Part 10 (1/2)
”Is it ever given?” asked Andrew cautiously.
”Oh, I know it's given,” interposed Mrs. Ramornie decisively. ”George's uncle drank it up to five minutes before he died.”
George's uncle had been a very bad example. At the same time he had been a baronet, and Andrew swithered between the dissoluteness of the request and a certain stylishness it undoubtedly possessed.
”Mr. Walkingshaw is very determined for it,” said the nurse.
”Very well,” he answered. ”I'll get it for you.”
He went out with her and then returned to his sisters.
”Does it mean the end is near?” asked Mrs. Donaldson in a very hushed voice.
”It means it's nearer,” he answered grimly.
Undoubtedly this was a wild end for one of the most respectable lives ever lived in Edinburgh. Outside, the gale was now positively shrieking; and inside, he presumed the cork was already popping.
”What a pity!” said Gertrude.
”Oh, I don't know about that,” replied her sister. ”It keeps them happy.
George's uncle tried to sing after they thought all was over.”
Her brother frowned. The possibility that the head of Walkingshaw & Gilliflower might exit singing exceeded his gloomiest forebodings. He wished women did not have that habit of talking about unpleasant things.
Could they not keep the like of that to themselves?
Even as he frowned the second tap disturbed them.
”What is it now?” he snapped.
”Could you tell me,” asked the nurse, ”where Mr. Walkingshaw keeps his cigars?”
”Cigars!” he cried.
”He is very set upon one.”
Andrew silently opened a cupboard and handed her a box of cigars. Then, still in silence, he seated himself before the fire and frowned at the dancing flames. Behind his back his sisters talked in low voices, but he seemed to have no taste for further conversation.
A few minutes later came the third tap, and this time there was so curious a look in the nurse's face that the junior partner was on his feet in an instant.
”Is it--shall we come up?” he exclaimed.
”Mr. Walkingshaw would like to know what there's to be for dinner,” said the nurse.
He looked at his sisters and they at him, and then he rang the bell.
n.o.body spoke till the butler came up.
”Will you ask the cook what's for dinner? Mr. Walkingshaw wants to know.”
Andrew threw into this speech all the concentrated bitterness of his soul. Here was the quintessence of unorthodoxy in the very home of Walkingshaw & Gilliflower! The head of the firm proposed to die not merely drinking and smoking, but, if possible, feasting. They might be in some wretched Bohemian den.