Volume I Part 9 (1/2)
”Grove is an a.s.s, and got plucked twice. It is a perfect disgrace to quote him.”
”Well, I only wish I may do as well. He's a.s.sistant-surgeon to the 'Taurus' gun-brig on the African station; and if I was there, it's little I 'd care for the whole lot of bones and balderdash.”
”Come, don't be silly. Let us go on with the scapula. Describe the glenoid cavity.”
”If you were the girl you might be, I'd not be bored with all this stupid trash, Polly.”
”What do you mean? I don't understand you.”
”It's easy enough to understand me. You are as thick as thieves, you and that old Admiral,--that Sir Charles Cobham. I saw you talking to the old fellow at the meet the other morning. You 've only to say, 'There's Tom--my brother Tom--wants a navy appointment; he's not pa.s.sed yet, but if the fellows at the Board got a hint, just as much as, ”Don't be hard on him--”'”
”I 'd not do it to make you a post-captain, sir,” said she, severely.
”You very much overrate my influence, and very much underrate my integrity, when you ask it.”
”Hoity-toity! ain't we dignified! So you'd rather see me plucked, eh?”
”Yes, if that should be the only alternative.”
”Thank you, Polly, that's all! thank you,” said he; and he drew his sleeve across his eyes.
”My dear Tom,” said she, laying her white soft hand on his coa.r.s.e brown fingers, ”can you not see that if I even stooped to anything so unworthy, that it would compromise your whole prospects in life? You'd obtain an a.s.sistant-surgeoncy, and never rise above it.”
”And do I ask to rise above it? Do I ask anything beyond getting out of this house, and earning bread that is not grudged me?”
”Nay, nay; if you talk that way, I've done.”
”Well, I do talk that way. He sent me off to Kilkenny last week--you saw it yourself--to bring out that trash for the shop, and he would n't pay the car hire, and made me carry two stone of carbonate of magnesia and a jar of leeches fourteen miles. You were just taking that post and rail out of Nixon's lawn as I came by. You saw me well enough.”
”I am glad to say I did not,” said she, sighing.
”I saw you, then, and how that gray carried you! You were waving a handkerchief in your hand; what was that for?”
”It was to show Ambrose Bushe that the ground was good; he was afraid of being staked!”
[Ill.u.s.tration: 084]
”That's exactly what I am. I 'm afraid of being 'staked up' at the Hall, and if _you_ 'd take as much trouble about your brother as you did for Ambrose Bushe--”
”Tom, Tom, I have taken it for eight weary months. I believe I know Bell on the bones, and Harrison on the arteries, by heart!”
”Who thanks you?” said he, doggedly. ”When you read a thing twice, you never forget it; but it's not so with me.”
”Try what a little work will do, Tom; be a.s.sured there is not half as much disparity between people's brains as there is between their industry.”
”I'd rather have luck than either, I know that. It's the only thing, after all.”
She gave a very deep sigh, and leaned her head on her hand.
”Work and toil as hard as you may,” continued he, with all the fervor of one on a favorite theme, ”if you haven't luck you 'll be beaten. Can you deny that, Polly?”
”If you allow me to call merit what you call luck, I'll agree with you.