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ON HIS WAY THROUGH THE WORLD 205
(as Philip told me in describing the scene), and made for the bell.
But when the butler came, Philip only asked for coffee ; and Hunt,
uttering a mad oath or two, staggered out of the room after the
servant. Brice said he had been drinking before he came. He was
often so. And Phil blessed his stars that he had not assaulted his
father's guest then and there, under his own roof-tree.
He went out into the air. He gasped and cooled himself under
the stars. He soothed his feelings by his customary consolation of
tobacco. He remembered that Ridley in Thornhaugh Street held
a divan that night ; and jumped into a cab, and drove to his old
friend.
The maid of the house, who came to the door as the cab was
driving away, stopped it ; and as Phil entered the passage, he found
the Little Sister and his father talking together in the hall. The
Doctor's broad hat shaded his face from the hall-lamp, which was
burning with an extra brightness, but Mrs. Brandon's was very
pale, and she had been crying.
She gave a little scream when she saw Phil. " Ah ! is it you,
dear ?" she said. She ran up to him : seized both his hands : clung
to him, and sobbed a thousand hot tears on his hand. " I never
will. Oh, never, never, never ! " she murmured.
The Doctor's broad chest heaved as with a great sigh of relief.
He looked at the woman and at his son with a strange smile ;—not
a sweet smile.
"God bless you, Caroline," he said, in his pompous, rather
theatrical way.
" Good night, sir," said Mrs. Brandon, still clinging to Philip's
hand, and making the Doctor a little humble curtsey. And when
he was gone, again she kissed Philip's hand, and dropped her tears
on it, and said, " Never, my dear ; no, never, never !"