“Keep the fish, doctor,” he said; “we give in.” He always answered for both of us.
“Well,” said Dr. Crackenthorpe, “that’s wise.” He stepped back as he spoke to signify that we might get on our feet, which we did.
“I keep the trout,” he said, grandly, “in evidence, and shall cast over in my mind the pros and cons of my duty to the authorities in the matter.”
At this, despite our discomfiture, we laughed like young hyenas. The trout, we knew, was destined for the doctor’s own table. He was a notorious skinflint, to whom sixpence saved from the cooking pot was a coin redoubled of its face value.
He made as if to continue his way, but paused again, and shot a question at Jason.
“Dad had any more finds?”
“No,” said Jason, “and if he had you wouldn’t get ’em.”
Dr. Crackenthorpe looked at the boy a minute, shrugged his shoulders and moved off.
And here, at this point, his question calls for some explanation.
One day, some twelve months or so earlier than the incident just described, we of the mill being all collected together for dinner and my father just coming out of one of his drunken fits, a coin tinkled on the floor and rolled into the empty fireplace, where it lay shining yellow. My father, who had somehow jerked it out of his pocket from the trembling of his hand, walked unsteadily across the room and stood looking down upon it vacantly. There he remained for a minute or two, we watching him, and from time to time shot a stealthy glance round at one or other of us. Twice or thrice he made as if to pick it up, but his heart apparently failed him, for he desisted. Suddenly, however, he had it in his hand and stood fingering it, still watchful of us.