When he spoke of his mother his voice sounded like some distant organ with the vox humana stop pulled out. I gathered that his mother had been a famous French actress. On the piano was a fan given her by the Empress Eugénie. He never spoke of his father. Nearly everything had some intimate association.
I formed a habit of calling on old Brancker on Thursday evenings, when my wife usually visited an invalid aunt. The experience was always a complete entertainment. He knew nothing of my world and I knew nothing of his. I came completely under the spell of his imagery. I had only to touch some trinket on the mantelpiece to set the whole machinery of retrospection on the move. He came haltingly to his subject as though he were feeling for it through the lavender-scented contents of some old drawer. But when the subject was discovered, he brought the whole picture vividly before my mind. I could see those people strutting before the footlights, hear them laugh and joke in their stuffy lodgings and their green-rooms, follow their hard life upon the road, their struggles, and adversities, and successes, and above all the moving throb of their passions and romances.
And then the picture would die out. It had no beginning and no end. It was just an impression. The angle of vision would alter. Something else would appear upon the scene.
After a time, touched with pity for this lonely and derelict old actor, my wife and I occasionally sent him little presents of game and port wine, when such things came our way. I would like to explain, at this point, that my wife is younger than I. Her outlook is less critical and introspective. To use her own expression, she is out to have a good time. She enjoys dances and theaters and gay parties. And, after all, why shouldn’t she? She is young and beautiful and full of life. Her hair—but I digress! In spite of the pheasants and the port, she had never met old Brancker. But one day we all happened to meet at the corner of the Talbot Road. I then enjoyed an entirely novel vision of my hero. He was magnificent. The bow he made, the long sweep of the hat, would have put d’Artagnan to shame. When I introduced them, he held her hand for a moment, and said:
“It is indeed a great pleasure.”
It doesn’t sound very much in print, but Alice completely went under. She blushed with pleasure, and told me afterwards that she thought he was “a perfect old dear.” The affair lapsed for several weeks. I still continued to call upon him, and we nearly exhausted the whole gamut of his belongings. We even routed through old drawers where faded remnants of ancient fustian would recall some moving episode of the past. I became greedy for these visionary adventures.
One night, rather late, I found the little white frock. So familiar had I become with my old friend that I was allowed to poke about his room on my own, and ask him questions. It was a child’s frock, and it lay neatly folded on the top of a chest in the passage. I brought it into the room, where he was sipping his rum-and-water, and said:
“What’s this, Mr. Brancker?”
He fixed his eyes upon the frock, and instantly I was aware that he was strangely moved. At first an expression of surprise and bewilderment crept over his face; then I observed a look of utter dejection and remorse. He did not speak, and rather confusedly I went up to him and touched him on the shoulder.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “Doubtless there is some story.... I ought not to have....”