Ewan Roy in “Unfinished Business”

Ewan Roy

Good morning. [...] What sort of people would stop a brother speaking for the sake of a share price? [...] It is not for me to judge my brother. History will tell that story. I can just give you a couple of instances about him. You probably all know we came across, the first time, during the war, for our safety. But the engines of our ship let go... and the rest of the convoy sailed on without us, leaving us adrift. They told us... They told us children... that if we spoke, or coughed, or moved an inch, that the U-boats would catch the vibrations through the hull, and we would die in the drink, right there in the hold. Three nights and two days, we stayed quiet. A four-year-old and a five-and-a-half year old speaking with our eyes. So... there's a little sob story. [clears throat] And, uh, once we were over, our uncle, who was... so to speak, "a character," he, um... Well, they-- they had a little money, and they sent Logan away to a better school, and he hated it. [chuckles] He just hated it. He wasn't, uh... He wasn't well. He was sick. And he mewed, and he cried, and in the end, he got out and came home under his own steam. But when he got back, our little sister, she was a baby, but she was there by then... She, uh... He always believed that he brought home the polio with him, which took her. I don't even know if that's true. But our aunt and uncle certainly did nothing to disabuse him of that notion. They let it lie with him. I... loved him, I suppose. And I suppose some of you did too, in whatever way he would let us and we could manage. [sniffles] But I can't help but say... he has wrought the most terrible things. [...] He was a man who has, here and there, drawn in the edges of the world. Now and then, darkened the skies a little, closed men's hearts. Fed that dark flame in men, the hard, mean, hard, relenting flame that keeps their hearths warm while another grows cold, their grain stashed while another goes hungry. And even has the temerity to tell that hard... [chuckles] ...funny, yes, funny, but hard joke about the man in the cold. You can get a little high, a little mighty, when you're warm. Oh, yes, he-- he gave away a few million of his billions, but he was not a generous man. He was mean, and he made but a mean estimation of the world. And he fed a certain kind of meagerness in men. Perhaps he had to, because he had a meagerness about him... and maybe I do about me, too. I don't know. I try. I try. I don't know when... but some time, he decided not to try anymore. And it was a terrible shame. Godspeed, my brother. And God bless.