Brother Jacob | Page 6

one of these delicacies had he ever offered to
poor Jacob, for David was not a young man to waste his jujubes and
barley-sugar in giving pleasure to people from whom he expected
nothing. But an idiot with equivocal intentions and a pitchfork is as
well worth flattering and cajoling as if he were Louis Napoleon. So
David, with a promptitude equal to the occasion, drew out his box of
yellow lozenges, lifted the lid, and performed a pantomime with his
mouth and fingers, which was meant to imply that he was delighted to
see his dear brother Jacob, and seized the opportunity of making him a
small present, which he would find particularly agreeable to the taste.
Jacob, you understand, was not an intense idiot, but within a certain
limited range knew how to choose the good and reject the evil: he took
one lozenge, by way of test, and sucked it as if he had been a
philosopher; then, in as great an ecstacy at its new and complex savour
as Caliban at the taste of Trinculo's wine, chuckled and stroked this
suddenly beneficent brother, and held out his hand for more; for, except
in fits of anger, Jacob was not ferocious or needlessly predatory.
David's courage half returned, and he left off praying; pouring a dozen
lozenges into Jacob's palm, and trying to look very fond of him. He
congratulated himself that he had formed the plan of going to see Miss
Sally Lunn this afternoon, and that, as a consequence, he had brought
with him these propitiatory delicacies: he was certainly a lucky fellow;
indeed, it was always likely Providence should be fonder of him than of
other apprentices, and since he WAS to be interrupted, why, an idiot
was preferable to any other sort of witness. For the first time in his life,
David thought he saw the advantage of idiots.
As for Jacob, he had thrust his pitchfork into the ground, and had
thrown himself down beside it, in thorough abandonment to the
unprecedented pleasure of having five lozenges in his mouth at once,
blinking meanwhile, and making inarticulate sounds of gustative
content. He had not yet given any sign of noticing the guineas, but in
seating himself he had laid his broad right hand on them, and
unconsciously kept it in that position, absorbed in the sensations of his
palate. If he could only be kept so occupied with the lozenges as not to
see the guineas before David could manage to cover them! That was

David's best hope of safety; for Jacob knew his mother's guineas; it had
been part of their common experience as boys to be allowed to look at
these handsome coins, and rattle them in their box on high days and
holidays, and among all Jacob's narrow experiences as to money, this
was likely to be the most memorable.
"Here, Jacob," said David, in an insinuating tone, handing the box to
him, "I'll give 'em all to you. Run!--make haste!--else somebody'll
come and take 'em."
David, not having studied the psychology of idiots, was not aware that
they are not to be wrought upon by imaginative fears. Jacob took the
box with his left hand, but saw no necessity for running away. Was
ever a promising young man wishing to lay the foundation of his
fortune by appropriating his mother's guineas obstructed by such a
day-mare as this? But the moment must come when Jacob would move
his right hand to draw off the lid of the tin box, and then David would
sweep the guineas into the hole with the utmost address and swiftness,
and immediately seat himself upon them. Ah, no! It's of no use to have
foresight when you are dealing with an idiot: he is not to be calculated
upon. Jacob's right hand was given to vague clutching and throwing; it
suddenly clutched the guineas as if they had been so many pebbles, and
was raised in an attitude which promised to scatter them like seed over
a distant bramble, when, from some prompting or other--probably of an
unwonted sensation--it paused, descended to Jacob's knee, and opened
slowly under the inspection of Jacob's dull eyes. David began to pray
again, but immediately desisted--another resource having occurred to
him.
"Mother! zinnies!" exclaimed the innocent Jacob. Then, looking at
David, he said, interrogatively, "Box?"
"Hush! hush!" said David, summoning all his ingenuity in this severe
strait. "See, Jacob!" He took the tin box from his brother's hand, and
emptied it of the lozenges, returning half of them to Jacob, but secretly
keeping the rest in his own hand. Then he held out the empty box, and
said, "Here's the box, Jacob! The box for the guineas!" gently sweeping
them from Jacob's palm into the box.

This procedure was