'A pretty circle of portraits truly! The principal of them thieves and gutter children! Andrew Meadow, it is incomprehensible to me. But your mind is set upon them evidently. Can anything I say move you from your resolution?'
'Nothing, sir.'
'Then here we part,' he said sternly and bitterly. 'As you cannot be moved from your resolution, I cannot be moved from mine. Not one shilling of my money shall you ever receive. I have striven hard for your good, and you reject me for these and such as these!'
He tapped the list scornfully, and rose. I understood from his action that I was dismissed. I knew it would be useless to attempt to soften him; he was a man of inflexible resolution.
'You need not trouble yourself,' he said, 'to call upon me again, unless I send for you. Goodnight.'
'Before I go, sir,' I said, very sad at heart, 'let me say how truly grateful I am to you for your past kindness to me. I shall hold you in my heart and mind with thankfulness and gratitude until my dying day.'
Then I walked sadly out of the peaceful garden towards the City, where lay my labour of love.
Two matters must be mentioned before I close this chapter.
The first is that before I acquainted Mr. Fairhaven with the decision I had arrived at, I endeavoured again to ascertain from what motive he had educated and befriended me when I was left an orphan. He refused distinctly to give me any explanation.
The next is that the hundred pounds a year he had hitherto given me to spend among my poor was stopped from that day. This grieved me exceedingly. I think I had never fully understood the power of money until then.