"Yes," I said, "I give him the whip, Gump," and luckily the old man could not distinguish between the past and present tenses of the verb, so that I was spared a lie. The little thief ran away with the whip in his hand, and it was long before the incident was recalled to me.
So I returned again to my books, and to the silent but no less active antagonism toward my aunt. Yet, I would not paint her treatment of me in too gloomy colors. Doubtless I gave her much just cause for offense, for I had grown into a surly and quick-tempered boy, with raw places ever open to her touch. That she loved her children I know well, and her love for them was at the bottom of her dislike for me. I have learned long since that there is no heart wholly bad and selfish.
While my grandfather yet lived, I think she had some hope that something would happen to make me an outcast utterly, but after his death this hope vanished, and she sent for me one morning to come to her. I found her seated in the selfsame chair in which I had first seen him, and the table was still littered with papers and accounts.
"Good-morning, Thomas," she said politely enough, as I entered, and, as I returned her greeting, motioned me to a chair. She seemed to hesitate at a beginning, and in the moment of silence that followed, I saw that her face was growing thinner, and that her hair was streaked with gray.
"I have sent for you, Thomas," she said at last, "to find out what your intention is with regard to this estate. You know, of course, that your father forfeited it voluntarily, and that you have no moral claim to it. Still, the law might sustain your claim, should you choose to assert it."
"I shall not choose to assert it," I answered coldly, and as I spoke, her face was suffused with sudden joy. "I promised my father never to claim it,—never to take it unless it were offered to me openly and freely,—and I intend to keep my promise."
For a moment her emotion prevented her replying, and she pressed one hand against her breast as though to still the beating of her heart.
"Very well," she said at last. "Your resolution does credit to your honor, and I will see that you do not regret it. I will undertake the management of both estates until my son becomes of age. You shall have an ample allowance. Let me see; how old are you?"
"I am fifteen years old," I answered.
"And have about sounded the depths of Master Scott's learning, I suppose?" she asked, smiling, the first smile, I think, she had ever given me.