Tom muttered that he only wanted Harry to be fit to be seen by the fellows.
“The fellows are not such asses as you!” cried Hector. “You don’t deserve that he should come to see you. If my—”
There poor Hector broke off. If his own only brother had been walking beside him, how would he not have felt? They had reached their tutor’s house, and, opening his own door, he made an imploring sign to Harry to enter with him. On the table lay a letter from Margaret, and another which Harry had written to him from Auckland.
“Oh, Harry, you were with him,” he said; “tell me all about him.”
And he established himself, with his face hidden on the table, uttering nothing, except, “Go on,” whenever Harry’s voice failed in the narration. When something was said of “all for the best,” he burst out, “He might say so. I suppose one ought to think so. But is not it hard, when I had nobody but him? And there was Maplewood; and I might have been so happy there, with him and Margaret.”
“They say nothing could have made Margaret well,” said Harry.
“I don’t care; he would have married her all the same, and we should have made her so happy at Maplewood. I hate the place! I wish it were at Jericho!”
“You are captain of the ship now,” said Harry, “and you must make the best of it.”
“I can’t. It will never be home. Home is with Margaret, and the rest of them.”
“So Alan said he hoped you would make it; and you are just like one of us, you know.”