‘I was afraid you wouldn’t like it, sir,’ said Paul ‘I’m not misliking it, lad,’ his father answered. ‘I’m not misliking it What’s your proposition, Paul?’
‘I don’t know, sir. I’ve formed no plans. I don’t know how to go about things. I’m stifling here.’
‘It’s natural,’ said Armstrong; ‘I’ve stifled here for twenty years, lad. But then,’ he added, with his own dry, wistful twinkle of a fleeting smile, ‘I was born to stifle. What’ll you do in the world, Paul, when ye get into it, if ye’re out of it here?’
‘I don’t know, sir. I shall try to do something.’
‘Ay!’ said Armstrong again; ‘ay, ay!’
His gray-blue eyes dreamed behind his grizzled brows, and Paul sat watching him. There was a touching something in the gray, bowed figure and the gray patience of his face. Paul seemed to see him alone, thus dreaming.
‘I won’t go, dad, unless you like.’
‘It’s best, Paul; it’s best.’
A knock sounded at the front-door, and Paul walked down the long narrow passage which lay alongside the sitting-room and the shop, and admitted the major part of the household. They had been to a tea-meeting and concert at Ebenezer, and they all trooped chattering into the big kitchen, bringing a smell of frost and night air in their raiment.
‘Mary,’ said Armstrong, at the first gap of silence, ‘Paul is going to London.’