Tales and Fantasies

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Роберт Стивенсон. Tales and Fantasies

THE MISADVENTURES OF JOHN NICHOLSON

CHAPTER I – IN WHICH JOHN SOWS THE WIND

CHAPTER II – IN WHICH JOHN REAPS THE WHIRLWIND

CHAPTER III – IN WHICH JOHN ENJOYS THE HARVEST HOME

CHAPTER IV – THE SECOND SOWING

CHAPTER V – THE PRODIGAL’S RETURN

CHAPTER VI – THE HOUSE AT MURRAYFIELD

CHAPTER VII – A TRAGI-COMEDY IN A CAB

CHAPTER VIII – SINGULAR INSTANCE OF THE UTILITY OF PASS-KEYS

CHAPTER IX – IN WHICH MR. NICHOLSON ACCEPTS THE PRINCIPLE OF AN ALLOWANCE

THE BODY-SNATCHER

THE STORY OF A LIE

CHAPTER I – INTRODUCES THE ADMIRAL

CHAPTER II – A LETTER TO THE PAPERS

CHAPTER III – IN THE ADMIRAL’S NAME

CHAPTER IV – ESTHER ON THE FILIAL RELATION

CHAPTER V – THE PRODIGAL FATHER MAKES HIS DEBUT AT HOME

CHAPTER VI – THE PRODIGAL FATHER GOES ON FROM STRENGTH TO STRENGTH

CHAPTER VII – THE ELOPEMENT

CHAPTER VIII – BATTLE ROYAL

CHAPTER IX – IN WHICH THE LIBERAL EDITOR RE-APPEARS AS ‘DEUS EX MACHINA’

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John Varey Nicholson was stupid; yet, stupider men than he are now sprawling in Parliament, and lauding themselves as the authors of their own distinction. He was of a fat habit, even from boyhood, and inclined to a cheerful and cursory reading of the face of life; and possibly this attitude of mind was the original cause of his misfortunes. Beyond this hint philosophy is silent on his career, and superstition steps in with the more ready explanation that he was detested of the gods.

His father – that iron gentleman – had long ago enthroned himself on the heights of the Disruption Principles. What these are (and in spite of their grim name they are quite innocent) no array of terms would render thinkable to the merely English intelligence; but to the Scot they often prove unctuously nourishing, and Mr. Nicholson found in them the milk of lions. About the period when the churches convene at Edinburgh in their annual assemblies, he was to be seen descending the Mound in the company of divers red-headed clergymen: these voluble, he only contributing oracular nods, brief negatives, and the austere spectacle of his stretched upper lip. The names of Candlish and Begg were frequent in these interviews, and occasionally the talk ran on the Residuary Establishment and the doings of one Lee. A stranger to the tight little theological kingdom of Scotland might have listened and gathered literally nothing. And Mr. Nicholson (who was not a dull man) knew this, and raged at it. He knew there was a vast world outside, to whom Disruption Principles were as the chatter of tree-top apes; the paper brought him chill whiffs from it; he had met Englishmen who had asked lightly if he did not belong to the Church of Scotland, and then had failed to be much interested by his elucidation of that nice point; it was an evil, wild, rebellious world, lying sunk in dozenedness, for nothing short of a Scots word will paint this Scotsman’s feelings. And when he entered into his own house in Randolph Crescent (south side), and shut the door behind him, his heart swelled with security. Here, at least, was a citadel impregnable by right-hand defections or left-hand extremes. Here was a family where prayers came at the same hour, where the Sabbath literature was unimpeachably selected, where the guest who should have leaned to any false opinion was instantly set down, and over which there reigned all week, and grew denser on Sundays, a silence that was agreeable to his ear, and a gloom that he found comfortable.

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He paused at that, for he saw his father wince at the picture like a man physically struck; and again there was silence.

‘I do not think,’ said Mr. Nicholson, at last, ‘that I am an ungenerous father. I have never grudged you money within reason, for any avowable purpose; you had just to come to me and speak. And now I find that you have forgotten all decency and all natural feeling, and actually pawned – pawned – your mother’s watch. You must have had some temptation; I will do you the justice to suppose it was a strong one. What did you want with this money?’

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