A Deal with the Devil

by Eden Phillpotts

"'I wonder you can inquire. If you've got any sense of justice or gratitude, you ought to feel the extent of your debt and not hesitate to pay it. In any case, whatever your private ambitions may be, your past record is such that, if you go anywhere at all, your destination is practically determined.'

"I did not argue upon this point," continued grandfather, "feeling it would be better tact to slur it over, and leave a loop-hole, but he held me to it, and finally got me to promise that I would never attempt to reform or amend my ways during the last year of my life. He insisted all the time that it would not alter the result, but I could see, from his great anxiety upon the point, that he knew there might be plenty of opportunity for me to turn over a new leaf, and make a good end, if I chose to do so. However, I promised him to lead as abandoned and dissolute a life as could be expected from a man of one hundred and eight, so we effected the compromise. He was nervous about it to the last, but felt it to be the only way out of the cul-de-sac his own stupidity had placed him in. Then the change was made. I went to sleep a boy and woke as you find me. I'm all here, but stiff about the legs, and deucedly rheumatic. Go out and get me a tall hat and some black, ready-made clothes, and some easy felt boots and a few walking sticks, and the strongest spectacles you can buy. Then I'll get up."

So ended my clear grandpapa's astounding statement, but my dream went on. I made him some bread-and-milk, fed him with it, and then hurried out to purchase necessaries.

The world, had turned upside down for me. I expected the newspaper boys to be yelling out "Failure of the New Scheme!"

CHAPTER XXII.

THE DWINDLING OF GRANDPAPA.

But there was no truth in the vision. I awoke unrested--rose, and, of course, found grandpapa under the New Scheme, as usual. He had arranged to hide somewhere in a backwater, and only paddle out when the race for the Diamond Sculls was beginning. I tried hard to dissuade him from making the attempt. I pointed out that arrest was sure to follow the struggle, and that, once taken, there would be sufficient legal complications all over the country to last him much more than the remainder of his life. I said:

"In a year's time you will be ten; in two years you will be nothing. Let us hide this tragedy if we can. Publicity now means that the concluding catastrophes of your life will be watched by the whole of England--perhaps by the entire civilised world. Surely that would add another sting to extinction? Let me implore of you, dear one, to give up this aquatic enterprise. We will fly together. I have done up the accounts this morning, and find we have exactly nine hundred and ninety-eight pounds left. This is ample provision for your approaching childhood. Come and dwindle by the sea--at Margate or somewhere. Or let us go abroad, if that idea gives you pleasure."

"Not me," he said. "I shall flicker out in the old country. And as to not rowing, that's absurd. This race is my last flutter. In six months I shall be a boy of fifteen. I must make my final adult appearance to-day. It's jolly lucky there's only one other entry besides myself, as I certainly shall have no chance of appearing more than once. However, this morning I mean to row the course, and then keep on the river and pull quietly into the backwater, and lie low till dark. Meantime you can go to Margate if you like and find new diggings, and I'll join you to-morrow."

With this arrangement I had to be content. I took a train to London, and managed to escape comfortably in it with my box. I journeyed to Margate, took three fair rooms overlooking the sea, and waited with deepest anxiety for grandfather's arrival. On the following morning I purchased the Sportsman, to find that the dear old man had managed to elude the detectives and win the Diamond Sculls! I felt that this was probably the last piece of real joy he would ever have. But the report in the Sportsman quickly quenched my passing happiness. Satisfaction, indeed, was turned into black despair, when I read what my grandfather had done on the completion of the boat-race.