‘After all, it is a bit of a place,’ said Ulick; ‘and the office parlour is not just a paradise! Then ‘tis all on such a narrow scale, too little to absorb one, and too much to let one do anything else; I see how larger transactions might be engrossing, but this is mere cramping and worrying; I know I could do better for my family in the end than by what I can screw out of my salary now; and if it is no longer to give my poor mother a sense of expiation, as she calls it, why, then, the cage-door is open.’
His eyes glittered, and Sophy exclaimed, ‘Yes; and now the training is over, it has made you fitter to fly.’
‘It has,’ he said; ‘and I’m thankful for it. Without being here, I would never have learnt application—nor some better things, I hope.’
They scarcely saw him again till after the funeral, when late in the day he came into the drawing-room, and saying that his aunt was pretty well and composed, he knelt down on the floor with the little Awk, and silently built up a tower with her wooden bricks. His hand trembled nervously at first, but gradually steadied as the elevation became critical; and a smile of interest lighted his face as he became absorbed in raising the structure to the last brick, holding back the eager child with one hand lest she should overthrow it. Completion, triumph, a shock, a downfall!
‘Well,’ cried the elder Albinia, unable to submit to the suspense.
‘Telle est la vie,’ answered Ulick, smiling sadly as he passed his hand over his brow.
‘It’s too bad of him,’ broke out Mrs. Kendal.
‘I thought you were prepared,’ said Sophy, severely, disappointed to see him so much discomposed.
‘How should I be prepared,’ said he, petulantly, ‘for the whole concern, house, and bank, and all the rest of it?’
‘Left to you?’ was the cry.