The doctor expressed satisfaction at finding that his new “charitable contributor” took such enlarged views of a pigeon-hole, and, promising to pay him another visit when the “cabin” should have been put to rights, said good-bye, and went to relieve the wants of the sick woman.
As the captain accompanied him along the passage, they heard the voice and step of poor Mrs Leven’s dissipated son, as he came stumbling and singing up the stair.
He was a stout good-looking youth, and cast a half impudent half supercilious look at Captain Wopper on approaching. He also bestowed a nod of careless recognition on Dr Lawrence.
Thinking it better to be out of the way, the Captain said good-bye again to his friend, and returned to the cabin, where he expressed to Mrs Roby the opinion that, “that young feller Leven was goin’ to the dogs at railway speed.”
Thereafter he went “aloft,” and, as he expressed it, “rigged himself out,” in a spruce blue coat with brass buttons; blue vest and trousers to match; a white dicky with a collar attached and imitation carbuncle studs down the front. To these he added a black silk neckerchief tied in a true sailor’s knot but with the ends separated and carefully tucked away under his vest to prevent their interfering with the effulgence of the carbuncle studs; a pair of light shoes with a superabundance of new tie; a green silk handkerchief, to be carried in his hat, for the purpose of mopping his forehead when warm, and a red silk ditto to be carried in his pocket for the benefit of his nose. In addition to the studs, Captain Wopper wore, as ornaments, a solid gold ring, the rude workmanship of which induced the belief that he must have made it himself, and a large gold watch, with a gold chain in the form of a cable, and a rough gold nugget attached to it in place of a seal or key. We class the watch among simple ornaments because, although it went—very demonstratively too, with a loud self-asserting tick—its going was irregular and uncertain. Sometimes it went too slow without apparent cause. At other times it went too fast without provocation. Frequently it struck altogether, and only consented to resume work after a good deal of gentle and persuasive threatening to wind it the wrong way. It had chronic internal complaints, too, which produced sundry ominous clicks and sounds at certain periods of the day. These passed off, however, towards evening. Occasionally such sounds rushed as it were into a sudden whirr and series of convulsions, ending in a dead stop, which was an unmistakeable intimation to the Captain that something vital had given way; that the watch had gone into open mutiny, and nothing short of a visit to the watchmaker could restore it to life and duty.
“I’m off now,” said the Captain, descending when he was fully “rigged.” “What about the door-key, mother?—you’ve no objection to my calling you mother, have you?”
“None whatever, Captain,” replied Mrs Roby, with a pleasant smile, “an old friend of William may call me whatever he pleases—short,” she added after momentary pause, “of swearin’.”
“Trust me, I’ll stop short of that. You see, old lady, I never know’d a mother, and I should like to try to feel what it’s like to have one. It’s true I’m not just a lad, but you are old enough to be my mother for all that, so I’ll make the experiment. But what about the key of the door, mother? I can’t expect you to let me in, you know.”
“Just lock it, and take the key away with you,” said Mrs Roby.
“But what if a fire should break out?” said the Captain, with a look of indecision.