoke their mind with painful freedom
concerning them.
“She and Teddy don’t speak to each other now,” said Mr. Wilks,
gloomily, “and to ’ear people talk you’d think it was my fault.”
[Illustration: “Captain Nugent.”]
Hardy gave him what comfort he could. He even went the length of saying
that Mrs. Silk was a fine woman.
“She acts like a suffering martyr,” exclaimed Mr. Wilks. “She comes
over ’ere dropping hints that people are talking about us, and that
they ask ’er awkward questions. Pretending to misunderstand ’er every
time is enough to send me crazy; and she’s so sudden in what she says
there’s no being up to ’er. On’y this morning she asked me if I should
be sorry if she died.”
“What did you say?” inquired his listener.
“I said ‘yes,’” admitted Mr. Wilks, reluctantly. “I couldn’t say
anything else; but I said that she wasn’t to let my feelings interfere
with ’er in any way.”
Hardy’s father sailed a day or two later, and after that nothing
happened. Equator Lodge was an impregnable fortress, and the only
member of the garrison he saw in a fortnight was Bella.
His depression did not escape the notice of his partner, who, after
first advising love-philtres and then a visit to a well-known
specialist for diseases of the heart, finally recommended more work,
and put a generous portion of his own on to the young man’s desk.
Hardy, who was in an evil temper, pitched it on to the floor and, with
a few incisive remarks on levity unbecoming to age, pursued his duties
in gloomy silence.
A short time afterwards, however, he had to grapple with his partner’s
work in real earnest. For the first time in his life the genial
shipbroker was laid up with a rather serious illness. A chill caught
while bathing was going the round of certain unsuspected weak spots,
and the patient, who was of an inquiring turn of mind, was taking a
greater interest in medical works than his doctor deemed advisable.
“Most interesting study,” he said, faintly, to Hardy, as the latter
sat by his bedside one evening and tried to cheer him in the usual way
by telling him that there was nothing the matter with him. “There are
dozens of different forms of liver complaint alone, and I’ve got ’em
all.”
“Liver isn’t much,” said his visitor, with the confidence of youth.
“Mine is,” retorted the invalid; “it’s twice its proper size and still
growing. Base of the left lung is solidifying, or I’m much mistaken;
the heart, instead of waltzing as is suitable to my time of life, is
doing a galop, and everything else is as wrong as it can be.”
“When are you coming back?” inquired the other.
“Back?” repeated Swann. “Back? You haven’t been listening. I’m a wreck.
All through violating man’s primeval instinct by messing about in cold
water. What is the news?”
Hardy pondered and shook his head. “Nugent is going to be married in
July,” he said, at last.
“He’d better have had that trip on the whaler,” commented Mr. Swann;
“but that is not news. Nathan Smith told it me this morning.”
“Nathan Smith?” repeated the other, in surprise.
“I’ve done him a little service,” said the invalid. “Got him out of a
mess with Garth and Co. He’s been here two or three times, and I must
confess I find him a most alluring rascal.”
“Birds of a feather—” began Hardy, superciliously.
“Don’t flatter me,” said Swann, putting his hand out of the bed-clothes
with a deprecatory gesture. “I am not worthy to sit at his feet. He is
the most amusing knave on the coast. He is like a sunbeam in a sick
room when you can once get him to talk of his experiences. Have you
seen young Nugent lately? Does he seem cheerful?”
“Yes, but he is not,” was the reply.
“Well, it’s natural for the young to marry,” said the other, gravely.
“Murchison will be the next to go, I expect.”
“Possibly,” returned Hardy, with affected calmness.
“Blaikie was saying something about it this morning,” resumed Swann,
regarding him from half-closed lids, “but he was punching and tapping
me all about the ribs while he was talking, and I didn’t catch all he
said, but I think it’s all arranged. Murchison is there nearly every
day, I understand; I suppose you meet him there?”
Mr. Hardy, whistling softly, rose and walked round the room, uncorking
medicine bottles and sniffing at their contents. A smile of unaffected
pleasure lit up his features as he removed the stopper from one
particularly pungent mixture.
“Two tablespoonfuls three times a day,” he read, slowly. “When did you
have the last, Swann? Shall I ring for the nurse?”
The invalid shook his head impatiently. “You’re an ungrateful dog,” he
muttered, “or you would tell me how your affair is going. Have you got
any chance?”
“You’re getting light-headed now,” said Hardy, calmly. “I’d better go.”
[Illustration: “Sniffing at their contents.”]
“All right, go then,” responded the invalid; “but if you lose that girl
just for the want of a little skilled advice from an expert, you’ll
never forgive yourself—I’m serious.”
“Well, you _must_ be ill then,” said the younger man, with anxiety.
“Twice,” said Mr. Swann, lying on his back and apparently addressing
the ceiling, “twice I have given this young man invaluable assistance,
and each time he has bungled.”
Hardy laughed and, the nurse returning to the room, bade him “good-bye”
and departed. After the close atmosphere of the sick room the air
was delicious, and he walked along slowly, deep in thought. From
Nathan Smith his thoughts wandered to Jack Nugent and his unfortunate
engagement, and from that to Kate Nugent. For months he had been
revolving impossible schemes in his mind to earn her gratitude, and
possibly that of the captain, by extricating Jack. In the latter
connection he was also reminded of that unhappy victim of unrequited
affection, Edward Silk.
It was early to go indoors, and the house was dull. He turned and
retraced his steps, and, his thoughts reverting to his sick partner,
smiled as he remembered remarks which that irresponsible person had
made at various times concerning the making of his last will and
testament. Then he came to a sudden standstill as a wild, forlorn-hope
kind of idea suddenly occurred to him. He stood for some time
thinking, then walked a little way, and then stopped again as various
difficulties presented themselves for solution. Finally, despite the
lateness of the hour, he walked back in some excitement to the house he
had quitted over half an hour before with the intention of speaking to
the invalid concerning a duty peculiarly incumbent upon elderly men of
means.
The nurse, who came out of the sick room, gently closing the door after
her, demurred a little to this second visit, but, receiving a promise
from the visitor not to excite the invalid, left them together. The
odour of the abominable physic was upon the air.
“Well?” said the invalid.
“I have been thinking that I was rather uncivil a little while ago,”
said Hardy.
“Ah!” said the other. “What do you want?”
“A little of that skilled assistance you were speaking of.”
Mr. Swann made an alarming noise in his throat. Hardy sprang forward in
alarm, but he motioned him back.
“I was only laughing,” he explained.
Hardy repressed his annoyance by an effort, and endeavoured, but with
scant success, to return the other’s smile.
“Go on,” said the shipbroker, presently.
“I have thought of a scheme for upsetting Nugent’s marriage,” said
Hardy, slowly.
“It is just a forlorn hope which depends for its success on you and
Nathan Smith.”
“He’s a friend of Kybird’s,” said the other, drily.
“That is the most important thing of all,” rejoined Hardy. “That is,
next to your shrewdness and tact; everything depends upon you, really,
and whether you can fool Smith. It is a great thing in our favour that
you have been taking him up lately.”
“Are you coming to the point or are you not?” demanded the shipbroker.
Hardy looked cautiously round the room, and then, drawing his chair
close to the bed, leaned over the prostrate man and spoke rapidly into
his ear.
“_What?_” cried the astounded Mr. Swann, suddenly sitting up in his
bed. “You—you scoundrel!”
“It’s to be done,” said Hardy.
“You ghoul!” said the invalid, glaring at him. “Is that the way to talk
to a sick man? You unscrupulous rascal!”
“It’ll be amusement for you,” pleaded the other, “and if we are
successful it will be the best thing in the end for everybody. Think of
the good you’ll do.”
“Where you get such rascally ideas from, I can’t think,” mused the
invalid. “Your father is a straightforward, honest man, and your
partner’s uprightness is the talk of Sunwich.”
“It doesn’t take much to make Sunwich talk,” retorted Hardy.
“A preposterous suggestion to make to a man of my standing,” said the
shipbroker, ignoring the remark. “If the affair ever leaked out I
should never hear the end of it.”
“It can’t leak out,” said Hardy, “and if it does there is no direct
evidence. They will never really know until you die; they can only
suspect.”
“Very well,” said the shipbroker, with a half-indulgent, half-humorous
glance. “Anything to get rid of you. It’s a crack-brained scheme, and
could only originate with a young man whose affections have weakened
his head—I consent.”
“Bravo!” said Hardy and patted him on the back; Mr. Swann referred to
the base of his left lung, and he apologized.
“I’ll have to fix it up with Blaikie,” said the invalid, lying down
again. “Murchison got two of his best patients last week, so that it
ought to be easy. And besides, he is fond of innocent amusement.”
“I’m awfully obliged to you,” said Hardy.
“It might be as well if we pretended to quarrel,” said the invalid,
reflectively, “especially as you are known to be a friend of Nugent’s.
We’ll have a few words—before my housekeeper if possible, to insure
publicity—and then you had better not come again. Send Silk instead
with messages.”
Hardy thanked him and whispered a caution as a footstep was heard on
the landing. The door opened and the nurse, followed by the housekeeper
bearing a tray, entered the room.
“And I can’t be worried about these things,” said Swann, in an
acrimonious voice, as they entered. “If you are not capable of settling
a simple question like that yourself, ask the office-boy to instruct
you.
“It’s your work,” retorted Hardy, “and a nice mess it’s in.”
“H’sh!” said the nurse, coming forward hastily. “You must leave the
room, sir. I can’t have you exciting my patient.”
Hardy bestowed an indignant glance at the invalid.
“Get out!” said that gentleman, with extraordinary fierceness for one
in his weak condition. “In future, nurse, I won’t have this person
admitted to my room.”
“Yes, yes; certainly,” said the nurse. “You must go, sir; at once,
please.”
“I’m going,” said Hardy, almost losing his gravity at the piteous
spectacle afforded by the house-keeper as she stood, still holding the
tray and staring open-mouthed at the combatants. “When you’re tired of
skulking in bed, perhaps you’ll come and do your share of the work.”
[Illustration: “’Puppy!’ Said the Invalid.”]
Mr. Swann rose to a sitting position, and his demeanour was so alarming
that the nurse, hastening over to him, entreated him to lie down, and
waved Hardy peremptorily from the room.
“Puppy!” said the invalid, with great relish. “Blockhead!”
He gazed fixedly at the young man as he departed and then, catching
sight in his turn of the housekeeper’s perplexity, laid himself down
and buried his face in the bed-clothes. The nurse crossed over to her
assistant and, taking the tray from her, told her in a sharp whisper
that if she ever admitted Mr. Hardy again she would not be answerable
for the consequences.