“Ah!” cried the boy, laughing, “I wish you had seen Alfred's face on the day he received our first quarter's remittance, and read out: 'You may drag on me like a mouse, if you please,' which was intended to be, 'draw upon me to a like amount, if you please;' and it was three weeks before we could make that out! But let me go on—where was I? Oh, at 'guidance.' 'Recent information has, however, shown me that nothing could have been more unfortunate than our choice of this young man, his father being one of the most dangerous individuals known to the police, a man familiar with the lowest haunts of crime, a notorious swindler, and a libeller by profession. In the letter which I send off by this day's post to your tutor I have enclosed one from his father to myself. It is not very likely that he will show it to you, as it contains the most insolent demands for an increase of salary—“as some slight, though inadequate, compensation for an office unbecoming my son's rank, insulting to his abilities, and even damaging to his acquirements.” I give you this in his own choice language, but there is much more in the same strain. The man, it would appear, has just come out of a lunatic asylum, to which place his intemperate habits had brought him; and I may mention that his first act of gratitude to the benevolent individual who had undertaken the whole cost of his maintenance there was to assault him in the open street, and give him a most savage beating. Captain Hone or Holmes—a distinguished officer, as I am told—is still confined to his room from the consequences.'”
“How very dreadful!” said Mrs. Morris calmly. “Shocking treatment! for a distinguished officer too!”
“Dreadful fellow he must be,” said the boy. “What a rare fright he must have given my old guardian! But the end of it all is, I 'm to leave Alfred, and go back to England at once. I wish I was going to sea again; I wish I was off thousands of miles away, and not to come home for years. To part with the kind, good fellow, that was like a brother to me, this way,—how can I do it? And do you perceive, he has n't one word to say against Alfred? It's only that he has the misfortune of this terrible father. And, after all, might not that be any one's lot? You might have a father you couldn't help being ashamed of.”
“Of course,” said she; “I can fancy such a case easily enough.”
“I know it will nearly kill poor Alfred; he 'll not be able to bear it. He's as proud as he is clever, and he'll not endure the tone of the Earl's letter. Who knows what he 'll do? Can you guess?”
“'Not in the least. I imagine that he 'll submit as patiently as he can, and look out for another situation.”
“Ah, there you don't know him!” broke in the boy: “he can't endure this kind of thing. He only consented to take me because his health was breaking up from hard reading; he wanted rest and a change of climate. At first he refused altogether, and only gave way when some of his college dons over-persuaded him.”
She smiled a half-assent, but said nothing.
“Then there's another point,” said he, suddenly: “I'm sure his Lordship has not been very measured in the terms of his letter to him. I can just fancy the tone of it; and I don't know how poor Alfred is to bear that.”
“My dear boy, you'll learn one of these days—and the knowledge will come not the less soon from your being a Peer—that all the world is either forbearing or overbearing. You must be wolf or lamb: there's no help for it.”