CHAPTER XXIV.
The few months slipped away and the birthday came, or at least the day that was always celebrated as such; for though neither Mrs. Ganderby nor any of the other people under the shadow of the old butternut-tree had the least idea when or where the record should have been made, the doctor called him just twelve when he first saw him, and insisted upon a birthday every year that same day in October.
Aleck went to the store an hour before time to catch him and have his talk out before people began to come in. But early as he was, Thorndyke was there before him, and a customer too; so Aleck retreated into the sheltered corner behind the desk to wait his opportunity. Thorndyke gave him a nod and a radiant look as he came in, for these birthdays were times when, for one day in the year, the “all but me” was forced to flee away; the doctor had always planned some excursion, and managed that he could bear it; and the little room, that had seemed such a paradise the first time he saw it, was gradually filling up with treasures, more and more beautiful every year, until the walls would hardly hold anything more. Uncle Ralph’s was missing this time, but all the rest were there, even to old Joan’s; and the flowers that had always come from Nelly since the very first, “went ahead,” as Aleck called it, of all that had ever come before. The doctor was in high spirits, and Thorndyke thought “the princess” had never been so bewitching in her gentle, lovely ways. He couldn’t say “All but me” this morning; he had almost forgotten it, and there was actually a bit of color in his cheeks, and the great eyes shone as Aleck had not seen them since that day he stood before the window so many years ago.
Aleck sat and watched him as he went about to fill the prescription waited for.
“Good for him!” he said to himself; “the boy looks gay this morning. But I declare I wish I didn’t remember how he looked that miserable day at the school. That thing between his shoulders was hardly worth noticing then; I wonder the boys saw it at all—and now! It seems as if it almost buried that splendid head and face of his, and I know the pain is always there by the patient, wistful look out of his eyes. And his step that flew down the street so that I couldn’t catch him that day! It never breaks now from that slow, noiseless way it has. Well, it’s no use thinking what might have been, and I suppose I should never have had him here if all had gone well. Will that man never be ready to go? Ah, there he is actually steering for the door!”
But at the same instant somebody else came in, only a little child, however, wanting something that would take but a moment. So Aleck possessed his soul in patience; there surely would not be any one else in, it was so early.
But what was the matter with Thorndyke?
The child stood innocently enough before the counter, but Thorndyke’s face was growing white, the glow was gone, and sharp lines coming in its place, and the thin fingers trembled so that it seemed as if the package never would be tied. But it was done at last, and Thorndyke handed it to the child with the same smile and the same gentle “Anything more?” that the customers had learned to expect. But when the door was shut, Aleck started. What was the matter? Thorndyke was leaning against the wall, his lips pressed tightly together, and the great veins showing blue and hard on his forehead.
“What is it, Thorndyke?” said Aleck, springing towards him.
Thorndyke covered his face with his fingers, and his whole frame quivered as Aleck had never seen it before, but as the doctor saw it once under the overhanging of the old rock.
“O Aleck, I cannot bear it! Didn’t you see? I can bear anything else. I can let a strong man look down at me, but that wondering, pitying look of a little child! That is the one thing I cannot bear! Oh, why must I always be a soldier? I am so tired, and I had almost forgotten I was one to-day!”
Aleck drew him quickly into the shelter of the desk, and got his arm round his neck.
“There, there, rest a little if you are so tired! you are the bravest little soldier in all the world, and the lightest weapons are the hardest to stand against sometimes. Is that the reason you always get out of the way when a child comes in? I noticed it, but I never knew. Why didn’t you tell me? Don’t, old fellow! don’t mind. I’ve got lots I want to say to you this morning, and I thought it should be such a happy day. If you only knew, if you only would believe how wonderful you are to every one! The doctor and Nelly would think they had nothing in the world to be proud of, if it weren’t for you; and you know what Uncle Ralph thought and everybody else is finding out. And as for fighting, you get victories every day where the strongest of us would go down.”
But Aleck had to wait awhile for his talk. The next customer that came in saw the queer little form going about just as usual, but Aleck knew it was no time for him, and waited till evening when he got Thorndyke by himself in his own room, the fire crackling and the room shining as if there had never been such a thing as a shadow in the world.
“Now, old fellow,” he began, after he had been going on merrily for a while, “I’ve got a little business proposal to make. I want you to buy me out.”
The great eyes opened in amazement.
“Buy you out, Aleck! What do you mean?”
“I mean exactly what I say,” and then Aleck told him all the sacrifice it had been to him to go into the store to begin with, how he had done it for Nellie’s sake and his uncle’s, and how he had gone steadily through the whole college course out of hours, as well as it was possible to do by himself.
“I had an idea, you see, of slipping off and leaving the coast to you, you were doing so splendidly and Uncle Ralph was so proud of you; but that night he talked to me about the partnership, I saw it would not do then. But now, why not? I know he thought I should always stay, but if he sees how things go among us at all, he sees what it would be to me to get away, and I know what he would say. We’ll never take the name down, old fellow, it shall be Halliday still, and I’ll hang about more or less till you have one more birthday, and when you are twenty-one, up goes ‘Halliday & Thorndyke,’ and I leave you to your own devices altogether.”
“But Aleck, where are you going? What do you want to do?”
“What do I want to do? I want to get my profession: what I have always wanted, and what my father wanted for me. He thought I should be a lawyer, I know, but I should never make one in the world; there is only one profession for me, and I am going to the headquarters you and I think most of. I’m going to study with Dr. Thorndyke. Why shouldn’t a man be a doctor if he wants to?”
“All but me!” The doctor had meant to make one of him, Thorndyke knew that very well. However that was neither here nor there. Aleck was going to leave him; that was all to be thought of now.
“But Aleck!” he cried, and then stopped himself. Aleck had sacrificed everything all these years, because his uncle wanted him; he should never know what the store and life would seem, when he hadn’t him at his side any longer!
“Only you know—why, Aleck, I can’t buy you out! you know very well what I have wouldn’t buy a corner of the store.”
“Well, put that in, if you’re not afraid to risk it, and you shall have the whole profits of the business from to-day onward; and if you manage the old concern as well as I know you can, you will own the whole of it before many years. Uncle Ralph would like it, I know, and I don’t see why we sha’n’t be jolly all around.”
“But Aleck!” said Thorndyke again, “I can’t do it! It would be just taking what belongs to you and putting it in my pocket. I never will do it in the world.”
“Well now, wait a minute,” said Aleck. “I haven’t finished my remarks about it. In the first place, there’s more than I know what to do with, without it, and in the second place, I owe it to you if there wasn’t, for you have made life in the store a different thing to me a thousand times over. Do you think I could ever have kept up heart if I hadn’t thought so much of your being there every day, or could ever have been patient through it all if I hadn’t seen such a little fighter at my side? So that’s settled so far, and now in the third place, I can’t desert the ship, unless you will take the whole command, and if you do you ought to have the whole profits. And in the fourth place,” and Aleck put his arm around his future partner’s neck again in a most unbusinesslike way, “in the fourth place, it’s all in the family, whatever you do and have, you dear, little old soldier? Don’t you know nobody could be closer to us all? Flesh and blood couldn’t bring it any nearer, and if we’re so proud of you now, what will it be by-and-by?”
Nobody could resist Aleck. It was all settled with the doctor and Thorndyke and everybody else, just as he would like it, and before they really knew what he was about, and Thorndyke very soon found himself really steering the ship, and Aleck only “hanging about more or less,” as he had said. A good deal “less,” Thorndyke thought, but it was better than losing him altogether, and he was determined he should never know how he missed him.