Elsley was struck dumb; first by the certainty which Tom"s words expressed, and next by the coolness of their temper. At last he stammered out, "Good heavens, Mr. Thurnall! you do not talk of that frightful scourge--so disgusting, too, in its character--as a matter of profit and loss? It is sordid, cold-hearted!"
"My dear sir, if I let myself think, much more talk, about the matter in any other tone, I should face the thing poorly enough when it came.
I shall have work enough to keep my head about the end of August or beginning of September, and I must not lose it beforehand, by indulging in any horror, disgust, or other emotion perfectly justifiable in a layman."
"But are not doctors men?"
"That depends very much on what "a man" means."
"Men with human sympathy and compa.s.sion."
"Oh, I mean by a man, a man with human strength. My dear sir, one may be too busy, and at doing good too (though that is not my line, save professionally, because it is my only way of earning money); but one may be too busy at doing good to have time for compa.s.sion. If while I was cutting a man"s leg off I thought of the pain which he was suffering--"
"Thank heaven!" said Elsley, "that it was not my lot to become a medical man."
Tom looked at him with the quaintest smile: a flush of mingled anger and contempt had been rising in him as he heard the ex-bottle-boy talking sentiment: but he only went on quietly,
"No, sir; with your more delicate sensibilities, you may thank Heaven that you did not become a medical man; your life would have been one of torture, disgust, and agonising sense of responsibility. But do you not see that you must thank Heaven for the sufferer"s sake also? I will not shock you again by talking of amputation; but even in the smallest matter--even if you were merely sending medicine to an old maid--suppose that your imagination were preoccupied by the thought of her old age, her sufferings, her disappointed hopes, her regretful dream of bygone youth, and beauty, and love, and all the tender fancies which might well spring out of such a mournful spectacle, would you not be but too likely (pardon the bathos) to end by sending her an elderly gentleman"s medicine after all, and so either frightfully increasing her sufferings, or ending them once for all?"
Tom said this in the most quiet and natural tone, without even a twinkle of his wicked eye: but Elsley heard him begin with reddening face; and as he went on, the red had turned to purple, and then to deadly yellow; till making a half-step forward he cried fiercely:--
"Sir!" and then stopped suddenly; for his feet slipped upon the polished stone, and on his face he fell into the pool at Thurnall"s feet.
"Well for both of us geese!" said Tom inwardly, as he went to pick him up. "I verily believe he was going to strike me, and that would have done for neither of us. I was a fool to say it; but the temptation was so exquisite; and it must have come some day."
But Vavasour staggered up of his own accord, and dashing away Tom"s proffered hand, was rushing off without a word.
"Not so, Mr. John Briggs!" said Tom, making up his mind in a moment that he must have it out now, or never; and that he might have everything to fear from Vavasour if he let him go home furious. We do not part thus, sir!"
"We will meet again, if you will," foamed Vavasour, "but it shall end in the death of one of us!"
"By each other"s potions? I can doctor myself, sir, thank you. Listen to me, John Briggs! You shall listen!" and Tom sprang past him, and planted himself at the foot of the rock steps, to prevent his escaping upward.
"What, do you wish to quarrel with me, sir? It is I who ought to quarrel with you. I am the aggrieved party, and not you, sir! I have not seen the son of the man who, when I was an apothecary"s boy, petted me, lent me books, introduced me as a genius, turned my head for me, which was just what I was vain enough to enjoy--I have not seen that man"s son cast ash.o.r.e penniless and friendless, and yet never held out to him a helping hand, but tried to conceal my ident.i.ty from him, from a dirty shame of my honest father"s honest name."
Vavasour dropped his eyes, for was it not true? but he raised them again more fiercely than ever.
"Curse you! I owe you nothing. It was you who made me ashamed of it.
You rhymed on it, and laughed about poetry coming out of such a name."
"And what if I did? Are poets to "be made of nothing but tinder and gall?" Why could you not take an honest joke as it was meant, and go your way like other people, till you had shown yourself worth something, and won honour even, for the name of Briggs?"
"And I have! I have my own station now, my own fame, sir, and it is nothing to you what I choose to call myself. I have won my place, I say, and your mean envy cannot rob me of it."
"You have your station. Very good," said Tom, not caring to notice the imputation; "you owe the greater part of it to your having made a most fortunate marriage, for which I respect you, as a practical man. Let your poetry be what it may (and people tell me that it is really very beautiful), your match shows me that you are a clever, and therefore a successful person."
"Do you take me for a sordid schemer, like yourself? I loved what was worthy of me, and won it because I deserved it."
"Then, having won it, treat it as it deserves," said Tom, with a cool searching look, before which Vavasour"s eyes fell again. "Understand me, Mr. John Briggs; it is of no consequence to me what you call yourself: but it is of consequence to me that I should not have a patient in my parish whom I cannot cure; for I cannot cure broken hearts, though they will be simple enough to come to me for medicine."
"You shall have no chance! You shall never enter my house! You shall not ruin me, sir, by your bills!"
Tom made no answer to this fresh insult. He had another game to play.
"Take care what you say, Briggs; remember that, after all, you are in my power, and I had better remind you plainly of the fact."
"And you mean to make me your tool? I will die first?"
"I believe that," said Tom, who was very near adding, "that he should be sorry to work with such tools."
"My tools are my lancet and my drugs," said he, quietly, "and all I have to say refers to them. It suits my purpose to become the princ.i.p.al medical man in this neighbourhood--"
"And I am to tout for introductions for you?"
"You are to be so very kind as to allow me to finish my sentence, just as you would allow any other gentleman; and because I wish for practice, and patients, and power, you will be so kind as to treat me henceforth as one high-minded man would treat another, to whom he is obliged. For you know, John Briggs, as well as I," said Tom, drawing himself up to his full height, "look me in the face, if you can, ere you deny it, that I was, while you knew me, as honourable a man, and as kind-hearted a man, as you ever were; and that now--considering the circ.u.mstances under which we meet,--you have more reason to trust me, than I have, prima facie, to trust you."
Vavasour answered not a word.
"Good-bye, then," said Tom, drawing aside from the step; "Mrs.
Vavasour will be anxious about you. And mind! With regard to her first of all, sir, and then with regard to other matters--as long, and only as long, as you remember that you are John Briggs of Whitbury, I shall be the first to forget it. There is my hand, for old acquaintance"
sake."
Vavasour took the proffered hand coldly, paused a moment, and then wrung it in silence, and hurried away home.
"Have I played my ace ill after all?" said Tom, sitting down to consider. "As for whether I should have played it all, that"s no business of mine now. Madam Might-have-been may see to that. But did I play ill? for if I did, I may try a new lead yet. Ought I to have twitted him about his wife? If he"s venomous, it may only make matters worse; and still worse if he be suspicious. I don"t think he was either in old times; but vanity will make a man so, and it may have made him. Well, I must only ingratiate myself all the more with her; and find out, too, whether she has his secret as well as I. What I am most afraid of is my having told him plainly that he was in my power; it"s apt to make sprats of his size flounce desperately, in the mere hope of proving themselves whales after all, if it"s only to their miserable selves. Never mind; he can"t break my tackle; and besides, that gripe of the hand seemed to indicate that the poor wretch was beat, and thought himself let off easily--as indeed he is. We"ll hope so. Now, zoophytes, for another turn with you!"
To tell the truth, however, Tom is looking for more than zoophytes, and has been doing so at every dead low tide since he was wrecked. He has heard nothing yet of his belt. The notes have not been presented at the London bank; n.o.body in the village has been spending more money than usual; for cunning Tom has contrived already to know how many pints of ale every man of whom he has the least doubt has drunk.
Perhaps, after all, the belt may have been torn off in the life struggle; it may have been for a moment in Grace"s hands, and then have been swept into the sea. What more likely? And what more likely, in that case, that, sinking by its weight, it is wedged away in some cranny of the rocks?
So spring-tide after spring-tide Tom searches, and all the more carefully because others are searching too, for waifs and strays from the wreck. Sad relics of mortality he finds at times, as others do: once, even, a dressing-case, full of rings and pins and chains, which belonged, he fancied, to a gay young bride with whom he had waltzed many a time on deck, as they slipped along before the soft trade-wind: but no belt. He sent the dressing-case to the Lloyd"s underwriters, and searched on: but in vain. Neither could he find that any one else had forestalled him; and that very afternoon, sulky and disheartened, he determined to waste no more time about the matter, and strode home, vowing signal vengeance against the thief, if he caught him.
"And I will catch him! These west-country yokels, to fancy that they can do Tom Thurnall! It"s adding insult to injury, as Sam Weller"s parrot has it."
Now his shortest way home lay across the sh.o.r.e, and then along the beach, and up the steps by the little waterfall, past Mrs. Harvey"s door; and at that door sat Grace, sewing in the sun. She looked up and bowed as his pa.s.sed, smiling modestly, and little dreaming of what was pa.s.sing in his mind; and when a very lovely girl smiled and bowed to Tom, he must needs do the same to her: whereon she added,--
"I beg your pardon, sir: have you heard anything of the money you lost? I--we--have been so ashamed to think of such a thing happening here."
Tom"s evil spirit was roused.
"Have _you_ heard anything of it, Miss Harvey? For you seem to me the only person in the place who knows anything about the matter."
"I, sir?" cried Grace, fixing her great startled eyes full on him.
"Why, ma"am," said Tom, with a courtly smile, "you may possibly recollect, if you will so far tax your memory, that you had it in your hands at least a moment, when you did me the kindness to save my life; and as you were kind enough to inform me that I should recover it when I was worthy of it, I suppose I have not yet risen in your eyes to the required state of conversion and regeneration." And swinging impatiently away, he walked on, really afraid lest he should say something rude.
Grace half called after him, and then suddenly checking herself, rushed in to her mother with a wild and pale face.
"What is this Mr. Thurnall has been saying to me about his belt and money which he lost?"