United States or Bouvet Island ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The secretary continued: "We don't hear from him quite as often as we should like, in fact." To his own surprise Scorrier murmured: "It's a silent place!" The secretary smiled. "Very good! Mr. Scorrier says, sir, it's a silent place; ha-ha! I call that very good!"
His diplomatic eyes flattered Scorrier, who passed a hand over his brow and said: "Of course." "Pippin doesn't hit it off with them. Between ourselves, he's a leetle too big for his boots. You know what it is when a man in his position gets a sudden rise!" Scorrier caught himself searching on the floor for a sight of Hemmings' boots; he raised his eyes guiltily.
"I suppose Pippin is doing the best he can!" "Wire him on no account to leave the mine idle!" "Poor devils!" "A fund? Of course, what ought we to give?" He had a strong conviction that nothing of all this would disturb the commonsense with which they would go home and eat their mutton. A good thing too; the less it was taken to heart the better! But Scorrier felt angry. The fight was so unfair!
Another answered him: "'Tis a gude enough bag for me!" They passed him, the whites of their eyes gleaming out of faces black as ink. Pippin drove him home at a furious pace, not uttering a single word. As they turned into the main street, a young woman starting out before the horses obliged Pippin to pull up. The glance he bent on Scorrier was ludicrously prescient of suffering.
Pippin could have told but he would never speak again. Nature, at whom, unaided, he had dealt so many blows, had taken her revenge...! In the night Scorrier stole down, and, with an ashamed face, cut off a lock of the fine grey hair. 'His daughter might like it! he thought.... He waited till Pippin was buried, then, with the letter in his pocket, started for England.
His face expressed a profound commiseration, almost ludicrously mixed with the ashamed contentment that men experience at the misfortunes of an enemy. The telegram, dated the day before, ran thus "Frightful explosion New Colliery this morning, great loss of life feared." Scorrier had the bewildered thought: 'Pippin will want me now.
Then softly a whisper of noises stole forth, a stir of light, and the whole slow radiance of the morning glory. But it brought no warmth; and Scorrier wrapped himself closer in his cloak, feeling as though old age had touched him. Close on noon he reached the township. Glamour seemed still to hover over it. He drove on to the mine.
Thinking of these things he answered curtly: "When shall I start?" "Down-by-the-starn" Hemmings replied with a sort of fearful sprightliness: "There's a good fellow! I will send instructions; so glad to see you well." Conferring on Scorrier a look fine to the verge of vulgarity he withdrew.
Scorrier broke in: "No man could have done so much for them;" and, carried away by an impulse to put things absolutely straight, went on "But, after all, a letter now and then what does it amount to?" Pippin besieged him with a subtle glance. "You too?" he said "I must indeed have been a wicked man!" and turned away.
The old miner woke him, saying: "Rummy stuff this here chokedamp; see, they all dies drunk!" The very next to be brought up was the chief engineer. Scorrier had known him quite well, one of those Scotsmen who are born at the age of forty and remain so all their lives. His face the only one that wore no smile seemed grieving that duty had deprived it of that last luxury.
Word Of The Day