CHAPTER II.
ILLNESS IN THE FAMILY.
SICK of the women, to all of whom he made love, openly, to avoid being thought serious by any; weary of the specious show, which failed to bring him the forgetfulness he craved, Adam left the assemblage early and went to search out the beef-eaters, at their humble quarters.
Improvidents that they were, Pike and Halberd had soon dispersed the not inconsiderable sum of money which Adam had divided between them, since which time he had provided the pair with their lodgings, keep, clothing and amusements.
The night being fine and the air soon reviving the rover’s livelier moods of delight in sheer existence, he found himself loitering along, stopping to look in the windows of the scattered shops still open for the tag-ends of the day’s trading. It was only the little knick-knack shops, old curio dens and lesser establishments that still had their lights aglow, but it happened that these were the particular ones in which Adam took an interest.
He stopped before one of the dingiest for fifteen minutes, carefully scanning a considerable collection of violins which the window contained. At length his eye lighted, he muttered something half exclamatory and went into the shop at once. The dealer knew him and nodded delightedly, glad to have him again in his place, as he had fully expected when he placed the rare old fiddle which Rust had seen, in his window.
Adam bought the instrument with all the eagerness of the confirmed connoisseur and went his way contented.
When he came to the tavern where the beef-eaters made their abode, he found little Pike dangerously ill with pleurisy and thinking of shuffling off forlornly into his next existence.
The one thing which alone could transform Adam Rust into the cheerful fellow he had been before his veneer of cynicism came upon him, was illness in his family. He refused to let his beef-eaters think of dying. They were his tie to everything he still held dear.
He pulled off his coat and went to work on Pike, whose spirits he raised with songs, raillery and cheer, and whose fever he lowered with teas and bitter drinks, which he steeped himself, from various herbs and roots, the specific qualities of which he had known from the Indians.
The Court saw no more of the reckless Adam for a week. At the end of this time he had coaxed the faithful Pike to something like his former health again, when he announced his intention of going to Spain, to add to his growing collection of violins. He therefore said good-by to Sir William Phipps and went off with his beef-eaters both in charge.
Having learned that the Pyrenees afforded splendid possibilities for building up depleted health and strength, the rover domiciled himself and companions in a spot that was charmingly lonely. And William Phipps, when Adam’s first letter arrived, wondered vaguely what manner of violins his comrade was finding in the mountains.