mr hancock, asking fanny to wait for him for a short time, took bridgewater by the arm and led him outside.
"now, bridgewater, what is the meaning of this? why have you left the office? why have you followed me? what earthly reason had you for doing such a thing? speak out, man—are you dumb?"
"i declare to god, mr james," said the unhappy bridgewater, "i had no reason——"
"no reason!—are you mad? bridgewater, you haven't been—drinking?"
"drinking!" cried bridgewater, with what your melodramatist would call a hollow laugh. "drinking!—oh yes—drinking? no! no!—don't mind me, mr james. drinking! one blessed glass of sherry, and not a bite[pg 177] have i had—waiting two hours and more—following you in a cab—three shillings the fare was—nearly torn in pieces by an ape—following you and hiding in all sorts of places, and then told i've been drinking. do i look as if i had been drinking, mr james? am i given to drinking, mr james? have you known me for forty years, mr james, and have you ever seen me do such a thing? answer me that, mr james——"
"hush, hush!—don't talk so loud," said hancock, rather alarmed at the old man's hysterical manner. "no, you are the last person to do such a thing, but tell me, all the same, why you followed me."
bridgewater was dumb. hungry, thirsty, frightened at being caught spying, startled by elephants and addled by apes as he was, still his manhood revolted at the idea of betraying patience and sheltering himself at her expense. all the same, he attempted very feminine tactics in endeavouring to evade a direct reply.
"drinking! i have been in the office, man and boy, this fifty years and more come next michaelmas; it's fifty-one years, fifty-one years next michaelmas day, every day at my place[pg 178] but sundays and holidays, year in, year out——"
"bridgewater," repeated mr hancock, "will you answer me the question i just asked you? why did you follow me to-day?"
"oh lord," said bridgewater, "i wish i had never seen this day! follow you, mr james? do you think i followed you for pleasure? why, the office—god bless my soul! it makes my hair stand on end—no one there but wolf to take charge, and i have been away hours and hours. it's three o'clock now, and here am i miles and miles away; and i ought to have called at the law courts at 3.20, and there's those bills to file. it seems all like a horrible nightmare, that it does; it seems——"
"i don't want to know what it seems. you have left your duty and come away—for what purpose?"
silence.
"ah well!" said hancock, speaking not in the least angrily, "i see there is a secret of some sort. i regret that a man in whom i have always placed implicit trust should keep from me a secret that concerns me; evidently—no matter, i am not curious. yes, it is three o'clock; it might be as well for you to return[pg 179] and look after things, though it is too late for the law courts now."
this tone and manner completely floored bridgewater. the fountains of his great deep were broken up, and if patience hancock could have seen the damage done to his confidential reservoir, she would have shuddered.
"i'll tell you the truth, mr james. it's not my fault—she put me to the work. i'll tell you the truth. i've been following you and spying upon you, but it was for your own good, she said——"
"who said?"
"miss patience."
"miss patience told you to follow me to-day?"
"yes."
"but what on earth—how on earth did she know i was—er—coming here?"
"she didn't know."
"well, how the devil did she tell you to follow me, then?"
"she wanted to know where you were going to."
"but," roared hancock, whose face had been slowly crimsoning, or purpling rather, since the mention of his sister's name, "how[pg 180] the blazes did she know i was going anywhere?"
"when i saw you going out of the office with miss lambert i ran round and told her."
"when you saw me going out of the office with miss lambert you ran round and told her!" said hancock, spacing each word and speaking with such a change from fire to ice that his listener shivered. "oh, this is too good! i pay you a large salary to spy upon me and to run round and tell my sister my doings. am i mad, or am i dreaming? and what—what—what led you, sir, to leave the office and run round and tell my sister?"
"for god's sake, mr james, don't talk so loud!" said bridgewater; "the people are turning round to look at us. i didn't leave the office of my own accord; it was miss patience, who said to me, she said, 'bridgewater, i trust you for your master's sake to let me know if you see him with a lady, for,' she said, 'there is a woman who has designs on him.'"
"ah!"
"those were her words. so when i saw[pg 181] you going out with miss lambert i ran round and told her."
"ah!"
mr hancock had fallen from fury into a thoughtful mood: one of the sharpest brains in london was engaged in unravelling the meaning to get at the inner-meaning of all this.
"my sister came round to the office some time ago asking me to spare you for an hour as she wished for your advice about a lease. that, of course, was all humbug: she wanted you for the purpose of talking about me?"
"that is true."
"the lease was never mentioned?"
"not once, mr james."
"all the conversation was about me and my welfare?"
"that it was."
"now see here, bridgewater, cast your memory back. is this the first time in your life that my sister has invited you to my house in gordon square to discuss my welfare?"
"no indeed, sir. i've been there before."
"how many times?"
bridgewater assumed the cast of countenance he always assumed when engaged in reckoning.
[pg 182]
"that's enough," said hancock, "don't count. now tell me, when did she first begin to take you into her confidence—twenty years ago?"
"yes, mr james, fully that."
hancock made a sound like a groan.
"and twenty years ago it was the same tale: 'protect my brother from a designing woman.'"
"why, it was, and that's the truth," said bridgewater, as if the fact had just been discovered by him.
"and you did your best, told her all about me and my movements, as far as you knew them, and mixed and muddled, and made an ass of yourself and a fool of me——"
"oh, mr james!"
"hold your tongue!—a fool of me. do you know, john bridgewater, that you have been aiding and abetting in a conspiracy—a conspiracy unpunishable by law, but still a conspiracy—hold your tongue!—you are innocent of everything but of being a fool; indeed, i ought not to call any man a fool, for i have been a fool myself, and i ought to have seen that the one end and aim of my sister's life was to secure her position as[pg 183] my keeper, and her tenure of my house. you have shown me at one flash a worm that has crawled through my past, cankering and corroding all it touched. money, money, money—that is my sister's creed. i am not young, bridgewater, and it seems to me that if instead of living all these years side by side with this money-grub, i had lived side by side with a wife, my lot would have been a better one. i might have had children, grown-up sons now, daughters—things that make an interest for us in our old age. between me and all that has come my sister. that woman has a very strong will. i see many things in the past now, ay, twenty years ago, that i can explain. bridgewater, you have done me a great injury, but you did it for the best, and i forgive you. half the people in this world are pawns and chess-pieces, moved about by the men and women of intellect who form the other half. if you had possessed eyes to see, you might have seen that the really designing woman against whom i should have been protected, was the woman with whom you leagued yourself—my sister."
the expression on bridgewater's face was so wonderfully funny that hancock would have[pg 184] laughed had he not been in such a serious mood.
"however, what's done is done, and there is no use in crying over spilt milk. you have at least done me a service by your stupidity in following me to-day, for you have shown me the light. miss lambert pleases me, and if i choose to make her mistress of my house, instead of my sister, mistress of my house she will be. we will return now to—where i left miss lambert, and we will all go home to gordon square and have dinner with my sister."
"not me, mr james," gasped bridgewater, "i don't feel well."
"nonsense! you need not fear my sister. she is no longer mistress of my house; next week she shall pack bag and baggage. come."
he turned towards the monkey house, and bridgewater followed him, so mazed in his intellect that it would be hard to tell whether monkeys, men, fanny lambert, patience hancock, or elephants, were uppermost in his brain.
