“Well, there's enough about it,” said he, pacing the room with hasty strides. “What is that you were saying the other day about a Mr. Elphinstone,—that he was an old friend of my father's, and that they had chummed together long ago?”
“All these scrawls that you see there,” said she, pointing to the table, “have been attempts to write to him, Tony. I was trying to ask him to give you some sort of place somewhere.”
“The very thing I want, mother,” said he, with a half-bitter laugh,—“some sort of place somewhere.”
“And,” continued she, “I was pondering whether it might not be as well to see if Sir Arthur Lyle would n't write to some of his friends in power—”
“Why should we ask him? What has he to do with it?” broke he in, hastily. “I 'm not the son of an old steward or family coachman, that I want to go about with a black pocket-book stuffed with recommendatory letters. Write simply and fearlessly to this great man,—I don't know his rank,—and say whose son I am. Leave me to tell him the rest.”
“My dear Tony, you little know how such people are overwhelmed with such-like applications, and what slight chance there is that you will be distinguished from the rest.”
“At all events, I shall not have the humiliation of a patron. If he will do anything for me, it will be for the sake of my father's memory, and I need not be ashamed of that.”
“What shall I write, then?” And she took up her pen.
“Sir—I suppose he is 'Sir;' or is he 'My Lord'?”
“No. His name is Sir Harry Elphinstone.”