His next conscious moment was on the Dean Bridge; but whether
he was John Nicholson of a bank in a California street, or
some former John, a clerk in his father's office, he had now
clean forgotten.  Another blank, and he was thrusting his
pass-key into the door-lock of his father's house.

Hours must have passed.  Whether crouched on the cold stones
or wandering in the fields among the snow, was more than he
could tell; but hours had passed.  The finger of the hall
clock was close on twelve; a narrow peep of gas in the hall-
lamp shed shadows; and the door of the back room - his
father's room - was open and emitted a warm light.  At so
late an hour, all this was strange; the lights should have
been out, the doors locked, the good folk safe in bed.  He
marvelled at the irregularity, leaning on the hall-table; and
marvelled to himself there; and thawed and grew once more
hungry, in the warmer air of the house.

The clock uttered its premonitory catch; in five minutes
Christmas-day would be among the days of the past -
Christmas! - what a Christmas!  Well, there was no use
waiting; he had come into that house, he scarce knew how; if
they were to thrust him forth again, it had best be done at
once; and he moved to the door of the back room and entered.

Oh, well, then he was insane, as he had long believed.

There, in his father's room, at midnight, the fire was
roaring and the gas blazing; the papers, the sacred papers -
to lay a hand on which was criminal - had all been taken off
and piled along the floor; a cloth was spread, and a supper
laid, upon the business table; and in his father's chair a
woman, habited like a nun, sat eating.  As he appeared in the
doorway, the nun rose, gave a low cry, and stood staring.
She was a large woman, strong, calm, a little masculine, her
features marked with courage and good sense; and as John
blinked back at her, a faint resemblance dodged about his
memory, as when a tune haunts us, and yet will not be
recalled.

'Why, it's John!' cried the nun.

'I dare say I'm mad,' said John, unconsciously following King
Lear; 'but, upon my word, I do believe you're Flora.'

'Of course I am,' replied she.

And yet it is not Flora at all, thought John; Flora was
slender, and timid, and of changing colour, and dewy-eyed;
and had Flora such an Edinburgh accent?  But he said none of
these things, which was perhaps as well.  What he said was,
'Then why are you a nun?'

'Such nonsense!' said Flora.  'I'm a sick-nurse; and I am
here nursing your sister, with whom, between you and me,
there is precious little the matter.  But that is not the
question.  The point is: How do you come here? and are you
not ashamed to show yourself?'

'Flora,' said John, sepulchrally, 'I haven't eaten anything
for three days.  Or, at least, I don't know what day it is;
but I guess I'm starving.'

'You unhappy man!' she cried.  'Here, sit down and eat my
supper; and I'll just run upstairs and see my patient; not
but what I doubt she's fast asleep, for Maria is a MALADE
IMAGINAIRE.'

With this specimen of the French, not of Stratford-atte-Bowe,
but of a finishing establishment in Moray Place, she left
John alone in his father's sanctum.  He fell at once upon the
food; and it is to be supposed that Flora had found her
patient wakeful, and been detained with some details of
nursing, for he had time to make a full end of all there was
to eat, and not only to empty the teapot, but to fill it
again from a kettle that was fitfully singing on his father's
fire.  Then he sat torpid, and pleased, and bewildered; his
misfortunes were then half forgotten; his mind considering,
not without regret, this unsentimental return to his old
love.

He was thus engaged, when that bustling woman noiselessly re-
entered.

'Have you eaten?' said she.  'Then tell me all about it.'

It was a long and (as the reader knows) a pitiful story; but
Flora heard it with compressed lips.  She was lost in none of
those questionings of human destiny that have, from time to
time, arrested the flight of my own pen; for women, such as
she, are no philosophers, and behold the concrete only.  And
women, such as she, are very hard on the imperfect man.

'Very well,' said she, when he had done; 'then down upon your
knees at once, and beg God's forgiveness.'

And the great baby plumped upon his knees, and did as he was
bid; and none the worse for that!  But while he was heartily
enough requesting forgiveness on general principles, the
rational side of him distinguished, and wondered if, perhaps,
the apology were not due upon the other part.  And when he
rose again from that becoming exercise, he first eyed the
face of his old love doubtfully, and then, taking heart,
uttered his protest.

'I must say, Flora,' said he, 'in all this business, I can
see very little fault of mine.'

'If you had written home,' replied the lady, 'there would
have been none of it.  If you had even gone to Murrayfield
reasonably sober, you would never have slept there, and the
worst would not have happened.  Besides, the whole thing
began years ago.  You got into trouble, and when your father,
honest man, was disappointed, you took the pet, or got
afraid, and ran away from punishment.  Well, you've had your
own way of it, John, and I don't suppose you like it.'

'I sometimes fancy I'm not much better than a fool,' sighed
John.

'My dear John,' said she, 'not much!'

He looked at her, and his eye fell.  A certain anger rose
within him; here was a Flora he disowned; she was hard; she
was of a set colour; a settled, mature, undecorative manner;
plain of speech, plain of habit - he had come near saying,
plain of face.  And this changeling called herself by the
same name as the many-coloured, clinging maid of yore; she of
the frequent laughter, and the many sighs, and the kind,
stolen glances.  And to make all worse, she took the upper
hand with him, which (as John well knew) was not the true
relation of the sexes.  He steeled his heart against this
sick-nurse.

'And how do you come to be here?' he asked.

She told him how she had nursed her father in his long
illness, and when he died, and she was left alone, had taken
to nurse others, partly from habit, partly to be of some
service in the world; partly, it might be, for amusement.
'There's no accounting for taste,' said she.  And she told
him how she went largely to the houses of old friends, as the
need arose; and how she was thus doubly welcome as an old
friend first, and then as an experienced nurse, to whom
doctors would confide the gravest cases.

'And, indeed, it's a mere farce my being here for poor
Maria,' she continued; 'but your father takes her ailments to
heart, and I cannot always be refusing him.  We are great
friends, your father and I; he was very kind to me long ago -
ten years ago.

A strange stir came in John's heart.  All this while had he
been thinking only of himself?  All this while, why had he
not written to Flora?  In penitential tenderness, he took her
hand, and, to his awe and trouble, it remained in his,
compliant.  A voice told him this was Flora, after all - told
him so quietly, yet with a thrill of singing.

'And you never married?' said he.

'No, John; I never married,' she replied.

The hall clock striking two recalled them to the sense of
time.

'And now,' said she, 'you have been fed and warmed, and I
have heard your story, and now it's high time to call your
brother.'

'Oh!' cried John, chap-fallen; 'do you think that absolutely
necessary?'

'I can't keep you here; I am a stranger,' said she.  'Do you
want to run away again?  I thought you had enough of that.'

He bowed his head under the reproof.  She despised him, he
reflected, as he sat once more alone; a monstrous thing for a
woman to despise a man; and strangest of all, she seemed to
like him.  Would his brother despise him, too?  And would his
brother like him?

And presently the brother appeared, under Flora's escort;
and, standing afar off beside the doorway, eyed the hero of
this tale.

'So this is you?' he said, at length.

'Yes, Alick, it's me - it's John,' replied the elder brother,
feebly.

'And how did you get in here?' inquired the younger.

'Oh, I had my pass-key,' says John.

'The deuce you had!' said Alexander.  'Ah, you lived in a
better world!  There are no pass-keys going now.'

'Well, father was always averse to them,' sighed John.  And
the conversation then broke down, and the brothers looked
askance at one another in silence.

'Well, and what the devil are we to do?' said Alexander.  'I
suppose if the authorities got wind of you, you would be
taken up?'

'It depends on whether they've found the body or not,'
returned John.  'And then there's that cabman, to be sure!'

'Oh, bother the body!' said Alexander.  'I mean about the
other thing.  That's serious.'

'Is that what my father spoke about?' asked John.  'I don't
even know what it is.'

'About your robbing your bank in California, of course,'
replied Alexander.

It was plain, from Flora's face, that this was the first she
had heard of it; it was plainer still, from John's, that he
was innocent.

'I!' he exclaimed.  'I rob my bank!  My God!  Flora, this is
too much; even you must allow that.'

'Meaning you didn't?' asked Alexander.

'I never robbed a soul in all my days,' cried John: 'except
my father, if you call that robbery; and I brought him back
the money in this room, and he wouldn't even take it!'

'Look here, John,' said his brother, 'let us have no
misunderstanding upon this.  Macewen saw my father; he told
him a bank you had worked for in San Francisco was wiring
over the habitable globe to have you collared - that it was
supposed you had nailed thousands; and it was dead certain
you had nailed three hundred.  So Macewen said, and I wish
you would be careful how you answer.  I may tell you also,
that your father paid the three hundred on the spot.'

'Three hundred?' repeated John.  'Three hundred pounds, you
mean?  That's fifteen hundred dollars.  Why, then, it's
Kirkman!' he broke out.  'Thank Heaven!  I can explain all
that.  I gave them to Kirkman to pay for me the night before
I left - fifteen hundred dollars, and a letter to the
manager.  What do they suppose I would steal fifteen hundred
dollars for?  I'm rich; I struck it rich in stocks.  It's the
silliest stuff I ever heard of.  All that's needful is to
cable to the manager: Kirkman has the fifteen hundred - find
Kirkman.  He was a fellow-clerk of mine, and a hard case; but
to do him justice, I didn't think he was as hard as this.'

'And what do you say to that, Alick?' asked Flora.

'I say the cablegram shall go to-night!' cried Alexander,
with energy.  'Answer prepaid, too.  If this can be cleared
away - and upon my word I do believe it can - we shall all be
able to hold up our heads again.  Here, you John, you stick
down the address of your bank manager.  You, Flora, you can
pack John into my bed, for which I have no further use to-
night.  As for me, I am off to the post-office, and thence to
the High Street about the dead body.  The police ought to
know, you see, and they ought to know through John; and I can
tell them some rigmarole about my brother being a man of
highly nervous organisation, and the rest of it.  And then,
I'll tell you what, John - did you notice the name upon the
cab?'

John gave the name of the driver, which, as I have not been
able to command the vehicle, I here suppress.

'Well,' resumed Alexander, 'I'll call round at their place
before I come back, and pay your shot for you.  In that way,
before breakfast-time, you'll be as good as new.'

John murmured inarticulate thanks.  To see his brother thus
energetic in his service moved him beyond expression; if he
could not utter what he felt, he showed it legibly in his
face; and Alexander read it there, and liked it the better in
that dumb delivery.

'But there's one thing,' said the latter, 'cablegrams are
dear; and I dare say you remember enough of the governor to
guess the state of my finances.'

'The trouble is,' said John, 'that all my stamps are in that
beastly house.'

'All your what?' asked Alexander.

'Stamps - money,' explained John.  'It's an American
expression; I'm afraid I contracted one or two.'

'I have some,' said Flora.  'I have a pound note upstairs.'

'My dear Flora,' returned Alexander, 'a pound note won't see
us very far; and besides, this is my father's business, and I
shall be very much surprised if it isn't my father who pays
for it.'

'I would not apply to him yet; I do not think that can be
wise,' objected Flora.

'You have a very imperfect idea of my resources, and not at
all of my effrontery,' replied Alexander.  'Please observe.'

He put John from his way, chose a stout knife among the
supper things, and with surprising quickness broke into his
father's drawer.

'There's nothing easier when you come to try,' he observed,
pocketing the money.

'I wish you had not done that,' said Flora.  'You will never
hear the last of it.'

'Oh, I don't know,' returned the young man; 'the governor is
human after all.  And now, John, let me see your famous pass-
key.  Get into bed, and don't move for any one till I come
back.  They won't mind you not answering when they knock; I
generally don't myself.'



CHAPTER IX - IN WHICH MR. NICHOLSON ACCEPTS THE PRINCIPLE OF
AN ALLOWANCE



IN spite of the horrors of the day and the tea-drinking of
the night, John slept the sleep of infancy.  He was awakened
by the maid, as it might have been ten years ago, tapping at
the door.  The winter sunrise was painting the east; and as
the window was to the back of the house, it shone into the
room with many strange colours of refracted light.  Without,
the houses were all cleanly roofed with snow; the garden
walls were coped with it a foot in height; the greens lay
glittering.  Yet strange as snow had grown to John during his
years upon the Bay of San Francisco, it was what he saw
within that most affected him.  For it was to his own room
that Alexander had been promoted; there was the old paper
with the device of flowers, in which a cunning fancy might
yet detect the face of Skinny Jim, of the Academy, John's
former dominie; there was the old chest of drawers; there
were the chairs - one, two, three - three as before.  Only
the carpet was new, and the litter of Alexander's clothes and
books and drawing materials, and a pencil-drawing on the
wall, which (in John's eyes) appeared a marvel of
proficiency.

He was thus lying, and looking, and dreaming, hanging, as it
were, between two epochs of his life, when Alexander came to
the door, and made his presence known in a loud whisper.
John let him in, and jumped back into the warm bed.

'Well, John,' said Alexander, 'the cablegram is sent in your
name, and twenty words of answer paid.  I have been to the
cab office and paid your cab, even saw the old gentleman
himself, and properly apologised.  He was mighty placable,
and indicated his belief you had been drinking.  Then I
knocked up old Macewen out of bed, and explained affairs to
him as he sat and shivered in a dressing-gown.  And before
that I had been to the High Street, where they have heard
nothing of your dead body, so that I incline to the idea that
you dreamed it.'

'Catch me!' said John.

'Well, the police never do know anything,' assented
Alexander; 'and at any rate, they have despatched a man to
inquire and to recover your trousers and your money, so that
really your bill is now fairly clean; and I see but one lion
in your path - the governor.'

'I'll be turned out again, you'll see,' said John, dismally.

'I don't imagine so,' returned the other; 'not if you do what
Flora and I have arranged; and your business now is to dress,
and lose no time about it.  Is your watch right?  Well, you
have a quarter of an hour.  By five minutes before the half-
hour you must be at table, in your old seat, under Uncle
Duthie's picture.  Flora will be there to keep you
countenance; and we shall see what we shall see.'

'Wouldn't it be wiser for me to stay in bed?' said John.

'If you mean to manage your own concerns, you can do
precisely what you like,' replied Alexander; 'but if you are
not in your place five minutes before the half-hour I wash my
hands of you, for one.'

And thereupon he departed.  He had spoken warmly, but the
truth is, his heart was somewhat troubled.  And as he hung
over the balusters, watching for his father to appear, he had
hard ado to keep himself braced for the encounter that must
follow.

'If he takes it well, I shall be lucky,' he reflected.

'If he takes it ill, why it'll be a herring across John's
tracks, and perhaps all for the best.  He's a confounded
muff, this brother of mine, but he seems a decent soul.'

At that stage a door opened below with a certain emphasis,
and Mr. Nicholson was seen solemnly to descend the stairs,
and pass into his own apartment.  Alexander followed, quaking
inwardly, but with a steady face.  He knocked, was bidden to
enter, and found his father standing in front of the forced
drawer, to which he pointed as he spoke.

'This is a most extraordinary thing,' said he; 'I have been
robbed!'

'I was afraid you would notice it,' observed his son; 'it
made such a beastly hash of the table.'

'You were afraid I would notice it?' repeated Mr. Nicholson.
'And, pray, what may that mean?'

'That I was a thief, sir,' returned Alexander.  'I took all
the money in case the servants should get hold of it; and
here is the change, and a note of my expenditure.  You were
gone to bed, you see, and I did not feel at liberty to knock
you up; but I think when you have heard the circumstances,
you will do me justice.  The fact is, I have reason to
believe there has been some dreadful error about my brother
John; the sooner it can be cleared up the better for all
parties; it was a piece of business, sir - and so I took it,
and decided, on my own responsibility, to send a telegram to
San Francisco.  Thanks to my quickness we may hear to-night.
There appears to be no doubt, sir, that John has been
abominably used.'

'When did this take place?' asked the father.

'Last night, sir, after you were asleep,' was the reply.

'It's most extraordinary,' said Mr. Nicholson.  'Do you mean
to say you have been out all night?'

'All night, as you say, sir.  I have been to the telegraph
and the police office, and Mr. Macewen's.  Oh, I had my hands
full,' said Alexander.

'Very irregular,' said the father.  'You think of no one but
yourself.'

'I do not see that I have much to gain in bringing back my
elder brother,' returned Alexander, shrewdly.

The answer pleased the old man; he smiled.  'Well, well, I
will go into this after breakfast,' said he.

'I'm sorry about the table,' said the son.

'The table is a small matter; I think nothing of that,' said
the father.

'It's another example,' continued the son, 'of the
awkwardness of a man having no money of his own.  If I had a
proper allowance, like other fellows of my age, this would
have been quite unnecessary.'

'A proper allowance!' repeated his father, in tones of
blighting sarcasm, for the expression was not new to him.  'I
have never grudged you money for any proper purpose.'

'No doubt, no doubt,' said Alexander, 'but then you see you
aren't always on the spot to have the thing explained to you.
Last night, for instance - '

'You could have wakened me last night,' interrupted his
father.

'Was it not some similar affair that first got John into a
mess?' asked the son, skilfully evading the point.

But the father was not less adroit.  'And pray, sir, how did
you come and go out of the house?' he asked.

'I forgot to lock the door, it seems,' replied Alexander.

'I have had cause to complain of that too often,' said Mr.
Nicholson.  'But still I do not understand.  Did you keep the
servants up?'

'I propose to go into all that at length after breakfast,'
returned Alexander.  'There is the half-hour going; we must
not keep Miss Mackenzie waiting.'

And greatly daring, he opened the door.

Even Alexander, who, it must have been perceived was on terms
of comparative freedom with his parent - even Alexander had
never before dared to cut short an interview in this high-
handed fashion.  But the truth is, the very mass of his son's
delinquencies daunted the old gentleman.  He was like the man
with the cart of apples - this was beyond him!  That
Alexander should have spoiled his table, taken his money,
stayed out all night, and then coolly acknowledged all, was
something undreamed of in the Nicholsonian philosophy, and
transcended comment.  The return of the change, which the old
gentleman still carried in his hand, had been a feature of
imposing impudence; it had dealt him a staggering blow.  Then
there was the reference to John's original flight - a subject
which he always kept resolutely curtained in his own mind;
for he was a man who loved to have made no mistakes, and when
he feared he might have made one kept the papers sealed.  In
view of all these surprises and reminders, and of his son's
composed and masterful demeanour, there began to creep on Mr.
Nicholson a sickly misgiving.  He seemed beyond his depth; if
he did or said anything, he might come to regret it.  The
young man, besides, as he had pointed out himself, was
playing a generous part.  And if wrong had been done - and
done to one who was, after, and in spite of, all, a Nicholson
- it should certainly be righted.

All things considered, monstrous as it was to be cut short in
his inquiries, the old gentleman submitted, pocketed the
change, and followed his son into the dining-room.  During
these few steps he once more mentally revolted, and once
more, and this time finally, laid down his arms: a still,
small voice in his bosom having informed him authentically of
a piece of news; that he was afraid of Alexander.  The
strange thing was that he was pleased to be afraid of him.
He was proud of his son; he might be proud of him; the boy
had character and grit, and knew what he was doing.

These were his reflections as he turned the corner of the
dining-room door.  Miss Mackenzie was in the place of honour,
conjuring with a tea-pot and a cosy; and, behold! there was
another person present, a large, portly, whiskered man of a
very comfortable and respectable air, who now rose from his
seat and came forward, holding out his hand.

'Good-morning, father,' said he.

Of the contention of feeling that ran high in Mr. Nicholson's
starched bosom, no outward sign was visible; nor did he delay
long to make a choice of conduct.  Yet in that interval he
had reviewed a great field of possibilities both past and
future; whether it was possible he had not been perfectly
wise in his treatment of John; whether it was possible that
John was innocent; whether, if he turned John out a second
time, as his outraged authority suggested, it was possible to
avoid a scandal; and whether, if he went to that extremity,
it was possible that Alexander might rebel.

'Hum!' said Mr. Nicholson, and put his hand, limp and dead,
into John's.

And then, in an embarrassed silence, all took their places;
and even the paper - from which it was the old gentleman's
habit to suck mortification daily, as he marked the decline
of our institutions - even the paper lay furled by his side.

But presently Flora came to the rescue.  She slid into the
silence with a technicality, asking if John still took his
old inordinate amount of sugar.  Thence it was but a step to
the burning question of the day; and in tones a little
shaken, she commented on the interval since she had last made
tea for the prodigal, and congratulated him on his return.
And then addressing Mr. Nicholson, she congratulated him also
in a manner that defied his ill-humour; and from that
launched into the tale of John's misadventures, not without
some suitable suppressions.

Gradually Alexander joined; between them, whether he would or
no, they forced a word or two from John; and these fell so
tremulously, and spoke so eloquently of a mind oppressed with
dread, that Mr. Nicholson relented.  At length even he
contributed a question: and before the meal was at an end all
four were talking even freely.

Prayers followed, with the servants gaping at this new-comer
whom no one had admitted; and after prayers there came that
moment on the clock which was the signal for Mr. Nicholson's
departure.

'John,' said he, 'of course you will stay here.  Be very
careful not to excite Maria, if Miss Mackenzie thinks it
desirable that you should see her.  Alexander, I wish to
speak with you alone.'  And then, when they were both in the
back room: 'You need not come to the office to-day,' said he;
'you can stay and amuse your brother, and I think it would be
respectful to call on Uncle Greig.  And by the bye' (this
spoken with a certain- dare we say? - bashfulness), 'I agree
to concede the principle of an allowance; and I will consult
with Doctor Durie, who is quite a man of the world and has
sons of his own, as to the amount.  And, my fine fellow, you
may consider yourself in luck!' he added, with a smile.

'Thank you,' said Alexander.

Before noon a detective had restored to John his money, and
brought news, sad enough in truth, but perhaps the least sad
possible.  Alan had been found in his own house in Regent
Terrace, under care of the terrified butler.  He was quite
mad, and instead of going to prison, had gone to Morningside
Asylum.  The murdered man, it appeared, was an evicted tenant
who had for nearly a year pursued his late landlord with
threats and insults; and beyond this, the cause and details
of the tragedy were lost.

When Mr. Nicholson returned from dinner they were able to put
a despatch into his hands: 'John V. Nicholson, Randolph
Crescent, Edinburgh. - Kirkham has disappeared; police
looking for him.  All understood.  Keep mind quite easy. -
Austin.' Having had this explained to him, the old gentleman
took down the cellar key and departed for two bottles of the
1820 port.  Uncle Greig dined there that day, and Cousin
Robina, and, by an odd chance, Mr. Macewen; and the presence
of these strangers relieved what might have been otherwise a
somewhat strained relation.  Ere they departed, the family
was welded once more into a fair semblance of unity.

In the end of April John led Flora - or, as more descriptive,
Flora led John - to the altar, if altar that may be called
which was indeed the drawing-room mantel-piece in Mr.
Nicholson's house, with the Reverend Dr. Durie posted on the
hearthrug in the guise of Hymen's priest.

The last I saw of them, on a recent visit to the north, was
at a dinner-party in the house of my old friend Gellatly
Macbride; and after we had, in classic phrase, 'rejoined the
ladies,' I had an opportunity to overhear Flora conversing
with another married woman on the much canvassed matter of a
husband's tobacco.

'Oh yes!' said she; 'I only allow Mr. Nicholson four cigars a
day.  Three he smokes at fixed times - after a meal, you
know, my dear; and the fourth he can take when he likes with
any friend.'

'Bravo!' thought I to myself; 'this is the wife for my friend
John!'



THE BODY-SNATCHER




EVERY night in the year, four of us sat in the small parlour
of the George at Debenham - the undertaker, and the landlord,
and Fettes, and myself.  Sometimes there would be more; but
blow high, blow low, come rain or snow or frost, we four
would be each planted in his own particular arm-chair.
Fettes was an old drunken Scotchman, a man of education
obviously, and a man of some property, since he lived in
idleness.  He had come to Debenham years ago, while still
young, and by a mere continuance of living had grown to be an
adopted townsman.  His blue camlet cloak was a local
antiquity, like the church-spire.  His place in the parlour
at the George, his absence from church, his old, crapulous,
disreputable vices, were all things of course in Debenham.
He had some vague Radical opinions and some fleeting
infidelities, which he would now and again set forth and
emphasise with tottering slaps upon the table.  He drank rum
- five glasses regularly every evening; and for the greater
portion of his nightly visit to the George sat, with his
glass in his right hand, in a state of melancholy alcoholic
saturation.  We called him the Doctor, for he was supposed to
have some special knowledge of medicine, and had been known,
upon a pinch, to set a fracture or reduce a dislocation; but
beyond these slight particulars, we had no knowledge of his
character and antecedents.

One dark winter night - it had struck nine some time before
the landlord joined us - there was a sick man in the George,
a great neighbouring proprietor suddenly struck down with
apoplexy on his way to Parliament; and the great man's still
greater London doctor had been telegraphed to his bedside.
It was the first time that such a thing had happened in
Debenham, for the railway was but newly open, and we were all
proportionately moved by the occurrence.

'He's come,' said the landlord, after he had filled and
lighted his pipe.

'He?' said I.  'Who? - not the doctor?'

'Himself,' replied our host.

'What is his name?'

'Doctor Macfarlane,' said the landlord.

Fettes was far through his third tumbler, stupidly fuddled,
now nodding over, now staring mazily around him; but at the
last word he seemed to awaken, and repeated the name
'Macfarlane' twice, quietly enough the first time, but with
sudden emotion at the second.

'Yes,' said the landlord, 'that's his name, Doctor Wolfe
Macfarlane.'

Fettes became instantly sober; his eyes awoke, his voice
became clear, loud, and steady, his language forcible and
earnest.  We were all startled by the transformation, as if a
man had risen from the dead.

'I beg your pardon,' he said, 'I am afraid I have not been
paying much attention to your talk.  Who is this Wolfe
Macfarlane?'  And then, when he had heard the landlord out,
'It cannot be, it cannot be,' he added; 'and yet I would like
well to see him face to face.'

'Do you know him, Doctor?' asked the undertaker, with a gasp.

'God forbid!' was the reply.  'And yet the name is a strange
one; it were too much to fancy two.  Tell me, landlord, is he
old?'

'Well,' said the host, 'he's not a young man, to be sure, and
his hair is white; but he looks younger than you.'

'He is older, though; years older.  But,' with a slap upon
the table, 'it's the rum you see in my face - rum and sin.
This man, perhaps, may have an easy conscience and a good
digestion.  Conscience!  Hear me speak.  You would think I
was some good, old, decent Christian, would you not?  But no,
not I; I never canted.  Voltaire might have canted if he'd
stood in my shoes; but the brains' - with a rattling fillip
on his bald head - 'the brains were clear and active, and I
saw and made no deductions.'

'If you know this doctor,' I ventured to remark, after a
somewhat awful pause, 'I should gather that you do not share
the landlord's good opinion.'

Fettes paid no regard to me.

'Yes,' he said, with sudden decision, 'I must see him face to
face.'

There was another pause, and then a door was closed rather
sharply on the first floor, and a step was heard upon the
stair.

'That's the doctor,' cried the landlord.  'Look sharp, and
you can catch him.'

It was but two steps from the small parlour to the door of
the old George Inn; the wide oak staircase landed almost in
the street; there was room for a Turkey rug and nothing more
between the threshold and the last round of the descent; but
this little space was every evening brilliantly lit up, not
only by the light upon the stair and the great signal-lamp
below the sign, but by the warm radiance of the bar-room
window.  The George thus brightly advertised itself to
passers-by in the cold street.  Fettes walked steadily to the
spot, and we, who were hanging behind, beheld the two men
meet, as one of them had phrased it, face to face.  Dr.
Macfarlane was alert and vigorous.  His white hair set off
his pale and placid, although energetic, countenance.  He was
richly dressed in the finest of broadcloth and the whitest of
linen, with a great gold watch-chain, and studs and
spectacles of the same precious material.  He wore a broad-
folded tie, white and speckled with lilac, and he carried on
his arm a comfortable driving-coat of fur.  There was no
doubt but he became his years, breathing, as he did, of
wealth and consideration; and it was a surprising contrast to
see our parlour sot - bald, dirty, pimpled, and robed in his
old camlet cloak - confront him at the bottom of the stairs.

'Macfarlane!' he said somewhat loudly, more like a herald
than a friend.

The great doctor pulled up short on the fourth step, as
though the familiarity of the address surprised and somewhat
shocked his dignity.

'Toddy Macfarlane!' repeated Fettes.

The London man almost staggered.  He stared for the swiftest
of seconds at the man before him, glanced behind him with a
sort of scare, and then in a startled whisper, 'Fettes!' he
said, 'You!'

'Ay,' said the other, 'me!  Did you think I was dead too?  We
are not so easy shut of our acquaintance.'

'Hush, hush!' exclaimed the doctor.  'Hush, hush! this
meeting is so unexpected - I can see you are unmanned.  I
hardly knew you, I confess, at first; but I am overjoyed -
overjoyed to have this opportunity.  For the present it must
be how-d'ye-do and good-bye in one, for my fly is waiting,
and I must not fail the train; but you shall - let me see -
yes - you shall give me your address, and you can count on
early news of me.  We must do something for you, Fettes.  I
fear you are out at elbows; but we must see to that for auld
lang syne, as once we sang at suppers.'

'Money!' cried Fettes; 'money from you!  The money that I had
from you is lying where I cast it in the rain.'

Dr. Macfarlane had talked himself into some measure of
superiority and confidence, but the uncommon energy of this
refusal cast him back into his first confusion.

A horrible, ugly look came and went across his almost
venerable countenance.  'My dear fellow,' he said, 'be it as
you please; my last thought is to offend you.  I would
intrude on none.  I will leave you my address, however - '

'I do not wish it - I do not wish to know the roof that
shelters you,' interrupted the other.  'I heard your name; I
feared it might be you; I wished to know if, after all, there
were a God; I know now that there is none.  Begone!'

He still stood in the middle of the rug, between the stair
and doorway; and the great London physician, in order to
escape, would be forced to step to one side.  It was plain
that he hesitated before the thought of this humiliation.
White as he was, there was a dangerous glitter in his
spectacles; but while he still paused uncertain, he became
aware that the driver of his fly was peering in from the
street at this unusual scene and caught a glimpse at the same
time of our little body from the parlour, huddled by the
corner of the bar.  The presence of so many witnesses decided
him at once to flee.  He crouched together, brushing on the
wainscot, and made a dart like a serpent, striking for the
door.  But his tribulation was not yet entirely at an end,
for even as he was passing Fettes clutched him by the arm and
these words came in a whisper, and yet painfully distinct,
'Have you seen it again?'

The great rich London doctor cried out aloud with a sharp,
throttling cry; he dashed his questioner across the open
space, and, with his hands over his head, fled out of the
door like a detected thief.  Before it had occurred to one of
us to make a movement the fly was already rattling toward the
station.  The scene was over like a dream, but the dream had
left proofs and traces of its passage.  Next day the servant
found the fine gold spectacles broken on the threshold, and
that very night we were all standing breathless by the bar-
room window, and Fettes at our side, sober, pale, and
resolute in look.

'God protect us, Mr. Fettes!' said the landlord, coming first
into possession of his customary senses.  'What in the
universe is all this?  These are strange things you have been
saying.'

Fettes turned toward us; he looked us each in succession in
the face.  'See if you can hold your tongues,' said he.
'That man Macfarlane is not safe to cross; those that have
done so already have repented it too late.'

And then, without so much as finishing his third glass, far
less waiting for the other two, he bade us good-bye and went
forth, under the lamp of the hotel, into the black night.

We three turned to our places in the parlour, with the big
red fire and four clear candles; and as we recapitulated what
had passed, the first chill of our surprise soon changed into
a glow of curiosity.  We sat late; it was the latest session
I have known in the old George.  Each man, before we parted,
had his theory that he was bound to prove; and none of us had
any nearer business in this world than to track out the past
of our condemned companion, and surprise the secret that he
shared with the great London doctor.  It is no great boast,
but I believe I was a better hand at worming out a story than
either of my fellows at the George; and perhaps there is now
no other man alive who could narrate to you the following
foul and unnatural events.

In his young days Fettes studied medicine in the schools of
Edinburgh.  He had talent of a kind, the talent that picks up
swiftly what it hears and readily retails it for its own.  He
worked little at home; but he was civil, attentive, and
intelligent in the presence of his masters.  They soon picked
him out as a lad who listened closely and remembered well;
nay, strange as it seemed to me when I first heard it, he was
in those days well favoured, and pleased by his exterior.
There was, at that period, a certain extramural teacher of
anatomy, whom I shall here designate by the letter K.  His
name was subsequently too well known.  The man who bore it
skulked through the streets of Edinburgh in disguise, while
the mob that applauded at the execution of Burke called
loudly for the blood of his employer.  But Mr. K- was then at
the top of his vogue; he enjoyed a popularity due partly to
his own talent and address, partly to the incapacity of his
rival, the university professor.  The students, at least,
swore by his name, and Fettes believed himself, and was
believed by others, to have laid the foundations of success
when he had acquired the favour of this meteorically famous
man.  Mr. K- was a BON VIVANT as well as an accomplished
teacher; he liked a sly illusion no less than a careful
preparation.  In both capacities Fettes enjoyed and deserved
his notice, and by the second year of his attendance he held
the half-regular position of second demonstrator or sub-
assistant in his class.

In this capacity the charge of the theatre and lecture-room
devolved in particular upon his shoulders.  He had to answer
for the cleanliness of the premises and the conduct of the
other students, and it was a part of his duty to supply,
receive, and divide the various subjects.  It was with a view
to this last - at that time very delicate - affair that he
was lodged by Mr. K- in the same wynd, and at last in the
same building, with the dissecting-rooms.  Here, after a
night of turbulent pleasures, his hand still tottering, his
sight still misty and confused, he would be called out of bed
in the black hours before the winter dawn by the unclean and
desperate interlopers who supplied the table.  He would open
the door to these men, since infamous throughout the land.
He would help them with their tragic burden, pay them their
sordid price, and remain alone, when they were gone, with the
unfriendly relics of humanity.  From such a scene he would
return to snatch another hour or two of slumber, to repair
the abuses of the night, and refresh himself for the labours
of the day.

Few lads could have been more insensible to the impressions
of a life thus passed among the ensigns of mortality.  His
mind was closed against all general considerations.  He was
incapable of interest in the fate and fortunes of another,
the slave of his own desires and low ambitions.  Cold, light,
and selfish in the last resort, he had that modicum of
prudence, miscalled morality, which keeps a man from
inconvenient drunkenness or punishable theft.  He coveted,
besides, a measure of consideration from his masters and his
fellow-pupils, and he had no desire to fail conspicuously in
the external parts of life.  Thus he made it his pleasure to
gain some distinction in his studies, and day after day
rendered unimpeachable eye-service to his employer, Mr. K-.
For his day of work he indemnified himself by nights of
roaring, blackguardly enjoyment; and when that balance had
been struck, the organ that he called his conscience declared
itself content.

The supply of subjects was a continual trouble to him as well
as to his master.  In that large and busy class, the raw
material of the anatomists kept perpetually running out; and
the business thus rendered necessary was not only unpleasant
in itself, but threatened dangerous consequences to all who
were concerned.  It was the policy of Mr. K- to ask no
questions in his dealings with the trade.  'They bring the
body, and we pay the price,' he used to say, dwelling on the
alliteration - 'QUID PRO QUO.'  And, again, and somewhat
profanely, 'Ask no questions,' he would tell his assistants,
'for conscience' sake.'  There was no understanding that the
subjects were provided by the crime of murder.  Had that idea
been broached to him in words, he would have recoiled in
horror; but the lightness of his speech upon so grave a
matter was, in itself, an offence against good manners, and a
temptation to the men with whom he dealt.  Fettes, for
instance, had often remarked to himself upon the singular
freshness of the bodies.  He had been struck again and again
by the hang-dog, abominable looks of the ruffians who came to
him before the dawn; and putting things together clearly in
his private thoughts, he perhaps attributed a meaning too
immoral and too categorical to the unguarded counsels of his
master.  He understood his duty, in short, to have three
branches: to take what was brought, to pay the price, and to
avert the eye from any evidence of crime.

One November morning this policy of silence was put sharply
to the test.  He had been awake all night with a racking
toothache - pacing his room like a caged beast or throwing
himself in fury on his bed - and had fallen at last into that
profound, uneasy slumber that so often follows on a night of
pain, when he was awakened by the third or fourth angry
repetition of the concerted signal.  There was a thin, bright
moonshine; it was bitter cold, windy, and frosty; the town
had not yet awakened, but an indefinable stir already
preluded the noise and business of the day.  The ghouls had
come later than usual, and they seemed more than usually
eager to be gone.  Fettes, sick with sleep, lighted them
upstairs.  He heard their grumbling Irish voices through a
dream; and as they stripped the sack from their sad
merchandise he leaned dozing, with his shoulder propped
against the wall; he had to shake himself to find the men
their money.  As he did so his eyes lighted on the dead face.
He started; he took two steps nearer, with the candle raised.

'God Almighty!' he cried.  'That is Jane Galbraith!'

The men answered nothing, but they shuffled nearer the door.

'I know her, I tell you,' he continued.  'She was alive and
hearty yesterday.  It's impossible she can be dead; it's
impossible you should have got this body fairly.'

'Sure, sir, you're mistaken entirely,' said one of the men.

But the other looked Fettes darkly in the eyes, and demanded
the money on the spot.

It was impossible to misconceive the threat or to exaggerate
the danger.  The lad's heart failed him.  He stammered some
excuses, counted out the sum, and saw his hateful visitors
depart.  No sooner were they gone than he hastened to confirm
his doubts.  By a dozen unquestionable marks he identified
the girl he had jested with the day before.  He saw, with
horror, marks upon her body that might well betoken violence.
A panic seized him, and he took refuge in his room.  There he
reflected at length over the discovery that he had made;
considered soberly the bearing of Mr. K-'s instructions and
the danger to himself of interference in so serious a
business, and at last, in sore perplexity, determined to wait
for the advice of his immediate superior, the class
assistant.

This was a young doctor, Wolfe Macfarlane, a high favourite
among all the reckless students, clever, dissipated, and
unscrupulous to the last degree.  He had travelled and
studied abroad.  His manners were agreeable and a little
forward.  He was an authority on the stage, skilful on the
ice or the links with skate or golf-club; he dressed with
nice audacity, and, to put the finishing touch upon his
glory, he kept a gig and a strong trotting-horse.  With
Fettes he was on terms of intimacy; indeed, their relative
positions called for some community of life; and when
subjects were scarce the pair would drive far into the
country in Macfarlane's gig, visit and desecrate some lonely
graveyard, and return before dawn with their booty to the
door of the dissecting-room.

On that particular morning Macfarlane arrived somewhat
earlier than his wont.  Fettes heard him, and met him on the
stairs, told him his story, and showed him the cause of his
alarm.  Macfarlane examined the marks on her body.

'Yes,' he said with a nod, 'it looks fishy.'

'Well, what should I do?' asked Fettes.

'Do?' repeated the other.  'Do you want to do anything?
Least said soonest mended, I should say.'

'Some one else might recognise her,' objected Fettes.  'She
was as well known as the Castle Rock.'

'We'll hope not,' said Macfarlane, 'and if anybody does -
well, you didn't, don't you see, and there's an end.  The
fact is, this has been going on too long.  Stir up the mud,
and you'll get K- into the most unholy trouble; you'll be in
a shocking box yourself.  So will I, if you come to that.  I
should like to know how any one of us would look, or what the
devil we should have to say for ourselves, in any Christian
witness-box.  For me, you know there's one thing certain -
that, practically speaking, all our subjects have been
murdered.'

'Macfarlane!' cried Fettes.

'Come now!' sneered the other.  'As if you hadn't suspected
it yourself!'

'Suspecting is one thing - '

'And proof another.  Yes, I know; and I'm as sorry as you are
this should have come here,' tapping the body with his cane.
'The next best thing for me is not to recognise it; and,' he
added coolly, 'I don't.  You may, if you please.  I don't
dictate, but I think a man of the world would do as I do; and
I may add, I fancy that is what K- would look for at our
hands.  The question is, Why did he choose us two for his
assistants?  And I answer, because he didn't want old wives.'

This was the tone of all others to affect the mind of a lad
like Fettes.  He agreed to imitate Macfarlane.  The body of
the unfortunate girl was duly dissected, and no one remarked
or appeared to recognise her.

One afternoon, when his day's work was over, Fettes dropped
into a popular tavern and found Macfarlane sitting with a
stranger.  This was a small man, very pale and dark, with
coal-black eyes.  The cut of his features gave a promise of
intellect and refinement which was but feebly realised in his
manners, for he proved, upon a nearer acquaintance, coarse,
vulgar, and stupid.  He exercised, however, a very remarkable
control over Macfarlane; issued orders like the Great Bashaw;
became inflamed at the least discussion or delay, and
commented rudely on the servility with which he was obeyed.
This most offensive person took a fancy to Fettes on the
spot, plied him with drinks, and honoured him with unusual
confidences on his past career.  If a tenth part of what he
confessed were true, he was a very loathsome rogue; and the
lad's vanity was tickled by the attention of so experienced a
man.

'I'm a pretty bad fellow myself,' the stranger remarked, 'but
Macfarlane is the boy - Toddy Macfarlane I call him.  Toddy,
order your friend another glass.'  Or it might be, 'Toddy,
you jump up and shut the door.'  'Toddy hates me,' he said
again.  'Oh yes, Toddy, you do!'

'Don't you call me that confounded name,' growled Macfarlane.

'Hear him!  Did you ever see the lads play knife?  He would
like to do that all over my body,' remarked the stranger.

'We medicals have a better way than that,' said Fettes.
'When we dislike a dead friend of ours, we dissect him.'

Macfarlane looked up sharply, as though this jest were
scarcely to his mind.

The afternoon passed.  Gray, for that was the stranger's
name, invited Fettes to join them at dinner, ordered a feast
so sumptuous that the tavern was thrown into commotion, and
when all was done commanded Macfarlane to settle the bill.
It was late before they separated; the man Gray was incapably
drunk.  Macfarlane, sobered by his fury, chewed the cud of
the money he had been forced to squander and the slights he
had been obliged to swallow.  Fettes, with various liquors
singing in his head, returned home with devious footsteps and
a mind entirely in abeyance.  Next day Macfarlane was absent
from the class, and Fettes smiled to himself as he imagined
him still squiring the intolerable Gray from tavern to
tavern.  As soon as the hour of liberty had struck he posted
from place to place in quest of his last night's companions.
He could find them, however, nowhere; so returned early to
his rooms, went early to bed, and slept the sleep of the
just.

At four in the morning he was awakened by the well-known
signal.  Descending to the door, he was filled with
astonishment to find Macfarlane with his gig, and in the gig
one of those long and ghastly packages with which he was so
well acquainted.