"So they may appear, but they deceive me--as everything else does. Bless my soul! they are gone!"
He referred to his spectacles; his spectacle-case was empty.
"Shall I send for them?" asked Gideon Rowe.
"No, no; they would not be found, perhaps. I must do without my eyes to-night. The clock is right, eh? What does it mark now?"
"Thirteen minutes to seven."
"Thank you. As I was saying, there are some things that do not change. The Silver Flagon, for instance--there is no change in that."
"There is no change in it from my first remembrance of it. I should like it never to change. I used to wish that it might be carried on in exactly the same way, and in the same old fashion, as it has been carried on during this last hundred years. But it is in the nature of things to change, and my wish will not be fulfilled. Had other things turned out as I hoped, my desire would almost certainly have been frustrated by the new scheme for the branch railway that is being talked about. I am told that its course is designed immediately in the rear of the garden." He looked regretfully towards the folding windows, through the transparent curtains of which the western sky could be seen reddening in the light of the declining sun. "One might fancy one's self almost out of the world here; but if the railway scheme be carried out, good-bye to the charm of perfect peacefulness which rests upon the Silver Flagon. Good-bye, perhaps, to the Silver Flagon itself. The thought hurts me, but not as much as it would have done had my dear boy been alive."
"Rowe!" exclaimed Mr. Weston, in a sympathising, wondering tone, "you have had news of Philip, then?"
"He is dead, poor lad! You know how I loved the boy, and how my heart was bound up in him. I cherished the hope that, when his wild fit was over, he would come and take my place here. The dear lad was working to bring home a hatful of money to repay me for what I had done for him. As though I needed repaying! Shame drove him away, and kept him away while he was poor. He did not know his father's heart."
"How did the news come?" asked Mr. Weston softly.