"I would have liked a drop broth to-day," he replied with a shadow of displeasure. "There's a nip in the air already; still, if ye haven't got any, that's all about it. Where's the potatoes, then?"
"I hadna time to make any potatoes for ye to-day. I've been fair rushed off my feet. Ye canna expect me to do everything for ye a' days, and dippin' my hands in cold dirty water to peel potatoes is what I've never been used to. Ye were glad enough to get a simpler dinner than that when ye used to come in to see me at the Winton Arms, and things are no better off with ye now. Eat it up and be content, man!"
The pupils of his eyes dilated as he looked at her, his lips shaped themselves to an angry reply, but with an effort he restrained himself, helped himself from the plate before him, and, taking a slice of bread, began his meal. She stood beside him for a moment, her hands upon her hips, flaunting her figure near to him, filled by the conscious sense of her power over him until, as Grandma Brodie entered the room, she flounced back into the scullery.
The old woman came forward to the table with a half -bemused expression upon her sallow, wrinkled visage and as she sat down, murmured to herself, "Teh! these things again"; but at her scarcely perceptible words Brodie turned and, showing his teeth at her in his old manner, snarled:
"What harm have the sausages done ? If ye don't like plain, honest meat ye can go to the poorhouse, and if ye do like it then shut your auld girnin' mouth!"
At his words, and more especially at the accompanying glance, she at once subsided into herself, and with her tremulous hands began, but without much eagerness, to assist herself to the food she had so indiscreetly condemned. Her ageing, muddled brain, incapable of fully comprehending the significance of the changes around her, accepted only the fact that she was now uncomfortable, presented with scanty, unpalatable meals, and as her weak jaws champed with a dry disrelish she vented her displeasure in quick, darting glances towards the hidden presence in the scullery.
After a few moments during which the two ate in silence, Brodie paused suddenly in his indifferent mastication, raised his head slightly at the light sound of some one entering the house and, fixing his eyes upon the door leading to the hall, waited expectantly for the entry of Nessie. She came in immediately and, although Brodie resumed his eating mechanically, he followed her everywhere about the room with his eyes. She slipped the thin elastic from under her chin and released her plain straw hat, threw this upon the sofa, discarded her blue serge jacket and laid it beside the hat, fluffed out her light flaxen hair and finally subsided in her chair beside him. She sat back in her chair languidly, surveying the table with a faint childish air of petulance, saying nothing, but feeling in her own mind that the sight of the solidifying grease before her had removed what little appetite she had possessed, that though she might have eaten, and enjoyed perhaps, a little stewed mince or even a small lamb chop, now she turned from the very thought of food. At her present age of fifteen years she had reached that period of her life when her budding and developing body required an additional attention, a more selective dietary, and though she realised nothing of this she felt instinctively, with her slightly throbbing head and the onset of her significant though unmentionable malaise, that it was an injustice to present her with the food she now surveyed. As she rested thus, her father, who had observed her continuously since her entry, spoke; with an unchanged face but in a voice which he tried to render light, persuasive, he said:
"Come on now, Nessie dear, and get your dinner begun. Don't sit and let it get cold. A big lassie like you should be hungry as a hunter and dashin' in for her meals as though she could eat the house up!"
At his words she came out of her meditation and at once began to obey, murmuring in explanation, almost apologetically:
"I've got a headache, Father, just right on the front of my brow, like a strap goin' round it," and she pointed listlessly to her forehead.
"Come, come now, Nessie," he replied in a low tone which could not carry to the scullery, "you're aye talkin' about that headache. If you're always crying 'wolf, wolf well not be believing you when it does come to the bit. So long as ye don't have the strap on the palm o' your hand ye shouldna mind it on the front o' your head."
"But it ties my brow so tight sometimes," she murmured mildly; "like a tight band."
"Tut! tut! It's the brain behind that matters, no' the brow, my girl. Ye should be thankful that ye're so well equipped in that respect." Then, as she began negligently to eat, he continued with extravagant approval, "That's better. Ye canna work without food. Take your fill o' whatever is goin'. Hard work should give a young lass like you an appetite, and hunger's guid kitchen." He suddenly shot a rancorous glance at his mother as he added harshly, "I'm pleased ye're not so particular and fasteedious as some folks."
Nessie, gratified that she was pleasing him and unfolding to some extent at his praise, redoubled her flagging efforts to eat but regarded him from time to time with a strained look in her eye as he continued reminiscently:
"When I was your age, Nessie, I could have eaten an ox when I came rushin' in from the fields for my dinner. I was a hardy chiel ay ready for what I could get. I could never get enough, though, No! No! Things were different for me than they are for you, Nessie! I didna have your chance. Tell me," he murmured confidentially, "how are things goin’ to-day?"
"Quite well," she replied automatically.
"You're still top of the class,' he insisted.
"Oh! Father," she expostulated, "I'm tired of explaining to you that we don't have that sort of thing now. I've told you half a dozen times in the last three months that it all goes by quarterly examinations." With a faint note of vanity in her voice she added, "Surely you understand that I’m past that stage now."
"Ay! ay!" he hastily replied. "I was forgettin' that a big girl and a fine scholar like you wouldna have to be fashed wi' such childish notions. True enough, it's examinations that you and me are concerned with." He paused, then in a sly tone remarked, "How long have we now till the big one?"
"About six months, I suppose," she answered half-heartedly, as she pallidly continued her meal.
"That's just fine," he retorted. "No' that long to wait and yet plenty of time for ye to prepare. Ye can't say ye havena had warnin' o't." He whispered almost inaudibly:
"Ay! I'll keep ye to it, lass you and me'll win the Latta between us."
At this point old Grandma Brodie, who had been sitting expectantly for a second course to follow and who, regardless of the conversation, had been itching, but afraid, to say, "Is there nothin' else comin'" or "Is this a' we're to get", at last abandoned hope; with a resigned but muffled sigh she scraped back her chair from the table, raised her stiff form, and dragged disconsolately from the kitchen. As she passed through the door she was unhappily aware that little comfort was in her, that in the sanctuary of her room two empty tins awaited her like rifled and unreplenished tabernacles mutely proclaiming the prolonged absence of her favourite Deesides and her beloved oddfellows.
Wrapped in the contemplation of his daughter, Brodie did not observe his mother's departure, but remarked in a tone that was almost coaxing:
"Have ye no news at all then, Nessie ? Surely some one said something to ye. Did nobody tell ye again that ye were a clever lass? I'll warrant that ye got extra good marks for your home work," It was as though he besought her to inform him of some commendation, some pleasing attribute bestowed upon the daughter of James Brodie; then, as she shook her head negatively, his eye darkened to a sudden thought and he burst out savagely, "They havena been talkin' about your father, have they, any o' these young whelps? I daresay they listen to what the backbitin' scum o' their elders might be say in 1 , but if they come over a thing to ye, just let me know. And dinna believe it. Keep your head up, high up. Remember who ye are that you're a Brodie and demand your due. Show them what that means. Ay and ye will show them, my girl, when ye snap awa' wi' the Latta from under their snivellin' nebs." He paused; then, with a twitching cheek, bit out at her, "Has that young brat o' Grierson's been makin' any of his sneakin' remarks to ye?"
She shrank back timidly from him, exclaiming, "No, no, Father! Nobody has said anything, Father. Everybody is as kind as can be. Mrs. Paxton gave me some chocolate when she met me going down the road."
"Oh! She did, did she?" He hesitated, digesting the information; apparently it disagreed with him, for he sneered: "Well, tell her to keep her braw presents the next time. Say we have all we want here. If ye're wantin' sweeties, like a big saftie, could ye not have asked me for them? Do ye not know that every scandalmonger in the town is just gaspin' for the chance to run us down? 'He canna afford to give his own daughter a bit sweetie next that's what we'll be hearin' to-morrow, and by the time it gets to the Cross they'll be makin' out that I'm starvin' ye." His annoyance was progressive and he worked himself up to a climax, crying: "Bah! Ye should have had more sense. They're all against us. That's the way o't now. But never mind! Let them fling all the mud they like. Let the hand of every man be turned against me I'll win through in spite o' them." As he concluded, he raised his eye wildly upwards when, suddenly, he observed Nancy had come into the room and was watching him from under her raised brows with a critical and faintly amused detachmcnt. At once his inflated bearing subsided and, as though caught in some unwarrantable act, he lowered his head while she spoke.
"What's all the noise about! I thought that somebody had taken a fit when I heard ye skirlin' like that," and as he did not reply she turned to Nessie.
"What was the haverin' about? I hope he wasna flightin' at you, henny?"
With Nancy's advent into the kitchen a vague discomfort had possessed Nessie and now the skin of her face and neck, which had at first paled, flushed vividly. She answered confusedly, in a low voice:
"Oh! No. It was nothing nothing like that."
"I'm glad to hear it," replied Nancy. "All that loud rantin' was enough to deafen a body. My ears are ringin' with it yet." She glanced around disapprovingly and was about to retire when Brodie spoke, looking sideways at Nessie, and with an effort making his voice unconcerned.
"If you've finished your dinner, Nessie, run out to the front and wait for me. I'll not be a minute before I'm ready to go down the road with you." Then, as his daughter arose, picked up her things from the sofa and went silently, uneasily, out of the room, he turned his still lowered head; looking upwards from under his brows, he regarded Nancy with a strong, absorbed intensity, and remarked:
"Sit down a minute, woman. I havena seen ye all the dinner hour. Ye're not to be angry at that tantrum. You should know my style by this time. I just forgot myself for a minute."
As she sat down carelessly in the chair Nessie had vacated, his look drew her in with a possessive gratification which told more clearly than his words how she had grown upon him. So long without a fresh and vital woman in his house, so painfully encumbered by the old and useless body of his wife, this firm, white, young creature had entered into his blood like an increasing fever, and, by satisfying his fierce and thwarted instincts, had made him almost her slave.
"Ye didna give us any pudding, Nancy," he continued, clumsily taking her hand in his huge grasp; "will ye not give a man something to make up for't just a kiss, now. That'll not hurt ye, woman, and it's sweeter to me than any dish ye could make."
"Tuts, Brodie! You're always on at the same thing," she answered, with a toss of her head. "Can ye not think o' something else for a change? Ye forget that you're a burly man and I'm but a wee bit lass that canna stand a deal of handlin'." Although the words were admonitory she threw an inflection of seductiveness into them which made him tighten his clasp on her fingers, saying:
"I'm sorry if I've been rough with ye, lass. I didna mean it. Come and sit closer by me. Come on now!"
"What!" she skirled. "In broad daylight! Ye maun be mad, Brodie, an’ after last night too, you great lump. Yell have me away to shadow No! No! Ye'll not wear me out like ye did the other."
She looked little like a shadow, with her plump cheeks and solid form that had filled out more maturely from her six months of easy, indolent existence, and, as she regarded him with a substantial appreciation of his dependence upon her, she became aware that he was already losing his hold upon her, that the strange strength which had drawn her was being sapped by drink and her embraces, that he had now insufficient money to gratify her fancies, that he looked old, morose and unsuited to her. She had almost an inward contempt for him as she resumed slowly, calculatingly, "I might gie ye a kiss, though. Just might, mind ye. If I did, what would ye give me for it?"
"Have I not given ye enough, woman?" he answered gloomily. "Ye're housed and fed like myself and I've sold many a thing out this house to meet your humour. Don't ask for the impossible, Nancy."
"Tuts, ye wad think ye had given me a fortune to hear ye," she cried airily. "As if I wasna worth it, either! I'm not askin' ye to sell ony more tie-pins or chains or pictures. I'm only wantin' a few shillings for my purse to go out and see my Aunt Annie in Overtoun tomorrow. Give us five shillin's and I'll give ye a kiss."
His lower lip hung out sulkily.
"Are ye goin' out again to-morrow ? Ye're aye goin' out and learin' me. When will ye be back ?"
"Man! I believe ye would like to tie me to the leg o' this table. I'm not your slave; I'm only your housekeeper." That was one for him, she thought, as she delivered the pert allusion to the fact that he had never offered to marry her. "I'll not be away all night. I'll be back about ten o'clock or so. Give us the two half-crowns and if ye behave I'll maybe be kinder to ye than ye deserve."
Under her compelling eyes he plunged his hand into his pocket, feeling, not the handful of sovereigns that had once reposed there, but some scanty coins, amongst which he searched for the sum she asked.
"Here ye are then," he said eventually, handing her the money. "I can ill afford it but ye well know I can deny ye nothing."
She jumped up, holding the money triumphantly, and was about to slip away with it when he too got up and catching her by the arm, cried:
"What about your bargain! You're not forgettin' about that! Do ye not care for me at all?"