“Hurrah, Doctor!” he exclaimed, as he dashed in through the open doorway. “I’ve done the trick; got the skipper of the Concordia to allow me to work my passage out to Port Natal as ordinary seaman at a shilling a month. I ‘sign on’ at the shipping office the day after to-morrow, and have to be on board by eight o’clock the same evening in readiness to haul out of dock at daylight on the following morning.”
Chapter Three.
Before the Mast.
The remainder of Dick Maitland’s time in England was pretty fully occupied in comforting and encouraging his mother, in view of the pending separation, and in getting his somewhat slender wardrobe ready and packed for the voyage. The first-mentioned part of his task proved very much more difficult than the other, for Mrs Maitland was rather a helpless kind of person, and had already come to look to Dick for advice and help in every sort of difficulty, whether great or small; the prospect, therefore, of being henceforth obliged to look after herself and manage her affairs unaided filled her at first with dismay. Besides, there was the separation from her son, the feeling that she knew not whether she would ever again set eyes on him in this world, and the terrible uncertainty generally of the future, to further distract her; but at length the buoyancy and unquenchable hopefulness of Dick’s spirit had its effect upon her; and, finally, when the moment of parting came, she had been brought to a frame of mind that enabled her to say the last words of farewell almost with calmness. As for Dick, he had already received Humphreys’ assurance that he would keep in touch with Mrs Maitland, and see, in conjunction with his friend Graham, the solicitor, that she came to no harm; therefore he had few fears for her immediate future; while, for the rest, he was confident that before his mother’s little capital became exhausted he would have found means to replenish it. He spent with her the remainder of the day upon which he had interviewed the skipper of the Concordia, and practically the whole of that which succeeded it, finally bidding her farewell about six o’clock in the evening, in order that he might spend the remainder of the day with Humphreys, with whom he had still much of importance to discuss.
Upon Dick’s return to Number 19 Paradise Street he found the genial Doctor so busily engaged in dispensing drugs and advice that the two had time for little more than a mutual nod of greeting; but later on, when the last patient had departed and business had been brought to a close for the night, they sat down together for a chat over a cup of coffee and—so far as Humphreys was concerned—a pipe. Dick had not yet taken to tobacco, and Humphreys, although an inveterate smoker himself, so far from urging his young friend to adopt the habit, had strongly dissuaded him from having anything to do with the weed, at least until he had reached his twenty-first birthday, learnedly descanting upon the injurious effects of nicotine upon the immature constitution, and incidentally warning him to eschew narcotics generally, which, he insisted, were always injurious, and only to be resorted to, even medically, when it became a choice between a narcotic and some greater evil.
“Well, my boy,” remarked the Doctor, when they were at length comfortably settled in their respective chairs, “so you have parted with your mother. I hope you were able to cheer the poor lady and reconcile her to the separation. It is of course very hard upon her that at her time of life she should be left absolutely alone, but necessity is a pitiless jade, exacting her tribute of sorrow and suffering from all alike, from the monarch to the pauper, and when she lays her hand upon us there is no escape. But do not allow anxiety on behalf of your dear mother to worry you for a moment, lad, for I have promised to keep an eye upon her, and, as you know, I am a man of my word, and no harm shall befall her so long as I have the power to avert it. No, don’t thank me, Dick, there is no need; the satisfaction and pleasure that I shall derive from helping your dear mother will be reward enough for me, for I regard her as a personal friend, and shall consider it a privilege to be allowed to do all that I can for her.”
“And now, to pass on to another topic, let me show you the medicine chest which I intend shall be my parting gift to you. Here it is,”—producing a stout case measuring about eighteen inches long by fourteen inches wide and twelve inches high. “It is not inconveniently bulky or heavy, but it contains a practically complete assortment of drugs, sufficient in quantity to enable you to fight successfully about half a dozen cases of almost every known disease. More than that it would be inconvenient to carry about with you; and when any particular drug shows signs of exhaustion you must take timely steps to replenish your supply. And, with reference to that same replenishment, you will find a little manuscript book, written by myself, containing full instructions in the art of preparing several of the drugs from their parent plants, which I believe you will find exceedingly useful.” Here Humphreys’ talk became professional and his speech surcharged with technicalities—for he was an enthusiast in everything relating to the combating and cure of disease, and far into the small hours he descanted learnedly upon his beloved science, confiding to and instructing Dick in many valuable secrets that, by dint of laborious research and much consumption of midnight oil, he had wrung from Dame Nature. And on many an occasion in the not-far-distant future Dick Maitland had ample cause to look back with gratitude upon that long midnight conversation.