‘Yes, sir.’
‘I was brought up,’ the old man said, in a muffled voice, advancing and retiring his hands before the fire, and chafing them automatically, ‘I was brought up by Christian parents. I never did a dishonourable act in all my days. I have been a God-fearing man and a—a steady church-goer. I give it all up. I renounce it. I don’t believe in God. I don’t believe in religion. I don’t believe in being honest. It’s a—it’s a vile wicked world, Hornett, and it’s my belief the devil rules it.’
‘Oh, sir,’ cried Hornett,’ you mustn’t talk like this, sir. You must excuse me speaking free, sir, but I can’t stand by and hear you talk like that. I can’t listen to it, sir—I can’t really. I’ve never said a disrespectful word to you, Mr. Bommaney, but I really must speak out now, sir. It isn’t respectable, sir, to talk like that.’
After this there was a long silence, and Bommaney, who had repouched the bottle after his last application to it, consulted it again, and handed it wordlessly to Hornett, without looking at him.
‘Phil might,’ he murmured in a while—’ he might be brought to believe me. He’s an honest man himself, James—a very honest high-minded man indeed. I must look where he lives,’ he murmured, seeking for the envelope his son had given him. ‘He gave me his address.’
‘His address, sir,’ said Hornett. ‘You could almost lay your hand on him. He lives there. That’s his window with the light in it.’ Bommaney moved to the window, and followed with his glance the direction of Hornett’s outstretched finger. There was a window a few feet higher than the one at which he stood, and half-hidden from observation by a stone parapet. A shadow obscured the light, and moved about the ceiling, visible from below.
‘I saw him there to-night, sir,’ said Hornett ‘I saw his face at the window. He put a glass of flowers outside. That’s his shadow moving about there now.’
‘Phil!’ groaned the wretched father, straining his dirty wasted hands together. ‘Phil!’
‘I’m not the figure, sir,’ said Hornett, ‘to call upon a gentleman like Mr. Phil; nor yet are you, sir, if you’ll excuse my saying so. But if you’d let me go, sir, and put the case to him, he might come and see you here, sir, and you might set yourself straight with him, sir, which would at least,’ the seedy man added, somewhat moved by the old man’s tears and tremblings, ‘be an advantage to a father’s heart.’
Bommaney stood in silence, looking upward. The moving shadow settled itself upon the ceiling in a huge silhouette, distinctly traceable. There was no doubting it was Phil’s dear head that threw the shadow, himself invisible, so near, so far. The foolish outcast’s heart ached bitterly, and he stretched both hands towards the shadow, not knowing that he moved.