The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition, Vol. 10, Page 2

  THE MISADVENTURES OF JOHN NICHOLSON

  CHAPTER I

  IN WHICH JOHN SOWS THE WIND

  John Varey Nicholson was stupid; yet stupider men than he are nowsprawling in Parliament, and lauding themselves as the authors of theirown distinction. He was of a fat habit, even from boyhood, and inclinedto a cheerful and cursory reading of the face of life; and possibly thisattitude of mind was the original cause of his misfortunes. Beyond thishint philosophy is silent on his career, and superstition steps in withthe more ready explanation that he was detested of the gods.

  His father--that iron gentleman--had long ago enthroned himself on theheights of the Disruption Principles. What these are (and in spite oftheir grim name they are quite innocent) no array of terms would renderthinkable to the merely English intelligence; but to the Scot they oftenprove unctuously nourishing, and Mr. Nicholson found in them the milk oflions. About the period when the churches convene at Edinburgh in theirannual assemblies, he was to be seen descending the Mound in the companyof divers red-headed clergymen: these voluble, he only contributingoracular nods, brief negatives, and the austere spectacle of hisstretched upper lip. The names of Candlish and Begg were frequent inthese interviews, and occasionally the talk ran on the ResiduaryEstablishment and the doings of one Lee. A stranger to the tight littletheological kingdom of Scotland might have listened and gatheredliterally nothing. And Mr. Nicholson (who was not a dull man) knew this,and raged at it. He knew there was a vast world outside to whomDisruption Principles were as the chatter of tree-top apes; the paperbrought him chill whiffs from it; he had met Englishmen who had askedlightly if he did not belong to the Church of Scotland, and then hadfailed to be much interested by his elucidation of that nice point; itwas an evil, wild, rebellious world, lying sunk in _dozenedness_, fornothing short of a Scots word will paint this Scotsman's feelings. Andwhen he entered his own house in Randolph Crescent (south side), andshut the door behind him, his heart swelled with security. Here, atleast, was a citadel unassailable by right-hand defections or left-handextremes. Here was a family where prayers came at the same hour, wherethe Sabbath literature was unimpeachably selected, where the guest whoshould have leaned to any false opinion was instantly set down, and overwhich there reigned all the week, and grew denser on Sundays, a silencethat was agreeable to his ear, and a gloom that he found comfortable.

  Mrs. Nicholson had died about thirty, and left him with three children:a daughter two years and a son about eight years younger than John; andJohn himself, the unfortunate protagonist of the present history. Thedaughter, Maria, was a good girl--dutiful, pious, dull, but so easilystartled that to speak to her was quite a perilous enterprise. "I don'tthink I care to talk about that, if you please," she would say, andstrike the boldest speechless by her unmistakable pain; this upon alltopics--dress, pleasure, morality, politics, in which the formula waschanged to "my papa thinks otherwise," and even religion, unless it wasapproached with a particular whining tone of voice. Alexander, theyounger brother, was sickly, clever, fond of books and drawing, and fullof satirical remarks. In the midst of these, imagine that natural,clumsy, unintelligent and mirthful animal, John; mighty well-behaved incomparison with many lads, although not up to the standard of the housein Randolph Crescent; full of a sort of blundering affection, full ofcaresses which were never very warmly received; full of sudden and loudlaughter which rang out in that still house like curses. Mr. Nicholsonhimself had a great fund of humour, of the Scots order--intellectual,turning on the observation of men; his own character, for instance--ifhe could have seen it in another--would have been a rare feast to him;but his son's empty guffaws over a broken plate, and empty, almostlight-headed remarks, struck him with pain as the indices of a weakmind.

  Outside the family John had early attached himself (much as a dog mayfollow a marquess) to the steps of Alan Houston, a lad about a yearolder than himself, idle, a trifle wild, the heir to a good estate whichwas still in the hands of a rigorous trustee, and so royally contentwith himself that he took John's devotion as a thing of course. Theintimacy was gall to Mr. Nicholson; it took his son from the house, andhe was a jealous parent; it kept him from the office, and he was amartinet; lastly, Mr. Nicholson was ambitious for his family (in which,and in the Disruption Principles, he entirely lived), and hated to see ason of his play second fiddle to an idler. After some hesitation, heordered that the friendship should cease--an unfair command, thoughseemingly inspired by the spirit of prophecy; and John, saying nothing,continued to disobey the order under the rose.

  John was nearly nineteen when he was one day dismissed rather earlierthan usual from his father's office, where he was studying the practiceof the law. It was Saturday; and except that he had a matter of fourhundred pounds in his pocket, which it was his duty to hand over to theBritish Linen Company's Bank, he had the whole afternoon at hisdisposal. He went by Princes Street enjoying the mild sunshine, and thelittle thrill of easterly wind that tossed the flags along that terraceof palaces, and tumbled the green trees in the garden. The band wasplaying down in the valley under the Castle; and when it came to theturn of the pipers, he heard their wild sounds with a stirring of theblood. Something distantly martial woke in him; and he thought of MissMackenzie, the daughter of a retired captain of Highlanders, whom he wasto meet that day at dinner in his father's house.

  Now, it is undeniable that he should have gone directly to the bank; butright in the way stood the billiard-room of the hotel where Alan wasalmost certain to be found; and the temptation proved too strong. Heentered the billiard-room, and was instantly greeted by his friend, cuein hand.

  "Nicholson," said he, "I want you to lend me a pound or two tillMonday."

  "You've come to the right shop, haven't you?" returned John. "I havetwopence."

  "Nonsense," said Alan. "You can get some. Go and borrow at yourtailor's; they all do it. Or I'll tell you what: pop your watch."

  "O yes, I daresay," said John. "And how about my father?"

  "How is he to know? He doesn't wind it up for you at night, does he?"inquired Alan, at which John guffawed. "No, seriously; I am in a fix,"continued the tempter. "I have lost some money to a man here. I'll giveit you to-night, and you can get the heirloom out again on Monday. Come;it's a small service, after all. I would do a good deal more for you."

  Whereupon John went forth, and pawned his gold watch under the assumedname of John Froggs, 85 Pleasance. But the nervousness that assailed himat the door of that inglorious haunt, a pawnshop, and the effortnecessary to invent the pseudonym (which somehow seemed to him anecessary part of the procedure), had taken more time than he imagined;and when he returned to the billiard-room with the spoils, the bank hadalready closed its doors.

  This was a shrewd knock. "A piece of business had been neglected." Heheard these words in his father's trenchant voice, and trembled, andthen dodged the thought. After all, who was to know? He must carry fourhundred pounds about with him till Monday, when the neglect could besurreptitiously repaired; and meanwhile, he was free to pass theafternoon on the encircling divan of the billiard-room, smoking hispipe, sipping a pint of ale, and enjoying to the mast-head the modestpleasures of admiration.

  None can admire like a young man. Of all youth's passions and pleasures,this is the most common and least alloyed; and every flash of Alan'sblack eyes; every aspect of his curly head; every graceful reach andeasy, stand-off attitude of waiting; everything about him down even tohis shirt-sleeves and wrist-links, were seen by John through a luxuriousglory. He valued himself by the possession of that royal friend, huggedhimself upon the thought, and swam in warm azure; his own defects, likevanquished difficulties, becoming things on which to plume himself. Onlywhen he thought of Miss Mackenzie there fell upon his mind a shadow ofregret; that young lady was worthy of better things than plain JohnNicholson, still known among schoolmates by the derisive name of"Fatty"; and he felt that if he could chalk a cue, or stand at ease,with such a careless grace as Alan, he could approach the object of hissentim
ents with a less crushing sense of inferiority.

  Before they parted, Alan made a proposal that was startling in theextreme. He would be at Collette's that night about twelve, he said. Whyshould not John come there and get the money? To go to Collette's was tosee life indeed; it was wrong; it was against the laws; it partook, in avery dingy manner, of adventure. Were it known, it was the sort ofexploit that disconsidered a young man for good with the more seriousclasses, but gave him a standing with the riotous. And yet Collette'swas not a hell; it could not come, without vaulting hyperbole, under thedescription of a gilded saloon; and if it was a sin to go there, the sinwas merely local and municipal. Collette was simply an unlicensedpublican, who gave suppers after eleven at night, the Edinburgh hour ofclosing. If you belonged to a club, you could get a much better supperat the same hour, and lose not a jot in public esteem. But if you lackedthat qualification, and were an-hungered, or inclined towardsconviviality at unlawful hours, Collette's was your only port. You werevery ill supplied. The company was not recruited from the Senate or theChurch, though the Bar was very well represented on the only occasion onwhich I flew in the face of my country's laws, and, taking my reputationin my hand, penetrated into that grim supper-house. And Collette'sfrequenters, thrillingly conscious of wrong-doing and "that two-handedengine (the policeman) at the door," were perhaps inclined to somewhatfeverish excess. But the place was in no sense a very bad one; and it issomewhat strange to me, at this distance of time, how it had acquiredits dangerous repute.

  In precisely the same spirit as a man may debate a project to ascend theMatterhorn or to cross Africa, John considered Alan's proposal, and,greatly daring, accepted it. As he walked home, the thoughts of thisexcursion out of the safe places of life into the wild and arduous,stirred and struggled in his imagination with the image of FloraMackenzie--incongruous and yet kindred thoughts, for did not each implyunusual tightening of the pegs of resolution? did not each woo him forthand warn him back again into himself?

  Between these two considerations, at least, he was more than usuallymoved; and when he got to Randolph Crescent, he quite forgot the fourhundred pounds in the inner pocket of his greatcoat, hung up the coat,with its rich freight, upon his particular pin of the hat-stand; and inthe very action sealed his doom.