"A man!" He laughed bitterly. "Yes," he continued, "a man first, then a conceited puppy with a moustache and ridiculous clothes; then a long-legged lout of a boy, with a pimply face that blushes when the girls pass by; then a little good-for-nothing devil at school; then a fat, sweetmeat-eating child in a straw hat and knickerbockers; then a small, red-cheeked beast in short frocks; then a limp, putty-faced, indiarubber-sucking, howling fragment in long frocks; then--then--My God! It's terrible."
He hid his old face and cried. I noticed the blue veins that used to cover the backs of his hands in a net-work, like the railway lines at Clapham Junction, were dwindling. The shiny skin was filling out; the muscles were developing once more.
"Terrible indeed, dear grandpapa; but I will never, never, leave you."
He brushed away his tears and stood erect.
"You may do what you please. And now I'll tell you what I'm going to do. No more crying over spilt milk, anyhow. I've got eight years left, and I'm going to use 'em. I'm a man without a future--at least without a future I can make or mar. Everything's settled, but I'm free for eight years. We've got five hundred a year; that means a principal of fifteen thousand pounds. I shall leave you five thousand, and spend the other ten thousand during my lifetime."
"Grandpapa!"
"Yes, I'm going to enjoy myself. It isn't as much money as I should like, but my tastes are fairly simple. I shall keep the bulk of the coin until three years hence. Then I shall be fifty. From that time, for the next three years, until I'm twenty, I shall paint the town red. Then, from twenty downwards, when I shall begin to shrink very rapidly, you may look after me again, if you're still alive."
"Thank you, grandpapa, but I shan't be. Such a programme as you are arranging would certainly kill me. I'm getting an old woman now. I couldn't stand it, I couldn't see you dragging an honoured name in the dust. Oh, think what this is you propose to do! What does your conscience say? What would my father, your eldest son, have said?"
"My conscience!" he cried, "a pretty sweet thing in consciences I must have! If my conscience couldn't keep me out of this hole I should think he had mistaken his vocation. You wait, that's all. I'll pay him back; I'll give him something to do presently! I'll keep him busy. I guess he'll be about the most over-worked conscience, even in London, before long."
It was in this bitter and irreligious way that grandpapa had now taken to talk. He picked up all the modern slang, and waited with almost fiendish impatience for his strength to reach a point when he would be able to go out once more into the wicked world. But, of course, the instincts and habits of old age were still to some extent upon him. He continued to read the political articles in the papers, and give vent to old-fashioned reflections. He was a Tory, left high and dry--a man who even yet declared that the Reform Bill ought never to have been passed.