"How do I come to be here? 'Tis the old thing—the old thing—and has been all along."
This poor wretch could not be allowed to go about half-naked, so I let the potman run out and get him a slop suit. (The Doctor sold the clothes next day for half-a-crown, and was speechless when I went to see him.) A hopeless, helpless wretch was the Doctor—the most hopeless I ever knew. He entered the army, early in life, and for a time he was petted and courted in Dublin society. The man was handsome, accomplished, and brilliantly clever, and success seemed to follow him. He sold out of the army and went to the Bar, where he succeeded during many years. No one could have lived a happier, fuller, or more fruitful life than he did before he slid into loose habits. His only pastime was the pursuit of literature, and he finished his big history of a certain great war while he was in full practice at the Chancery Bar. Power seemed to reside in him; fortune poured gifts on him; and he lost all. In an incredibly short space of time he drank away his practice, his reputation, his hopes of high honour, his last penny.
Thus it was that my historian came to beg of me for that muddy penn'orth.
I may as well finish the Doctor's story. If I were writing fiction the tale would be scouted as improbable, yet I am going to state plain facts. A firm of lawyers hunted up the Doctor, and informed him that he had succeeded to the sum of £30,000. There was no mistake about the matter; the long years of vile degradation, the rags, the squalor, the scorn, of men were all to disappear. The solicitors dressed the Doctor properly and advanced him money; he set off for Ireland to make some necessary arrangements, and he solemnly swore that he would become a total abstainer. At Swindon he chose to break his journey, took to drinking, and kept on for many hours. It was long since he had had such a chance of unlimited drink, and he greedily seized it. When he went to bed he took a bottle with him, and in the morning he was dead. Suffocated by alcohol, they said. He had no living soul related to him, and I believe his money went to the Crown.
I have written this last fragment on separate sheets, and my journal is interleaved for the first time.
The Gentleman and I became very friendly. I never tried to keep him from drinking: it was useless. When he was sober his company was pleasant, and I was very sorry when he mysteriously migrated, and many of our crew missed his help badly.
Some time after the Gentleman's flight, I was in a common lodging-house in Holborn, and in the kitchen I met a delightful vagabond of a Frenchman with whom I had a long talk. He happened to say, "One of our old friends died last week. He was a good man, and very well bred. Figure it to yourself, he was brother of one of your judges!" Then I knew that the Gentleman had gone. I wish I could have seen him again. As I look back at the old leaves of my journal I seem to see that sweet, patient smile which he wore as he told the story of his fall. There are some things almost too sad to bear thinking about. This is one.
Our friend Dicky had a bad misfortune lately. I should say that Dicky is an oldish man, who drifted into this ugly quarter some time ago, and took his place in the parlour, which is a room that I now prefer to the bar. I was holding a friendly discussion with a butcher when a strident voice said, "You are absolutely and irredeemably ignorant of the rudiments of your subject." I started. Where had I heard that voice before? The man was clad in an old shooting-jacket; his trousers were out at the knee, and his linen was very dirty; yet there was a something about him—a kind of distinction—which was impressive. After launching his expression of contempt at us, he buried his face in his pot and took a mighty drink. Slowly my memory aided me, and under that knobby, pustuled skin I traced the features of Dicky Nash, the most dreaded political journalist of my time. Often I had heard that voice roaring blasphemies with a vigour that no other man could equal; often had I seen that sturdy form extended beside the editorial chair, while the fumes in the office told tales as to the cause of the fall. And now here was Dicky—ragged, dirty, and evidently down on his luck. I soon made friends with him by owning his superior authority, and he kindly took a quart of ale at my expense. This was a man who used to earn £2,000 a year after he resigned his University fellowship. He was the friend and adviser of statesmen; he might have ended as a Cabinet Minister, for no man ever succeeded in gauging the extent of his miraculous ability; he seemed to be the most powerful, as well as the most dreaded man in England. Woe is me! We had to carry him up to bed; and he stayed on until he spent a three-guinea cheque, which Mr. Landlord cashed for him.
I knew no good would come of his Fleet-street games, though he used to laugh things off himself. He would come in about seven in the evening, and seat himself at his table. Then he would hiccup, "Can't write politics; no good. Give us a nice light subject."