Read Ebook: The Brown Study by Richmond Grace S Grace Smith

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Ebook has 1028 lines and 48231 words, and 21 pages

Brown kept Jennings overnight, making a bed for him on his couch, where he could see the fire. As Jennings sat on the couch, ready to turn in, Brown came out from his bedroom, a long figure in his bathrobe and slippers, and knelt down before the old rocking-chair. Jennings, in his surprise, sat perfectly still, looking at him. He could see Brown's lean, strong face in profile, the fine head--it was a very fine head, though perhaps Jennings did not appreciate that--a little lifted, the eyes closed. Brown prayed in a conversational tone, as if the One he addressed were in the room above, with an opening between.

Then he rose, a little tender smile on his face, said, "Good-night, old man," and went away into the inner room--the door of which he did not close.

What did he leave behind him? What was in the air? Was this a common room, a homely room, lighted only by a smoldering fire? What was it which suddenly and unaccountably gripped George Jennings's heart, so that a sob rose in his throat? What made him want to cry, like a schoolboy, with his head on his arms? With all his long misery, tears had never once come to his relief. His heart had been hard and his eyes dry. Now, somehow, he felt something give way.

Jennings slept all night, and came out to breakfast with a queer, shamefaced aspect, yet with considerably less heaviness of foot than he had shown the night before. He ate heartily, as well he might, for the food was extremely appetizing. When he got up to go he stood still by his chair, seeming to be trying to say something. Seeing this, Brown came over to him and put his hand on his shoulder.

"Yes, lad?" said he interrogatively. He was smiling and the smile transformed his face, as always.

"I--feel better, this morning," stammered Jennings. "I--want to thank you. I'm ashamed of the way I talked last night. It was as you said. I knew better, but I couldn't seem to--to--"

"Shall I?" Jennings asked eagerly.

"Surely. We'll have oysters to-night, roasted on the half-shell over the coals in the fireplace. Like 'em?"

"I never ate any that way," admitted Jennings. "It sounds good." And he smiled broadly, a real smile at last.

"Wait till you try them," promised Brown.

BROWN'S BORROWED BABY

On the following Saturday, at five in the afternoon, the previous hours having been filled with a long list of errands of all sorts, yet all having to do with people, and the people's affairs, seldom his own, Brown turned his steps home-ward. The steps lagged a little, for he was tired.

At the house next his own--a shabby little house, yet with rows of blooming scarlet geraniums in tin cans on its two lower window sills, and clean, if patched, muslin curtains behind the plants--Brown turned in once more. Standing in the kitchen doorway he put a question:

"Mrs. Kelcey, may I borrow Norah for an hour?"

The person addressed looked up from her work, grinned a broad Irish grin, pushed back a lock of bothersome hair with a soapy hand, and answered heartily:

"To be shure ye may, Misther Brown. I says to mesilf an hour ago, I says, 'Happen he'll come for Nory to-night, it bein' Saturday night, an' him bein' apt to come of a Saturday night.' So I give her her bath early, to get her out o' the way before the bhoys come home. So it's clane she is, if she ain't got into no mischief the half hour."

She dashed into the next room and returned triumphant, her youngest daughter on her arm. Five minutes later Brown bore little Norah Kelcey into his bachelor domain, wrapped in her mother's old plaid shawl, her blue eyes looking expectantly from its folds. It was not the first time she had paid a visit to the place--she remembered what there was in store for her there. She was just two years old, was Norah, a mere slip of an Irish baby, with a tangled mop of dark curls above eyes of deep blue set in bewildering lashes, and with a mouth like a freshly budded rose.

Brown withdrew the shawl and knelt on the floor before her. Bim, who had welcomed the two with eagerness, sat down beside them.

"You see, Bim," explained his master, "I had to have something human to love for an hour or two. You're pretty nearly human, I know, but not quite. Norah is human--she's flesh-and-blood. A fellow gets starved for the touch of flesh-and-blood sometimes, Bim."

He bent over the child. Then he lifted her again and bore her into his bedroom. Clean and wholesome she was without question, but he disliked the faint odour of laundry soap which hung about her. Smiling at her, playing with her, making a game of it, he gently bathed the little face and neck, the plump arms and hands, using a clear toilet soap with a most delicate suggestion of fragrance. When he brought her back to his fireside she was a small honey-pot for sweetness and daintiness, and fit for the caresses she was sure to get.

Brown sat down with her upon his knee. He had given her a tiny doll to snuggle in her arms, and she was quiet as a kitten.

"Norah," said he, speaking softly, "you are adorable. Your eyes are the colour of deep-sea water and they make havoc with my heart. That heart, by the way, is soft as melting snow to-night, Norah. It's longing for all the old things, longing so hard it aches like a bruise. It's done its best to be stoical about this exile, but there are times when stoicism is a failure. This is one of those times. Norah baby, would you mind very much if I kiss the back of your little neck?"

Norah did not mind in the least.

"All right, little human creature," said Brown, placing her upon the hearth-rug to play with Bim's silky brown ears, "you've given me as much comfort as one of us is likely to give another, in a world where everybody starves for something he can't have, and only God knows what the fight for self-denial costs. Shall we have supper now, Norah and Bim? Milk for Norah, bones for Bim, meat for Donald Brown--and a prayer for pluck and patience for us all!"

BROWN'S SISTER SUE

It was a rainy, windy, November night. Brown and Bim were alone together--temporarily. Suddenly, above the howling of the wind sounded sharply the clap of the old knocker on the door. Brown laid down his book--reluctantly, for he was human. A woman's figure, clad from head to foot in furs, sprang from the car at the curb, ran across the sidewalk, and in at the open door.

"Go back to the hotel and come for me at twelve, Simpson," she said to her chauffeur as she passed him, and the next moment she was inside the house and had flung the door heavily shut behind her.

"O Don!" she cried, and assailed the tall figure before her with a furry embrace, which was returned with a right good will.

"Well, well, Sue girl! Have you driven seventy miles to see me?" was Brown's response. Bim, circling madly around the pair, barked his emotion.

"Is this--" began Brown's visitor, glancing rapidly about her as she released herself. "Is this--" she began again, and stopped helplessly. Then, "O Don!" she said once more, and again, "O Don!"--and laughed.

"Yes, I know," said Brown, smiling. "Here, let me take off your furs. It's pretty warm here, I imagine. Bim and I are apt to keep a lot of wood on the fire."

"Bim?"

"At your feet--and your service."

The lady looked at the dog, who stood watching her.

"Your only companion, Don?" she asked.

"My best chum. He's so nearly human he understands at this moment that you don't think him handsome. Never mind! We're used to it, aren't we, Bim? Come over and take this chair, Sue. Are you cold? Would you like something hot? Tea--or coffee?"

She sat in the chair he drew to the fire for her. As he looked at his sister's charming, youthful face, and saw her sitting there in her handsome street dress with its various little indications of wealth and fashion--the gold-meshed purse on its slender chain, the rare jewel in the brooch at the throat, the flashing rings on the white hands--he drew in his breath in an incredulous little whistle.

"Is it really you, Sis?" he said. "You look pretty good to me, do you know, sitting there in my old chair!"

She glanced at the arm of the old rocker, worn smooth by the rubbing of many hands.

"Why do you have such a chair?" she answered impatiently--or so it sounded. "Why in the world, if you must live in a hovel like this, don't you make yourself comfortable? Send home for some easy chairs, and rugs and pictures." Her eye wandered about the room. "And a decent desk--and--and--a well-bred dog!"

He laughed. "A better bred dog, in one sense, than Bim you couldn't find. His manners are finer than those of most men. And as for this being a hovel, you do it injustice. It was built at the beginning of the last century by a titled Englishman, who used it for an office on his estate. Look at the big oak beams. Look at the floor, the doors, the fireplace. It's a distinguished little old house, Sue. Admit it!"

She shook her head. "I'll admit nothing, except that you are the most eccentric fellow who ever lived, to come off here and stay all by yourself, when you've been the idol of a congregation like St. Timothy's--and might still be their idol, if you would take just a little more assistance and not kill yourself with work. I've no patience with you, Don!"

He did not reply to this. Instead, he asked again gently, "Shall it be tea or coffee, Sue?" He stood in the doorway which led to the kitchen and added, as she hesitated, that he could give her an excellent brand of either. "Coffee, then," she chose, and sat staring into the fire until her brother returned with his earthenware pot and the other essentials for the brewing of coffee, all set forth on a small tray. When, presently, he offered her a fragrant cup, she drank it eagerly.

"On my vacations in the woods. The guides taught me. LaFitte was a wonderful cook--with certain limitations. I've picked up a few other tricks as well. Would you like something to eat?"

"No, thank you."

She had studied him with attention as he knelt before the fire, noting every detail of his appearance. She now put a question which she had reserved.

"Just how well are you now?"

He looked up. "Don't I look well enough to satisfy you?"

"I can't tell. You are frightfully thin--"

"I never was anything else."

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