“Oh! is that your tone?” whispered the other, still lower. “Thank your stars for it, you never met a man more ready to humor your whim.”
“What's the 'Member' plotting?” said Agincourt, coming up between them. “Do let me into the plan.”
“It is something he wishes to speak to me about tomorrow at eleven o'clock,” said Layton, with a significant look at O'Shea, “and which is a matter strictly between ourselves.”
“All right,” said Agincourt, turning back to the table again, while O'Shea, with a nod of assent, left the room.
“We must set to work vigorously to-morrow, Henry,” said Layton, laying his hand on the boy's shoulder. “You have fallen into idle ways, and the fault is all my own. For both our sakes, then, let us amend it.”
“Whatever you like, Alfred,” said the boy, turning on him a look of real affection; “only never blame yourself if you don't make a genius of me. I was always a stupid dog!”
“You are a true-hearted English boy,” muttered Layton, half to himself, “and well deserved to have fallen into more careful hands than mine. Promise me, however, all your efforts to repair the past.”
“That I will,” said he, grasping the other's hand, and shaking it in token of his pledge. “But I still think,” said he, in a slightly broken voice, “they might have made a sailor of me; they 'll never make a scholar!”
“We must get away; we must leave this,” said Layton, speaking half to himself.
“I 'm sorry for it,” replied the boy. “I like the old villa, and I like Sir William and Charley, and the girls too. Ay, and I like that trout stream under the alders, and that jolly bit of grass land where we have just put up the hurdles. I say, Layton,” added he, with a sigh, “I wonder when shall we be as happy as we have been here?”