“Fiddle-de-dee,” said Kenelm.
CHAPTER VI.
AS Kenelm regained the street dignified by the edifice of the Temperance Hotel, a figure, dressed picturesquely in a Spanish cloak, brushed hurriedly by him, but not so fast as to be unrecognized as the tragedian. “Hem!” muttered Kenelm, “I don’t think there is much triumph in that face. I suspect he has been scolded.”
The boy—if Kenelm’s travelling companion is still to be so designated—was leaning against the mantelpiece as Kenelm re-entered the dining-room. There was an air of profound dejection about the boy’s listless attitude and in the drooping tearless eyes.
“My dear child,” said Kenelm, in the softest tones of his plaintive voice, “do not honour me with any confidence that may be painful. But let me hope that you have dismissed forever all thoughts of going on the stage.”
“Yes,” was the scarce audible answer.
“And now only remains the question, ‘What is to be done?’”
“I am sure I don’t know, and I don’t care.”
“Then you leave it to me to know and to care; and assuming for the moment as a fact that which is one of the greatest lies in this mendacious world—namely, that all men are brothers—you will consider me as an elder brother, who will counsel and control you as he would an imprudent young—sister. I see very well how it is. Somehow or other you, having first admired Mr. Compton as Romeo or Richard III., made his acquaintance as Mr. Compton. He allowed you to believe him a single man. In a romantic moment you escaped from your home, with the design of adopting the profession of the stage and of becoming Mrs. Compton.”