Enhances the reader's opinion of Mr. Palethorpe and Miss Sowersoft still higher and higher; and describes an interview which the latter had with Mr. Longstaff respecting our hero.
THE benevolent Mr. Longstaff lost no time after his return home in acquainting Mrs. Clink with the great and innumerable advantages of the situation at Snitterton Lodge, which he had been endeavouring to procure for her son. Nor did he fail very strongly to impress upon her mind how necessary it would be, when Miss Sowersoft should arrive, for her to avoid stickling much about the terms on which Colin was to go; because, if by any mishap she should chance to offend that lady, and thus break off the negotiation, an opportunity would slip through her fingers, which, it was highly probable, no concatenation of fortunate circumstances would ever again throw in her way.
Mrs. Clink's decision not being required before the following morning, she passed the night almost sleeplessly in considering the affair under every point of view that her anxious imagination could suggest. Colin himself, like most other boys, true to the earliest propensity of our nature, preferred a life passed in fields and woods, amongst horses, dogs, and cattle, to that of a dull shop behind a counter; or of any tedious and sickly mechanical trade. So far that was good. What he himself approved, he was most likely to succeed in; and with success in field-craft, he might eventually become a considerable farmer, or raise himself, like Mr. Longstaff, to the stewardship of some large estate. Visions, never to be realised, now rose in vivid distinctness before the mental eye of Mistress Clink. The far-off greatness of her son as a man of business passed in shining glory across the field of her telescope. But when again she reflected that every penny of his fortune remained to be gathered by his own fingers, the glass dropped from her eye,—all became again dark; the very speck of light she had so magnified, disappeared. But sleep came to wrap up all doubts; and she woke on the morrow, resolved that Colin should thus for the first time be launched upon the stream of life.
Early in the afternoon a horse stopped at Mrs. Clink's door, bearing upon his back a very well-fed, self-satisfied, easy-looking man, about forty years of age; and behind him, on a rusty pillion at least three generations old, a lady in black silk gown and bonnet, of no beautiful aspect, and who had passed apparently about eight-and-forty years in this sublunary world. Mistress Clink was at no loss to conjecture at once that in this couple she beheld the future master and mistress of her son Colin. Nor can it be said she was mistaken: the truth being that, after the departure of Mr. Longstaff from Snitterton Lodge on the preceding day, it had occurred to Miss Sowersoft that, instead of taking the chaise-cart, as had been intended, it would be far pleasanter to take the longest-backed horse on the premises, and ride on a pillion behind Palethorpe. In this manner, then, they reached Bramleigh.
While Mr. Palethorpe went down to the alehouse to put up his horse, and refresh himself with anything to be found there which he thought he could relish, Miss Sowersoft was conducted into the house by Fanny; and in a few minutes the desired interview between her and Mistress Clink took place.
Colin was soon after called in to be looked at.
“A nice boy!” observed Miss Sowersoft,—“a fine boy, indeed! Dear! how tall he is of his age! Come here, my boy,” and she drew him towards her, and fixed him between her knees while she stroked his hair over his forehead, and finished off with her hand at the tip of his nose. “And how should you like, my boy, to live with me, and ride on horses, and make hay, and gather up corn in harvest-time, and keep sheep and poultry, and live on all the fat of the land, as we do at Snitterton Lodge?”
“Very much,” replied Colin; “I should have some rare fun there.”
“Rare fun, would you?” repeated Miss Sowersoft, laughing. “Well, that is finely said. We shall see about that, my boy,—we shall see. Then you would like to go back with us, should you?”
“Oh, yes; I 'll go as soon as Fanny has finished my shirts, thank you.”