Part 66 (1/2)
”I want ye--” Darius recommenced. But he was defeated again by his insidious foe. He wept loudly and without restraint for a few moments, and then suddenly ceased, and endeavoured to speak, and wept anew, agitating the watch in the direction of Edwin.
”Take it, Edwin,” said Mrs Hamps. ”Perhaps he wants it put away,” she added, as Edwin obeyed.
Darius shook his head furiously. ”I want him--” Sobs choked him.
”I know what he wants,” said Auntie Hamps. ”He wants to give dear Edwin the watch, because Edwin's been so kind to him, helping him to dress every day, and looking after him just like a professional nurse--don't you, dear?”
Edwin secretly cursed her in the most horrible fas.h.i.+on. But she was right.
”Ye-hes,” Darius confirmed her, on a sob.
”He wants to show his grat.i.tude,” said Auntie Hamps.
”Ye-hes,” Darius repeated, and wiped his eyes.
Edwin stood foolishly holding the watch with its ma.s.sive Albert chain.
He was very genuinely astonished, and he was profoundly moved. His father's emotion concerning him must have been gathering force for months and months, increasing a little and a little every day in those daily, intimate contacts, until at length grat.i.tude had become, as it were, a spirit that possessed him, a monstrous demon whose wild eagerness to escape defeated itself. And Edwin had never guessed, for Darius had mastered the spirit till the moment when the spirit mastered him. It was out now, and Darius, delivered, breathed more freely.
Edwin was proud, but his humiliation was greater than his pride. He suffered humiliation for his father. He would have preferred that Darius should never have felt grat.i.tude, or, at any rate, that he should never have shown it. He would have preferred that Darius should have accepted his help nonchalantly, grimly, thanklessly, as a right. And if through disease, the old man could not cease to be a tyrant with dignity, could not become human without this appalling ceremonial abas.e.m.e.nt--better that he should have exercised harshness and oppression to the very end! There was probably no phenomenon of human nature that offended Edwin's instincts more than an open conversion.
Maggie turned nervously away and busied herself with the grate.
”You must put it on,” said Auntie Hamps sweetly. ”Mustn't he, father?”
Darius nodded.
The outrage was complete. Edwin removed his own watch and dropped it into the pocket of his trousers, subst.i.tuting for it the gold one.
”There, father!” exclaimed Auntie Hamps proudly, surveying the curve of the Albert on her nephew's waistcoat.
”Ay!” Darius murmured, and sank back on the pillow with a sigh of relief.
”Thanks, father,” Edwin muttered, reddening. ”But there was no occasion.”
”Now you see what it is to be a good son!” Auntie Hamps observed.
Darius murmured indistinctly.
”What is it?” she asked, bending down.
”I must have his,” said Darius. ”I must have a watch here.”
”He wants your old one in exchange,” Clara explained eagerly.
Edwin smiled, discovering a certain alleviation in this shrewd demand of his father's, and he drew out the silver Geneva.
THREE.
Shortly afterwards the nurse surprised them all by coming into the room.