Brodie (stopping his ears). Brandy, brandy, brandy, brandy, brandy!
Lawson. William Brodie, mony’s the long day that I’ve believed in you; prood, prood was I to be the Deacon’s uncle; and a sore hearing have I had of it the day. That’s past; that’s past like Flodden Field; it’s an auld sang noo, and I’m an aulder man than when I crossed your door. But mark ye this—mark ye this, William Brodie, I may be no’ sae guid’s I should be; but there’s no’ a saul between the east sea and the wast can lift his een to God that made him, and say I wranged him as ye wrang that lassie. I bless God, William Brodie—ay, though he was like my brother—I bless God that he that got ye has the hand of death upon his hearing, and can win into his grave a happier man than me. And ye speak to me, sir? Think shame—think shame upon your heart!
Brodie. Rogues all!
Lawson. You’re the son of my sister, William Brodie. Mair than that I stop not to inquire. If the siller is spent, and the honour tint—Lord help us, and the honour tint!—sae be it, I maun bow the head. Ruin shallna come by me. Na, and I’ll say mair, William; we have a’ our weary sins upon our backs, and maybe I have mair than mony. But, man, if ye could bring half the jointure ... (potius quam pereas) ... for your mither’s son? Na? You couldna bring the half? Weel, weel, it’s a sair heart I have this day, a sair heart and a weary. If I were a better man mysel’ ... but there, there, it’s a sair heart that I have gotten. And the Lord kens I’ll help ye if I can. (Potius quam pereas.) (He goes out.)
SCENE V
Brodie. Sore hearing, does he say? My hand’s wet. But it’s victory. Shall it be go? or stay? (I should show them all I can, or they may pry closer than they ought.) Shall I have it out and be done with it? To see Mary at once (to carry bastion after bastion at the charge)—there were the true safety after all! Hurry—hurry’s the road to silence now. Let them once get tattling in their parlours, and it’s death to me. For I’m in a cruel corner now. I’m down, and I shall get my kicking soon and soon enough. I began it in the lust of life, in a hey-day of mystery and adventure. I felt it great to be a bolder, craftier rogue than the drowsy citizen that called himself my fellow-man. (It was meat and drink to know him in the hollow of my hand, hoarding that I and mine might squander, pinching that we might wax fat.) It was in the laughter of my heart that I tip-toed into his greasy privacy. I forced the strong-box at his ear while he sprawled beside his wife. He was my butt, my ape, my jumping-jack. And now ... O fool, fool! (Duped by such knaves as are a shame to knavery, crime’s rabble, hell’s tatterdemalions!) Shorn to the quick! Rooked to my vitals! And I must thieve for my daily bread like any crawling blackguard in the gutter. And my sister ... my kind, innocent sister! She will come smiling to me with her poor little love-story, and I must break her heart. Broken hearts, broken lives!... I should have died before.
SCENE VI
Brodie, Mary
Mary (tapping without). Can I come in, Will?
Brodie. O yes, come in, come in! (Mary enters.) I wanted to be quiet, but it doesn’t matter, I see. You women are all the same.