Chapter XXIV: Brothers

"Is that you, Jake?"

Outraged pride and sullen submission combined in the utterance of the question. The room was in complete darkness.

"Yes, it's me," said Jake.

He went forward into the darkness, feeling out before him.

"Why don't you strike a match?" said Bunny.

Jake found the bed and stood beside it. "Going to behave yourself, my son?" he asked.

There was silence from the bed, a dogged, uncompromising silence.

Jake stooped. Feeling over the boy's body, he began to undo his bonds.

"Say, Bunny, I reckoned you were a bigger man than this," he said.

Bunny remained silent, stiff and unyielding.

Jake completed his task and stood up. "If you're wanting to tell me to go to blazes, you may as well say it as not," he said.

"I'm not," growled Bunny. "But you've no right to treat me like a dog. I'm not used to it."

"A damn' good hiding is what you're most in need of," said Jake, in his soft, imperturbable voice. "You'd learn a lot that way. There's too much pride in your family, my son, and it ain't always the proper sort of pride either. It's likely to lead you into difficulties." He paused a moment; then bent again, his hand moving lightly upwards over the bedclothes. "Say, Bunny, climb down a bit; climb down!" he said. "I can't get within a mile of you on that high horse of yours."

There was a hint of coaxing in the words and action to which Bunny taken by surprise made instant almost involuntary response. With a swift, passionate movement, he caught the persuasive hand.

"Old chap--" he said, and stopped, breaking off short.

There followed a few, pulsing seconds, during which Jake's hand was pressed hard against a burning face. Then, very suddenly Bunny cast his pride wholly from him and burst into choking tears.

"Little feller! Little feller!" said Jake, and gathered him into arms that were full of motherly comfort.

He sat down on the bed, so holding him, rocking him a little, soothing him in the darkness that seemed to banish all barriers and link them in a brotherhood more close than either had anticipated before that moment.

Bunny's surrender was complete and unconditional. He clung fast to Jake with whispered words of penitence. "I'm always like that when I feel bad. I've had that filthy neuralgia in my back ever since tea. It makes me want to bite and kick. I didn't mean to be a beast to you, Jake. I take back all I said. You'll forget it--say you'll forget it!"

"I have forgotten it," Jake assured him. "Don't you fret now!"

Bunny burrowed into his shoulder. "You're so beastly good to a fellow. But you're right--quite right--about the hiding. I only wish you could give me one. It's just that I want."

"No--no!" Jake said tenderly. "I wouldn't lay a finger on you."

"You would if I were sound," protested Bunny, strangling a sob.

But Jake shook his head. "No, sonny, no! I was wrong. It ain't the treatment for a soft-hearted little chap like you. I've been used to dealing with roughs, and I'm rough myself. I try not to be; but there it is. You've sensed it, and so has Maud. But--I say it now, and I'll stick to it--I'll never use violence to you as long as I live."

"Jake, old boy, that's rot!--I--I like you to smack my head sometimes," blurted forth Bunny, still in accents of distress.

Jake laughed a little. "Well, maybe, I'll do that now and then, seeing we're brothers." He was rubbing the head with a caressing hand as he spoke. "You know, I've got a sort of liking for you, little pard; and I want you to grow up a man."

"How can I?" said Bunny very bitterly.

"It ain't the body that makes the man," said Jake gently. "Physical conditions don't matter two cents. Reckon if you were to be a cripple all your days, you could still be a great man. But, please God, you won't be a cripple always. My friend Capper--you've heard me talk of him--he's coming over from the States, and maybe he'll be able to put you right. We'll give him the chance, eh, Bunny? We'll get him anyway to come along and look at you."

Bunny's frail body had begun to tremble. He held very fast to Jake's arm. "Oh, Jake!" he whispered.

"Guess it's a big proposition," said Jake. "But you've got spunk for anything. I'm going to send him a letter right away. Maud views the matter as we do. She says, the sooner the better."

"Whatever made her say that?" said Bunny curiously.

"She was thinking of you," said Jake. "She thinks more of you than of anyone else in the world. Reckon you owe her a mighty lot, Bunny. Ever thought of that?"

"Reckon she'd be rather lost without me," said Bunny perversely.

"Not for long," said Jake.

"She would," persisted Bunny. "If I were to get well, she'd be glad for my sake, but she'd be utterly miserable for her own."

He spoke with the shrewdness that years of passive observation had wrought in him--a shrewdness that somehow lifted him above the plane of ordinary unthinking boyhood. Almost instinctively Jake responded to it. He spoke to Bunny as though he had been a man.

"She won't be miserable when she has children of her own to look after," he said. "That's what she wants, and what I want too. They'll make all the difference in the world to her."

Bunny was momentarily surprised. This was a possibility that had not occurred to him. "Oh, that's the idea, is it?" he said.

"What's the matter with it?" said Jake.

"I don't know," said Bunny. "Somehow I don't seem to realize that she actually is married to you."

"She doesn't realize it either," said Jake rather shortly.

"That's because you don't make love to her," said Bunny wisely. "Why, you don't even kiss her, do you?"

"I haven't." Jake's voice was an odd compound of humour and dissatisfaction.

"Why on earth don't you?" said Bunny.

"You'd better ask her," said Jake somewhat grimly.

"Aren't you friends?" There was quick sympathy in the boy's voice. "I know Maud is a bit difficult to get on with. She was very odd even to Charlie this evening when he wanted us to go to the races with him. Why shouldn't we have gone, Jake? She knew I wanted to, and she used to like it herself."

An echo of resentment sounded in the question. Bunny had plainly not wholly buried his grievance.

"I'll take you one day, my son, when you're stronger," Jake promised. "And Maud too--if she's keen. I didn't know she was. She didn't tell me so."

"She doesn't tell you everything, does she?" said Bunny, giving him a squeeze.

"Reckon she's half afraid of me," said Jake. "What reason did she give for not going with Lord Saltash?"

"Oh, none. She just said we couldn't. Charlie wasn't best pleased about it. Charlie can be rather hot stuff when he isn't pleased."

Jake uttered a dry laugh. "Did he make himself unpleasant?"

"No. But he cleared out almost at once. You see, he always used to be able to twist Maud round his little finger--till she broke with him."

Jake's arms suddenly grew tense about the slim boyish body he held. "Say, young feller! Will you tell me something?" he said.

"Of course! If I can," said Bunny.

"Just this--only this," said Jake, his voice sunk to a whisper. "Have you any real reason--any good reason--for believing that Maud still cares for this old flame of hers? Honestly now! Was there any truth in what you said downstairs?"

"Oh, Jake, I'm beastly sorry I said it!" Bunny turned a distressed face upwards, pressing his hot forehead hard against Jake's neck.

"All right. You needn't answer." Jake's words seemed to come from between his teeth. "It's what I suspected all along. It won't make any difference in the end, so you needn't be upset about it. I always knew I was taking chances."

"She'd soon forget him if you started making love to her," Bunny assured him. "Why don't you, Jake? Why don't you?"

"Ah! Why don't I?" Jake uttered again his dry, somewhat scoffing laugh. "P'raps I'm waiting for someone else to make the running. But don't you bother your head about that, my son! I shall get home on the straight--or perish in the attempt."

He stooped, and laid Bunny gently down on the pillows.

"I'll light your lamp now and leave you. Maud will be up with your supper directly."

But Bunny clung to his arm. "You'll come back, Jake? You--you'll sleep with me?"

"Oh, yes, I'll sleep with you--if Maud will let me." Jake's voice held ironic humour. "But it's a sore point, I warn you."

"Of course she'll let you. She can't help herself. She knows I'm ten times more comfortable with you to look after me. It's jolly decent of you, Jake." Bunny hugged the arm a little closer. "Sure you've forgiven me for being such a beast?"

"Shucks, lad! Don't think any more about it! We're all beasts sometimes, though we don't all take the trouble to be sorry afterwards." Jake stooped abruptly and kissed his forehead--a token received by Bunny with a satisfaction as great as his surprise. "Be decent to Maud, little chap!" he said. "Remember, nearly the whole of her life has been one big sacrifice to you!"

"Oh, I know she's a brick," Bunny said quickly. "I'm awfully fond of her of course. You--I suppose you're fond of her too, Jake?"

He put the question with slight hesitation, not wholly certain as to whether Jake would welcome it, yet oddly desirous of a reply.

Jake had withdrawn his arm. He stood by the bed in the darkness, only dimly visible to Bunny--a square, powerful figure, of rock-like strength, endued with the hard endurance that springs in the wilderness and is the natural heritage of beasts and savage tribes, coming but seldom upon the sons of adoption.

He did not speak at all for several seconds, and Bunny began to wonder if he had given offence. Then suddenly he stretched out his arms with a wide, fierce gesture as of one who would seize and hold in the face of any odds.

"My God!" he said, and in his voice was a deep throb as of a force that rose unfettered from the very heart of the man. "I--worship her!"

In the awed silence that followed the words, his arms fell. He stood a second or two as one in a dream striving to grip afresh the realities of life. Then, quite calmly he turned aside and crossed the room to light the lamp.

Bunny, watching him, marvelled that the kindling flame revealed only the resolute face and steady eyes of the man he knew. For it seemed to him that another man had spoken in the darkness.