Helen Vardons Confession | Page 7

in hand,
around the end of the bench where the work lay.
"Wonder if I'd better anneal it a bit,' he mused, picking up the bronze

foot and examining the unfinished space. "Mustn't make it too soft.
Think I will, though. We can hammer it up a,little on the stake after it's
brazed on. That will harden it enough."
He laid the foot down, but only that he might apply a match to the great
gas blowpipe; and I watched him with a sinking heart as he stood with
his teacup in one hand, while with the other he held the foot, gripped in
a pair of tongs, in the roaring purple flame. What did it mean, this
strange, restless haste to finish what was, after all, but a work of
pleasure? Did it portend some change that he saw more clearly than I?
Was he, impelled by the craftsman's instinct, turning in this fashion a
page of the book of life? Or was it--Oh! dreadful thought!--was it that
he was deliberately writing "Finis" before closing the volume?
But whatever was in his secret mind, he chatted cheerfully as he
worked, and submitted to be fed with scraps of bread and butter and to
have cups of tea administered at intervals; yet still I noted that the
chasing hammer flew at unwonted speed, and the depth of the
punch-marks on the work that rested on the sand-bag told of an unusual
weight in the blows.
"What a pity it is," he remarked, "that social prejudices prevent a
middle-class man from earning a livelihood with his hands. Now, here I
am, a third-rate solicitor perforce, whereas, if I followed my bent, I
should be a first-rate coppersmith. Shouldn't I?"
"Quite first-rate," I replied.
"Or even a silversmith," he continued, "if I could have my mate, Jim, to
do the art with a capital A while I did the work with a capital W. Hm?"
He looked up at me with a twinkle, and I took the opportunity to pop a
piece of bread and butter into his mouth, which occasioned a pause in
the conversation.
I had entertained faint--very faint--hopes that he might say something
to me about his difficulties. Not that I was inquisitive on the subject;
but, in view of a resolution that was slowly forming in my mind, I

should have liked to have some idea what his position really was. It
seemed pretty plain, however, that he did not intend to take me into his
confidence; notwithstanding which I decided in a tentative way to give
him an opening.
"Wasn't that Mr. Otway who was with you this afternoon?" I asked.
"Yes," he replied. "How did you know?"
"I heard his voice in the hall as you let him out," I answered, with
something of a gulp at the implied untruth.
The chasing hammer was arrested for a moment in mid air, and, as my
father's eye fixed itself reflectively on the punch that he held, I could
see that he was trying to remember what Mr. Otway had said in the
hall.
Yes," he replied, after a brief pause, "it was Mr. Otway. I should hardly
have thought you would have known his voice. Queer fellow, Otway.
No brains to speak of, but yet an excellent man of business in his way."
"What does he do--by way of profession, I mean?"
"The Lord knows. He was originally a solicitor, but he hasn't practised
for years. Now he is what is called a financier, which is a little vague,
but apparently profitable. And I think he does something in the way of
precious stones."
"Do you mean that he deals in them?"
"Yes, occasionally; at least, so I have heard. I know that he is
something of a connoisseur in stones, and that he had a collection,
which he sold some time ago. I have also heard--and I believe it is a
fact-- that his name was originally Levy, and that he is one of the
Chosen. But why he changed his name I have no notion, unless it was
an undesirable one to present to the financial world."
I was half disposed to pursue my enquiries further, but as he finished

speaking, he once more began to ply the hammer with such furious
energy that I became quite uneasy.
"You mustn't exert yourself so much, Pater," I remarked. "Remember
what Dr. Sharpe said."
"Bah I" he replied. "Sharpe is an old woman. My heart is sound enough.
At any rate, it will last as long as the rest of me. An old fellow like me
cannot expect to go in for sprinting or high jumping, but there's no need
for him to live in splints and cotton wool."
"Nor to endanger his health by perfectly unnecessary exertion. Why on