I’m afraid that I was a very ignorant boy. Perhaps not so in the ordinary sense of the word ignorant, for I had been fairly educated, and besides being pretty forward with my Latin, I could have written a letter or carried on a decent conversation in French; but, living in a secluded part of the country, I was very ignorant about the matters of ordinary every-day life, and I found it hard to understand how it was that Mr Blakeford, the lawyer, should be allowed to do just as he pleased in our old house.
The terrible misfortunes that had come, one after the other, had seemed to stun me and take away my breath. One day we seemed to be all so happy together, and I was sitting reading to my invalid mother in the pleasant old room opening on to the lawn. And the next day I was holding my throbbing head in my bedroom, after crying till it ached as if about to split, while I tried again and again to believe that it was all some dreadful dream, that my father had been carried home dead, killed in an instant by a fall from his horse, and that my mother lay beside him in the darkened room, silent too in death, for the shock had been too great for her delicate frame.
All that followed seemed to me dreamlike and strange – the darkened house and the rustling sounds of the black dresses that were made for the servants; my own new black things and stiff black hat; the terrible stillness of the place, and the awe with which I used to gaze at the closed room upstairs; and lastly that dreadful darkest day when I was the companion of Mr Blakeford and an old uncle in the mourning coach which followed the hearse with its nodding plumes to the grave.
I wanted to be alone and sit and think, but those about me seemed to consider that it was their duty to try and comfort and cheer me in my affliction, when all they did was to worry me and make me more wretched than before. It troubled me, too, terribly, that people should think me callous and indifferent to my loss, when all the time my heart was throbbing, and I felt a sensation of desolation and misery that I tried my best to conceal.
I remember going on tiptoe towards the dining-room on the day of the funeral, dreading lest my new boots should make a noise, when, as I reached the mat at the door, I stopped short, for my uncle was saying roughly —
“Don’t seem to trouble him much.”
“No, of course not,” Mr Blakeford replied. “What can you expect? I dare say he’s thinking more of his new black clothes.”
I had to clench my hands and bite my lips to keep from bursting out into a passionate fit of weeping, and I stood there for some minutes, unable to move, as I heard all that was said.
“Well, it’s no business of mine,” said my uncle. “It was his own money.”
“Yes,” said Mr Blakeford, with a sigh. “I was his legal adviser, but he would not be advised.”
“Never would,” said my uncle. “All he thought of was catching butterflies and drying weeds in blotting-paper.”
“But he was a good man,” said Mr Blakeford.
“Bah! good? What, to plunge into speculation and ruin himself?”
“We are none of us perfect,” said Mr Blakeford.
“Who wants to be?” said my uncle. “Well, I wash my hands of the whole affair. You know where I am if you want me. He was never like a brother to me. I will do as you said.”
“Yes,” said Mr Blakeford, “of course. You may trust me, Mr Grace.”
“I don’t trust anybody,” said my uncle, just as one of the servants, coming along the passage, said kindly —
“Why don’t you go in, Master Tony?”
There was a sudden movement of a chair, and I saw Mr Blakeford come forward and look at me curiously as I entered in a shamefaced way. Then he exchanged glances with my uncle, and my heart sank as I felt that they both suspected me of having been listening on the mat.
It was only at nights when I was alone in my own room that I could cry as a half heart-broken boy of eleven can cry in the desolation of his heart. My uncle had gone away the day after the funeral, telling me shortly that I must be a man now, and mind what Mr Blakeford said; and Mr Blakeford had looked at me in his peculiar way, tightening his thin lips, and smiling strangely, but saying nothing.
I knew that some arrangements had been made about my future, but though I was the person most concerned, every one seemed to consider that I was only a boy, and no explanation was vouchsafed. So it was, then, that I rambled about the house and grounds almost alone, growing more and more thoughtful and wretched as the change oppressed me like a weight of lead.
As the days went on, though, and the first passionate feelings of grief gave way to a strange sense of despair, I began to take notice of what was passing around me. It seemed as if the servants in their new black dresses looked upon the change as a holiday. They had frequent visitors; there seemed to be always a kind of lunch in progress, and as I sat alone of an evening I could often hear laughter from the kitchen; and at last, unable to bear the solitude, I used to go into the study and sit down and stare at Mr Rowle.
It was not cheerful, even there, for Mr Rowle used to sit and stare at me. We rarely spoke. Still, it was company, and the old man did sometimes give me a nod, and say, in allusion to a burst of mirth from the kitchen —
“They’re keeping the game alive, young un?”
Chapter Two.
Mr Rowle and I Become Friends
As I have said, in the days that followed, I used, when feeling very lonely, to go and sit and stare at Mr Rowle and he at me. Few words were spoken, but quite a friendship sprang up between us, and by degrees I learned what his position really was – that of man in possession, placed there by Mr Blakeford.
Mr Rowle was not an active busy man, but somehow he had a way with him that seemed to take charge of everything in the house. I verily believe that in a few moments he made a mental inventory of the contents of the room, and he quite offended Jane one morning by ringing the blue-room bell.
I was with him at the time, and after the ring had been twice repeated, Jane came bouncing upstairs, and, quite ignoring the presence of Mr Rowle, addressed herself sharply to me.
“I’m surprised at you, Master Antony, ringing the bells like that, knowing how busy I am. Whatever do you want?”
“It was me as rung, Jane, my dear,” said Mr Rowle. “What’s gone of those two little chayney candlesticks off this table?”
“I’ve took ’em down to clean, Master Antony, if you must know,” said Jane, addressing me spitefully. “You don’t suppose as I’ve took them away?”
She looked at me angrily, while I felt as if I had been accusing her unjustly.
“Oh no, my dear, of course not!” said Mr Rowle. “You’re too highly respectable a girl to do such a thing; but where I was once there was a housemaid as stole a little bronze pen-tray out of the study, and she was found out about it, and given into custody of the police, and got three months.”
Jane looked fiercely at him and whisked out of the room.
“Please, Mr Rowle,” I said, “the little pen-tray that mamma gave poor papa has – has – ”
I could say no more, for the recollection of that birthday present, towards which I had subscribed some of my pocket-money, caused such a choking sensation that I was ready to break down once more, and I had to strive hard to keep it back.
“Gone out of the study, young un? Oh no, not it. You fancy as it has.”
“I’m sure it has gone, sir,” I said eagerly. “I was looking for it yesterday.”
“Ah, well, you’ll see when we get downstairs,” said Mr Rowle, and he went on from room to room, always sending a few puffs of smoke into each, till we went downstairs, meeting Jane on the way, looking very hot and indignant as she carried up the little china candlesticks, and sure enough, to my great surprise, on entering the study, there was the pen-tray in its familiar place.
“There;