The Novel of the White Powder

White Powder

Arthur Machen
My name is Leicester; my father, Major-General Wyn Leicester, a
distinguished officer of artillery, succumbed five years ago to a
complicated liver complaint acquired in the deadly climate of India. A
year later my only brother, Francis, came home after a exceptionally
brilliant career at the University, and settled down with the resolution
of a hermit to master what has been well called the great legend of the
law. He was a man who seemed to live in utter indifference to
everything that is called pleasure; and though he was handsomer than
most men, and could talk as merrily and wittily as if he were a mere
vagabond, he avoided society, and shut himself up in a large room at
the top of the house to make himself a lawyer. Ten hours a day of hard
reading was at first his allotted portion; from the first light in the east to
the late afternoon he remained shut up with his books, taking a hasty
half-hour's lunch with me as if he grudged the wasting of the moments,
and going out for a short walk when it began to grow dusk. I thought
that such relentless application must be injurious, and tried to cajole
him from the crabbed textbooks, but his ardour seemed to grow rather
than diminish, and his daily tale of hours increased. I spoke to him
seriously, suggesting some occasional relaxation, if it were but an idle
afternoon with a harmless novel; but he laughed, and said that he read
about feudal tenures when he felt in need of amusement, and scoffed at
the notions of theatres, or a month's fresh air. I confessed that he looked
well, and seemed not to suffer from his labours, but I knew that such
unnatural toil would take revenge at last, and I was not mistaken. A
look of anxiety began to lurk about his eyes, and he seemed languid,
and at last he avowed that he was no longer in perfect health; he was
troubled, he said, with a sensation of dizziness, and awoke now and
then of nights from fearful dreams, terrified and cold with icy sweats. "I

am taking care of myself," he said, "so you must not trouble; I passed
the whole of yesterday afternoon in idleness, leaning back in that
comfortable chair you gave me, and scribbling nonsense on a sheet of
paper. No, no; I will not overdo my work; I shall be well enough in a
week or two, depend upon it."
Yet in spite of his assurances I could see that he grew no better, but
rather worse; he would enter the drawing-room with a face all
miserably wrinkled and despondent, and endeavour to look gaily when
my eyes fell on him, and I thought such symptoms of evil omen, and
was frightened sometimes at the nervous irritation of his movements,
and at glances which I could not decipher. Much against his will, I
prevailed on him to have medical advice, and with an ill grace he called
in our old doctor.
Dr. Haberden cheered me after examination of his patient.
"There is nothing really much amiss," he said to me. "No doubt he
reads too hard and eats hastily, and then goes back again to his books in
too great a hurry, and the natural sequence is some digestive trouble
and a little mischief in the nervous system. But I think--I do indeed,
Miss Leicester--that we shall be able to set this all right. I have written
him a prescription which ought to do great things. So you have no
cause for anxiety."
My brother insisted on having the prescription made up by a chemist in
the neighbourhood. It was an odd, oldfashioned shop, devoid of the
studied coquetry and calculated glitter that make so gay a show on the
counters and shelves of the modern apothecary; but Francis liked the
old chemist, and believed in the scrupulous purity of his drugs. The
medicine was sent in due course, and I saw that my brother took it
regularly after lunch and dinner. It was an innocent-looking white
powder, of which a little was dissolved in a glass of cold water; I
stirred it in, and it seemed to disappear, leaving the water clear and
colorless. At first Francis seemed to benefit greatly; the weariness
vanished from his face, and he became more cheerful than he had ever
been since the time when he left school; he talked gaily of reforming
himself, and avowed to me that he had wasted his time.

"I have given too many hours to law," he said, laughing; "I think you
have saved me in the nick of time. Come, I shall be Lord Chancellor
yet, but I must not forget life. You and I