The Story of Antony Grace

by George Manville Fenn

Another Wakeful Night.

Stephen Hallett was in too much trouble to speak to me about the model that evening. Mrs Hallett was in tears, and full of repinings, and Linny was out, it seemed, when her brother had returned.

I soon found that he did not wish me to stay, and being tired out, I made the best of my way back to Caroline Street, and went to bed to sleep heavily, dreaming that Hallett and I were working away at the model, but as fast as ever we got it nearly to perfection, Mr Blakeford came and stood by to throw in the pieces of the stick with which he had been beaten by Mr Wooster, and every time he did so the little model was broken.

Then the whole scene of the flogging seemed to take the place of Hallett’s attic, and I saw Mr Blakeford sit down in a chair, panting, bloody, and exhausted, and he kept on saying in a low hoarse voice, “Antony, lad, water!”

It was very terrible to see him sitting there by the light of the office gas, for though I wanted to help him, the power was not there, and, strive how I would, I could not get to his side, or fetch what he asked for.

“Antony, lad, water!”

His voice sounded like a groan, and I knew he must be very bad; but still I could not help him, and the bitter moan with which he appealed to me seemed to cut me to the heart.

“Antony, lad, water!”

There it was again, and I started up to find myself in bed, with a candle burning in the room, and Revitts, with his hat on the floor, his coat torn open, and his face besmeared with the blood flowing from a cut in the forehead, was seated close beside his bed, evidently half fainting.

“Antony, lad, water?” he moaned; and leaping out of bed and hurrying on some clothes, I tried to give him what help I could, but in a strangely confused way; for I was, as it were, in a dream, consequent upon the deep sleep succeeding a night without my usual rest. I held a glass of water to his lips, however, from which he drank with avidity. And then, awakening more to the state in which he was, and realising that it was not a dream, I set to work and sponged and bound up the cut with a handkerchief, to find, however, to my horror, that there was another terrible cut on the back of his head, which was also bleeding profusely.