The Nebuly Coat. John Meade Falkner

dead on the cobbles. They found clenched in her hand the two coppers for which she had lost her soul, and it was recognised at once that nothing less than an inn could properly commemorate such an exhibition of Divine justice. So the Hand of God was built, and flourished while Cullerne flourished, and fell when Cullerne fell. It stood empty ever since I can remember it, till Miss Joliffe took it fifteen years ago. She elevated it into Bellevue Lodge, a select boarding-house, and spent what little money that niggardly landlord old Blandamer would give for repairs, in painting out the Hand of God on the front. It was to be a house of resort for Americans who came to Cullerne. They say in our guide-book that Americans come to see Cullerne Church because some of the Pilgrim Fathers’ fathers are buried in it; but I’ve never seen any Americans about. They never come to me; I have been here boy and man for sixty years, and never knew an American do a pennyworth of good to Cullerne Church; and they never did a pennyworth of good for Miss Joliffe, for none of them ever came to Bellevue Lodge, and the select boarding-house is so select that you and I are the only boarders.” He paused for a minute and went on: “Americans—no, I don’t think much of Americans; they’re too hard for me—spend a lot of money on their own pleasure, and sometimes cut a dash with a big donation, where they think it will be properly trumpeted. But they haven’t got warm hearts. I don’t care for Americans. Still, if you know any about, you can say I am quite venal; and if any one of them restores my organ, I am prepared to admire the whole lot. Only they must give a little water-engine for blowing it into the bargain. Shutter, the organist of Carisbury Cathedral, has just had a water-engine put in, and, now we’ve got our own new waterworks at Cullerne, we could manage it very well here too.”

      The subject did not interest Westray, and he flung back:

      “Is Miss Joliffe very badly off?” he asked; “she looks like one of those people who have seen better days.”

      “She is worse than badly off—I believe she is half starved. I don’t know how she lives at all. I wish I could help her, but I haven’t a copper myself to jingle on a tombstone, and she is too proud to take it if I had.”

      He went to a cupboard in a recess at the back of the room, and took out a squat black bottle.

      “Poverty’s a chilly theme,” he said; “let’s take something to warm us before we go on with the variations.”

      He pushed the bottle towards his friend, but, though Westray felt inclined to give way, the principles of severe moderation which he had recently adopted restrained him, and he courteously waved away the temptation.

      “You’re hopeless,” said the organist. “What are we to do for you, who neither smoke nor drink, and yet want to talk about poverty? This is some eau-de-vie old Martelet the solicitor gave me for playing the Wedding March at his daughter’s marriage. ‘The Wedding March was magnificently rendered by the organist, Mr. John Sharnall,’ you know, as if it was the Fourth Organ-Sonata. I misdoubt this ever having paid duty; he’s not the man to give away six bottles of anything he’d paid the excise upon.”

      He poured out a portion of spirit far larger than Westray had expected, and then, becoming intuitively aware of his companion’s surprise, said rather sharply: “If you despise good stuff, I must do duty for us both. Up to the top of the church windows is a good maxim.” And he poured in yet more, till the spirit rose to the top of the cuts, which ran higher than half-way up the sides of the tumbler. There was silence for a few minutes, while the organist puffed testily at his pipe; but a copious draught from the tumbler melted his chagrin, and he spoke again:

      “I’ve had a precious hard life, but Miss Joliffe’s had a harder; and I’ve got myself to thank for my bad luck, while hers is due to other people. First, her father died. He had a farm at Wydcombe, and people thought he was well off; but when they came to reckon up, he only left just enough to go round among his creditors; so Miss Euphemia gave up the house, and came into Cullerne. She took this rambling great place because it was cheap at twenty pounds a year, and lived, or half lived, from hand to mouth, giving her niece (the girl you saw) all the grains, and keeping the husks for herself. Then a year ago turned up her brother Martin, penniless and broken, with paralysis upon him. He was a harum-scarum ne’er-do-well. Don’t stare at me with that Saul-among-the-prophets look; he never drank; he would have been a better man if he had.” And the organist made a further call on the squat bottle. “He would have given her less bother if he had drunk, but he was always getting into debt and trouble, and then used to come back to his sister, as to a refuge, because he knew she loved him. He was clever enough—brilliant they call it now—but unstable as water, with no lasting power. I don’t believe he meant to sponge on his sister; I don’t think he knew he did sponge, only he sponged. He would go off on his travels, no one knew where, though they knew well what he was seeking. Sometimes he was away two months, and sometimes he was away two years; and then, when Miss Joliffe had kept Anastasia—I mean her niece—all the time, and perhaps got a summer lodger, and seemed to be turning the corner, back would come Martin again to beg money for debts, and eat them out of house and home. I’ve seen that many a time, and many a time my heart has ached for them; but what could I do to help? I haven’t a farthing. Last he came back a year ago, with death written on his face. I was glad enough to read it there, and think he was come for the last time to worry them; but it was paralysis, and he a strong man, so that it took that fool Ennefer a long time to kill him. He only died two months ago; here’s better luck to him where he’s gone.”

      The organist drank as deeply as the occasion warranted.

      “Don’t look so glum, man,” he said; “I’m not always as bad as this, because I haven’t always the means. Old Martelet doesn’t give me brandy every day.”

      Westray smoothed away the deprecating expression with which he had felt constrained to discountenance such excesses, and set Mr. Sharnall’s tongue going again with a question:

      “What did you say Joliffe used to go away for?”

      “Oh, it’s a long story; it’s the nebuly coat again. I spoke of it in the church—the silver and sea-green that turned his head. He would have it he wasn’t a Joliffe at all, but a Blandamer, and rightful heir to Fording. As a boy, he went to Cullerne Grammar School, and did well, and got a scholarship at Oxford. He did still better there, and just when he seemed starting strong in the race of life, this nebuly coat craze seized him and crept over his mind, like the paralysis that crept over his body later on.”

      “I don’t quite follow you,” Westray said. “Why did he think he was a Blandamer? Did he not know who his father was?”

      “He was brought up as a son of old Michael Joliffe, a yeoman who died fifteen years ago. But Michael married a woman who called herself a widow, and brought a three-year-old son ready-made to his wedding; and that son was Martin. Old Michael made the boy his own, was proud of his cleverness, would have him go to college, and left him all he had. There was no talk of Martin being anything but a Joliffe till Oxford puffed him up, and then he got this crank, and spent the rest of his life trying to find out who his father was. It was a forty-years’ wandering in the wilderness; he found this clue and that, and thought at last he had climbed Pisgah and could see the promised land. But he had to be content with the sight, or mirage I suppose it was, and died before he tasted the milk and honey.”

      “What was his connection with the nebuly coat? What made him think he was a Blandamer?”

      “Oh, I can’t go into that now,” the organist said; “I have told you too much, perhaps, already. You won’t let Miss Joliffe guess I have said anything, will you? She is Michael Joliffe’s own child—his only child—but she loved her half-brother dearly, and doesn’t like his cranks being talked about. Of course, the Cullerne wags had many a tale to tell of him, and when he came back, greyer each time and wilder-looking, from his wanderings, they called him ‘Old Nebuly,’ and the boys would make their bow in the streets, and say ‘Good-morning, Lord Blandamer.’ You’ll hear stories enough about him, and it was a bitter thing for his poor sister to bear, to see her brother a butt and laughing-stock, all the time that he was frittering away her savings. But it’s all over now, and Martin’s gone where they don’t wear nebuly coats.”