"They wouldna own him. Brodie may have the name. He may look like the Wintons. But what's in a name and what's in a likeness?" said the first draughts player. "He hasna a shadow o' proof."
"I'm afeared what proof there was had a big, black bar through it," remarked Grierson judicially; "for I'm gey and certain that onything that might have happened lang back took place the wrang side o' the blanket. That's why our friend willna blatter it out. That's maybe the bonnie kinship."
"'Tis not only kinship that he claims," said Provost Gordon slowly. "Na! Na! The disease has swelled beyond that. I hardly like to come over it to ye and 'deed I'm hardly sure myself, but I’ll mention no names and ye mustna repeat it. I had it from a man who saw James Brodie when he was the worse o' liquor, mad ravin’
drunk. There's no' many has seen that," he continued, "for he's a close man in they things. But this night his dour tongue was loosed and he talked and "
"Another time, Provost," cried Paxton suddenly. "Wheesht, man, wheesht."
"Talk o' the deevil."
"About that new trap o' yours now, Provost, will ye "
Brodie had entered the room. He came in heavily, blinking at the sudden transition from the darkness to the lighted room and frowning from the bitter suspicion that he had been at the moment of his entry the object of their backbiting tongues. His dour, hard face had to-night a pale grimness, as he looked around the company, nodding his head silently several times in salutation, more in the manner of a challenge than a greeting.
"Come away in, come away in," remarked Grierson smoothly; "we were just wonderin' if the rain that was threatenin' had come on yet."
"It's still dry," said Brodie gruffly. His voice was flat, had lost its old resonant timbre, was, like the brooding mask of his face, inexpressive of anything but stoic endurance. He took out his pipe and began to fill it. An old man, the messenger and factotum of the club, dignified as such by a green baize apron, put his head around the door in speechless enquiry, and to him Brodie shortly remarked,
"The usual."
A momentary silence descended upon the group whilst the old man retreated, was absent, returned shamblingly with a large whisky for Brodie, then finally departed. The Provost felt it his duty to break the awkward stillness which had descended upon the group and, looking at Brodie, he said, in a kindly tone, moved in spite of himself by the other's ghastly look:
"Well, Brodie man, how are things with ye? How's the world waggin' now?"
"Oh! Fair, Provost! very fair," replied Brodie slowly, "Nothing to complain about." The grim assumption of indifference in his tone was almost tragic and deceived none of the assembly, but Gordon, with an assumption of heartiness, retorted:
"That's fine! That's the ticket! We're expectin' every day to see the Mungo Company wi' the shutters up.”
Brodie accepted this polite fiction and the spurious murmur of assent from the group which followed it, not with the blatant satisfaction which it would have provoked six months ago but, in the face of his present position, with a blank indifference which the others did not fail to observe. They might discuss him freely in his absence, criticise, condemn, or even vilify him, but when he was in their midst their strongly expressed feelings weakened sensibly under the shadow of his actual presence and they were impelled, often against their wish, to make some flattering remark which they did not mean and which they had not intended to utter.
He was a man whom they thought wiser to humour; better to keep on the right side of, safer to propitiate than to enrage; but now, as they noted his moody humour and slyly watched his oppressed demeanour, they wondered if his iron control might be at last beginning to fail him.
A gentle, insinuating voice from the corner, addressing the company at large, broke into their general air of meditation.
"If you Ye thinkin' o' the Company's shutters goin' up you'll a' have to bide a wee na, na, they'll not be shuttin' up shop for a bit, anyway not for a bittie," drawled Grierson.
"How's that?" queried some one.
"Oh! Just a little private information," answered Grierson complacently, pursing his lips, placing his finger tips together and beaming on the company, especially upon Brodie, with an aspect of secret yet benevolent comprehension. Brodie looked up quickly from beneath his tufted eyebrows, not fearing the man but dreading, from his past experience, the sly, meek attitude which betokened in the other a deep and calculating venom.
"What is it then, man?" asked Paxton. "Out with it!"
But now that he had thoroughly aroused their curiosity, Grierson was in no haste to divulge his secret information and still smiled sleekly, keeping them on tenterhooks, tantalising them with the plum which would not drop from his lips until it was juicy with ripeness.
"Odd! You wouldna be interested," he purred. " Tis just a lettle piece o' local news I happened to get wind o' privately."
"Do you know yourself, Brodie?" asked Paxton, in an effort to terminate the irritating procrastination.
Brodie shook his head mutely, thinking bitterly how Grierson got his finger first into every pie, how he was always the last to remove it.
"It's just a wee, insignificant bit of information," Grierson said, with increased satisfaction.
"Then out with it, ye sly deevil!"
"Well, if you must know, the district manager o' Mungo's is goin' away, now that they're so firmly established. I'm told they're doin’ uncommon weel." He smiled blandly at Brodie and continued, "Ay! They've made a clever move too, in offering the vacant post and a real fine post it is an' all to a Levenford man. He's been offered it and he's accepted it."
"Who is 't then?" cried several voices.
"Oh, he's a real deservin' chap, is the new local manager o' the Mungo Company."
"What's his name then?"
"It's our friend's assistant, none other than young Peter Perry," drawled Grierson, with a triumphant wave of his hand towards Brodie.
Immediately a babble of comment broke out.
"Man, ye don't say so!"
"The auld, weedowed mother will be unco' pleased about that.”
"What a step up for the young fellow!"
"He would jump at it like a cock at a groset."
Then, as the first flush of excitement at the unexpected titbit of local gossip subsided, and the real realisation of its meaning to Brodie dawned upon them, a silence fell, and all eyes were turned upon him. He sat perfectly still, stunned at the news, every muscle in his huge body rigid, his jaw set, his teeth gripping the stem of his pipe with the increasing pressure of a slowly closing vice. So Perry was leaving him, Perry, upon whom of late he had come to depend utterly, realising at last that he had himself got out of the way of serving, that he was above it now and was unable to lower himself to such lackey's work had he even desired it. A sharp crack split the attentive silence, as, with the onset of a pang of sudden bitterness, his teeth compressed themselves with such a vicious, final force upon his pipe that the stem snapped through. As though in a trance, he looked at the riven pipe in his hand for a long second, then spat out the broken end coarsely upon the floor, looked again stupidly at the ruined meerschaum and muttered to himself, unconscious that they heard him;
"I liked that pipe liked it weel. It was my favourite."
Then he became aware of the ring of faces regarding him as though he sat in an arena for their contemplation, became aware that he must show them how he met the bitter shock of the blow, or better, show them that it held no bitterness for him. He stretched out towards his glass, raised it to his lips with a hand as steady as a rock, looked steadily back at Grierson, whose gaze immediately slipped off that unwavering stare. He would at that moment have given his right hand for the power to utter some cutting, withering retort which would shrivel the other by its very potency, but, despite a fury of endeavour, his brain was not sufficiently agile, his slow, ponderous wit refused to function, and all that he could do was to say, with an attempt at his habitual, sneering grimace:
"It's of no concern, not the slightest! Not the slightest concern to me!"
"I hope he'll not take any o' your trade with him," said Paxton solicitously.
"Now I come to think on't, 'tis a downright dirty trick, Mr. Brodie," came in a toadying tone from one of the draughts players. "He ken's a' your customers."
"Trust these Mungo bodies to move smartly. They're a deevelish clever lot, in my opeenion," said another voice.
"Myself, I think it's raither a poor spirit," drawled Grierson considcringly. "Somehow it gives me the impression that he's just like a rat leavin' the sinkin' ship."
There was a sudden hush whilst every one sat aghast at the audacity of his remark, the most direct affront that had ever been offered to Brodie in that clubroom. They expected him to arise and rend the puny form of Grierson, tear him apart by the sudden exertion of his brute strength, but instead he remained inert, unheeding, as if he had not heard or understood the other's remark. With his thoughts sunk in a gloomy abyss, he reflected that this was the most deadly blow he had suffered of any, although already they had smote him hip and thigh.
They had lavished their abundant capital in the struggle against him. In a dozen ways had exercised their ingenious cunning, but now in taking Perry they had snapped his last mainstay. Appropriately, he recollected his assistant's strange suppressed manner that night, his half-intimidated, half-exultant look, as if he had been glad yet regretful, as if he had wished to speak and yet could not summon courage to do so. Strangely, he did not blame Perry, realising in justice
that the other had merely accepted a better offer than he could have made; instead, any animosity that stirred within him turned against the Mungo Company itself. His feeling, however, was at this moment not truly one of hatred, but rather of curious compassion for himself, a sad consideration that he, so noble, so worthy, should suffer at such treacherous hands, should in consequence be compelled continually to assume this false front of indifference, when hitherto his careless arrogance had, unwittingly, protected him like armour. Then, amongst his meditations, he became again aware of the circle of watching eyes and the imperative need for speech, and hardly knowing what he said, yet whipping himself to anger, he began: