This eBook was produced by Pat Castevens
and David Widger
It was a beautiful summer afternoon when the coach set me down at myfather's gate. Mrs. Primmins herself ran out to welcome me; and I hadscarcely escaped from the warm clasp of her friendly hand before I wasin the arms of my mother.
As soon as that tenderest of parents was convinced that I was notfamished, seeing that I had dined two hours ago at Dr. Herman's, she ledme gently across the garden towards the arbor. "You will find yourfather so cheerful," said she, wiping away a tear. "His brother is withhim."
I stopped. His brother! Will the reader believe it? I had never heardthat he had a brother, so little were family affairs ever discussed inmy hearing.
"His brother!" said I. "Have I then an Uncle Caxton as well as an Uncle
Jack?"
"Yes, my love," said my mother. And then she added, "Your father and hewere not such good friends as they ought to have been, and the Captainhas been abroad. However, thank Heaven! they are now quite reconciled."
We had time for no more,—we were in the arbor. There, a table wasspread with wine and fruit,—the gentlemen were at their dessert; andthose gentlemen were my father, Uncle Jack, Mr. Squills, and—tall,lean, buttoned-to-the-chin—an erect, martial, majestic, and imposingpersonage, who seemed worthy of a place in my great ancestor's "Boke ofChivalrie."
All rose as I entered; but my poor father, who was always slow in hismovements, had the last of me. Uncle Jack had left the very powerfulimpression of his great seal-ring on my fingers; Mr. Squills had pattedme on the shoulder and pronounced me "wonderfully grown;" my new-foundrelative had with great dignity said, "Nephew, your hand, sir,—I amCaptain de Caxton;" and even the tame duck had taken her beak from herwing and rubbed it gently between my legs, which was her usual mode ofsalutation, before my father placed his pale hand on my forehead, andlooking at me for a moment with unutterable sweetness, said, "More andmore like your mother,—God bless you!"
A chair had been kept vacant for me between my father and his brother.I sat down in haste, and with a tingling color on my cheeks and a risingat my throat, so much had the unusual kindness of my father's greetingaffected me; and then there came over me a sense of my new position. Iwas no longer a schoolboy at home for his brief holiday: I had returnedto the shelter of the roof-tree to become myself one of its supports. Iwas at last a man, privileged to aid or solace those dear ones who hadministered, as yet without return, to me. That is a very strange crisisin our life when we come home for good. Home seems a different thing;before, one has been but a sort of guest after all, only welcomed andindulged, and little festivities held in honor of the released and happychild. But to come home for good,—to have done with school andboyhood,—is to be a guest, a child no more. It is to share theeveryday life of cares and duties; it is to enter into the confidencesof home. Is it not so? I could have buried my face in my hands andwept!
My father, with all his abstraction and all his simplicity, had a knacknow and then of penetrating at once to the heart. I verily believe heread all that was passing in mine as easily as if it had been Greek. Hestole his arm gently round my waist and whispered, "Hush!" Then,lifting his voice, he cried aloud, "Brother Roland, you must not letJack have the best of the argument."
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