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Authors: Winston Graham
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temptation, my boy. I have yielded, here and there, and that is the point, ain't it. I'm not at all easy in my mind, and I don't fancy passing on to meet my Maker with a burdended conscience. I'm terrible uneasy. You truly believe there is such a Being, do you? You believe these tales of hell-fire and eternal damnation? Upon my soul, I don't know what to think.'
'God is eternal,' said Ossie, 'God is omnipresent, God is the supreme judge. There can be no turning away. If you go down into the nethermost parts of Hell He is there also. There is no escaping Him, Is it the sins of y our youth that trouble you now?’
'Youth? Whose youth? Mine? Nay, nay. Did I sin then? Maybe. If so, I have forgot. I have forgot what they were. Nay, my boy, tis the sins of age that trouble me. Those of the past ten years,'
Ossie took out a handkerchief and breathed into it. 'What sins can you have in mind, Mr Pearce ? Gluttony? Sloth? Concupiscence? I detected you once, I believe, cheating at whist.'
Mr Pearce had his hand behind his ear. 'What? Oh, that. If it had only been at whist, my boy ... If only at whist ...'
'Then pray what is wrong? I haven't all day to listen.'
Mr Pearce coughed, trying to clear the phlegm gathering in his throat. 'I have - from time to time, my boy, indulged in a little speculation. It seemed harmless enough. There was money to be made, d'you know - in India - in Italy - in some of our burgeoning industries. It is difficult for a country solicitor to accumulate wealth, though all his life he attends on it. Alas, in the main, my little speculations were unfortunate. It is chiefly the war. Italy was overrun. Madras was seized for the French. Some of our English industries have failed for lack of outlet, with all Europe closed against them. So, money was lost instead of made. Eh? Eh? I say money was lost instead of made,'
'So you are less well off,' Ossie said, never one to jump quickly to another's meaning. 'What is there to that?'
'Alas,' said Mr Pearce . 'I have to tell you, my boy, that - that some of the money I speculated with was not ... well, not my own.'
IV
Half an hour later the Reverend Mr Whitworth, having offered what contemptuous comfort he could to his ailing and contrite friend, went into the stables of the Red Lion Inn to pick up his horse; but there, feeling the impulsive need of further refreshment to sustain him before his ride home, he waved the ostler away and stooped through the gloomy passage that led to one of the parlours and ordered a pint of porter. So little light came from the latticed windows after the brightness outside that it was not for some seconds that he recognized the man silting at a table near him.
He at once got up and moved to the other table. 'Dr Behenna. May I join you?'
'Certainly, sir. I'm at your service.' Behenna was a man of forty-two, the principal surgeon of the town, authoritative, stocky and well dressed. Many a simple man would have trembled at the sight of these two together, for between them they encompassed all that anyone could know of the body and the soul. On the whole Behenna was the greater feared, for his denunciations and judgments were the more immediate. Hellfire was at least at one remove.
Behenna was drinking porter too, and for a few minutes their conversion was casual: neither man was accustomed to lowering his voice, and two corn merchants were at another table and well within earshot. Behenna began to inveigh against the spread of apothecaries in the town who, without any qualifications except a board over their shops, saw fit to prescribe for all and every ailment man was heir to.
'Look at this’ he said, spreading a broadsheet on the table. 'This is what they distribute and advertise, sir. "Dr Rymer's Cardiac Tincture and Analeptic Pills," "Roberts's Medicated Vegetable Water for Scrofulous Wounds. For the Evil, Leprosy, Pimpled Faces, Flushing, and all Morbid Affections," "Dr Smyth's Specific Drops for Weakness of the Natural
'God is eternal,' said Ossie, 'God is omnipresent, God is the supreme judge. There can be no turning away. If you go down into the nethermost parts of Hell He is there also. There is no escaping Him, Is it the sins of y our youth that trouble you now?’
'Youth? Whose youth? Mine? Nay, nay. Did I sin then? Maybe. If so, I have forgot. I have forgot what they were. Nay, my boy, tis the sins of age that trouble me. Those of the past ten years,'
Ossie took out a handkerchief and breathed into it. 'What sins can you have in mind, Mr Pearce ? Gluttony? Sloth? Concupiscence? I detected you once, I believe, cheating at whist.'
Mr Pearce had his hand behind his ear. 'What? Oh, that. If it had only been at whist, my boy ... If only at whist ...'
'Then pray what is wrong? I haven't all day to listen.'
Mr Pearce coughed, trying to clear the phlegm gathering in his throat. 'I have - from time to time, my boy, indulged in a little speculation. It seemed harmless enough. There was money to be made, d'you know - in India - in Italy - in some of our burgeoning industries. It is difficult for a country solicitor to accumulate wealth, though all his life he attends on it. Alas, in the main, my little speculations were unfortunate. It is chiefly the war. Italy was overrun. Madras was seized for the French. Some of our English industries have failed for lack of outlet, with all Europe closed against them. So, money was lost instead of made. Eh? Eh? I say money was lost instead of made,'
'So you are less well off,' Ossie said, never one to jump quickly to another's meaning. 'What is there to that?'
'Alas,' said Mr Pearce . 'I have to tell you, my boy, that - that some of the money I speculated with was not ... well, not my own.'
IV
Half an hour later the Reverend Mr Whitworth, having offered what contemptuous comfort he could to his ailing and contrite friend, went into the stables of the Red Lion Inn to pick up his horse; but there, feeling the impulsive need of further refreshment to sustain him before his ride home, he waved the ostler away and stooped through the gloomy passage that led to one of the parlours and ordered a pint of porter. So little light came from the latticed windows after the brightness outside that it was not for some seconds that he recognized the man silting at a table near him.
He at once got up and moved to the other table. 'Dr Behenna. May I join you?'
'Certainly, sir. I'm at your service.' Behenna was a man of forty-two, the principal surgeon of the town, authoritative, stocky and well dressed. Many a simple man would have trembled at the sight of these two together, for between them they encompassed all that anyone could know of the body and the soul. On the whole Behenna was the greater feared, for his denunciations and judgments were the more immediate. Hellfire was at least at one remove.
Behenna was drinking porter too, and for a few minutes their conversion was casual: neither man was accustomed to lowering his voice, and two corn merchants were at another table and well within earshot. Behenna began to inveigh against the spread of apothecaries in the town who, without any qualifications except a board over their shops, saw fit to prescribe for all and every ailment man was heir to.
'Look at this’ he said, spreading a broadsheet on the table. 'This is what they distribute and advertise, sir. "Dr Rymer's Cardiac Tincture and Analeptic Pills," "Roberts's Medicated Vegetable Water for Scrofulous Wounds. For the Evil, Leprosy, Pimpled Faces, Flushing, and all Morbid Affections," "Dr Smyth's Specific Drops for Weakness of the Natural
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