II
Twelve years have passed since Bottles sent in his papers, and in
twelve years many things happen. Amongst them recently it had happened
that our hero's only and elder brother had, owing to an unexpected
development of consumption among the expectant heirs, tumbled into a
baronetcy and eight thousand a year, and Bottles himself into a modest
but to him most ample fortune of as many hundred. When the news
reached him he was the captain of a volunteer corps engaged in one of
the numerous Basuto wars in the Cape Colony. He served the campaign
out, and then, in obedience to his brother's entreaties and a natural
craving to see his native land, after an absence of nearly fourteen
years, resigned his commission and returned to England.
Thus it came to pass that the next scene of this little history opens,
not upon the South African veld, or in a whitewashed house in some
half-grown, hobbledehoy colonial town, but in a set of the most
comfortable chambers in the Albany, the local and appropriate
habitation of the bachelor brother aforesaid, Sir Eustace Peritt.
In a very comfortable arm-chair in front of a warm fire (for the month
is November) sits the Bottles of old days--bigger, uglier, shyer than
ever, and in addition, disfigured by an assegai wound through the
cheek. Opposite to him, and peering at him occasionally with fond
curiosity through an eyeglass, is his brother, a very different stamp
of man. Sir Eustace Peritt is a well-preserved, London-looking
gentleman, of apparently any age between thirty and fifty. His eye is
so bright, his figure so well preserved, that to judge from
appearances alone you would put him down to the former age. But when
you come to know him so as to be able to measure his consummate
knowledge of the world, and to have the opportunity of reflecting upon
the good-natured but profound cynicism which pleasantly pervades his
talk as absolutely as the flavour of lemon pervades rum punch, you
would be inclined to assign his natal day to a much earlier date. In
reality he was forty, neither more nor less, and had both preserved
his youthful appearance and gained the mellowness of his experience by
a judicious use of the opportunities of life.
"Well, my dear George," said Sir Eustace, addressing his brother--
determined to take this occasion of meeting after so long a time to be
rid of the nickname "Bottles," which he hated--"I haven't had such a
pleasure for years."
"As--as what?"
"As meeting you again, of course. When I saw you on the vessel I knew
you at once. You have not changed at all, unless expansion can be
called a change."
"Nor have you, Eustace, unless contraction can be called a change.
Your waist used to be bigger, you know."
"Ah, George, I drank beer in those days; it is one of things of which
I have lived to see the folly. In fact, there are not many things of
which I have not lived to see the folly."
"Except living itself, I suppose?"
"Exactly--except living. I have no wish to follow the example of our
poor cousins," he answered with a sigh, "to whose considerate
behaviour, however," he added, brightening, "we owe our present
improved position." Then came a pause.
"Fourteen years is a long time, George; you must have had a rough time
of it."
"Yes, pretty rough. I have seen a good deal of irregular service, you
know."
"And never got anything out of it, I suppose?"
"Oh, yes; I have got my bread and butter, which is all I am worth."
Sir Eustace looked at his brother doubtfully through his eyeglass.
"You are modest," he said; "that does not do. You must have a better
opinion of yourself if you want to get on in the world."
"I don't want to get on. I am quite content to earn a living, and I am
modest because I have seen so many better men fare worse."
"But now you need not earn a living any more. What do you propose to
do? Live in town? I can set you going in a very good lot. You will be
quite a lion with that hole in your cheek--by the way, you must tell
me the story. And then, you see, if anything happens to me you stand
in for the title and estates. That will be quite enough to float you."
Bottles writhed uneasily in his chair. "Thank you, Eustace; but really
I must ask you--in short, I don't want to be floated or anything of
the sort. I would rather go back to South Africa and my volunteer
corps. I would indeed. I hate strangers, and society, and all that
sort of thing. I'm not fit for it like you."
"Then what do you mean to do--get married and live in the country?"
Bottles coloured a little through his sun-tanned skin--a fact that did
not escape the eyeglass of his observant brother. "No, I am not going
to get married, certainly not."
"By the way," said Sir Eustace carelessly, "I saw your old flame, Lady
Croston, yesterday, and told her you were coming home. She makes a
charming widow."
"/What!/" ejaculated his brother, slowly raising himself out of his
chair in astonishment. "Is her husband dead?"
"Dead? Yes, died a year ago, and a good riddance too. He appointed me
one of his executors; I am sure I don't know why, for we never liked
each other. I think he was the most disagreeable fellow I ever knew.
They say he gave his wife a roughish time of it occasionally. Serve
her right, too."
"Why did it serve her right?"
Sir Eustace shrugged his shoulders.
"When a heartless girl jilts the fellow she is engaged to in order to
sell herself to an elderly beast, I think she deserves all she gets.
This one did not get half enough; indeed, she has made a good thing of
it--better than she expected."
His brother sat down again before he answered in a constrained voice,
"Don't you think you are rather hard on her, Eustace?"
"Hard on her? No, not a bit of it. Of all the worthless women that I
know, I think Madeline Croston is the most worthless. Look how she
treated you."
"Eustace," broke in his brother almost sharply, "if you don't mind, I
wish you would not talk of her like that to me. I can't--in short, I
don't like it."
Sir Eustace's eyeglass dropped out of Sir Eustace's eye--he had opened
it so wide to stare at his brother. "Why, my dear fellow," he
ejaculated, "you don't mean to tell me you still care for that woman?"
His brother twisted his great form about uncomfortably in the low
chair as he answered, "I don't know, I'm sure, about caring for her,
but I don't like to hear you say such things about her."
Sir Eustace whistled softly. "I am sorry if I offended you, old
fellow," he said. "I had no idea that it was still a sore point with
you. You must be a faithful people in South Africa. Here the 'holy
feelings of the heart' are shorter lived. We wear out several
generations of them in twelve years."
