And that remaineth still:
Not he that repeateth the name,
But he that doeth the will!
—Longfellow.
Frank Unett had spoken truly—it was impossible that he should live to see his child grow up; yet he made a hard fight with death, and, thanks to the tender nursing of his wife and the rare skill of his friend, Dr. Bridstock Harford, lived for some time after that December day when Hilary’s future had been spoken of.
It always seemed to Gabriel that their childhood ended at his funeral, for then it was that they learnt of the separation in store for them. Hilary was to go with her mother for a long visit to some of her father’s kinsfolk, and by the time she returned his own schooldays would have begun, Dr. Harford having decided to send him to Gloucester with Sir Robert Harley’s son Ned, a boy some eighteen months his junior.
Very sorrowfully did the playmates take leave of each other, and Gabriel moped about sadly, understanding for the first time what it meant to be an only child.
It was on one of the days when he was missing his playfellow most that Hereford was thrown into a state of unwonted excitement by a visitation from Archbishop Laud. Gabriel found great relief and satisfaction in the crowded streets and the gala aspect of the city with its flags and decorations. But he was disappointed to find that the Archbishop himself was a little hard-featured, cold-eyed man in whom he could feel no interest at all.
“There was nothing to see but clothes,” he said afterwards to his father. “Except for them his Grace was just a common little man, much like Dickon, the tailor, in Eign street.”
Dr. Harford laughed. “I do not think his Grace is a large man either in body or mind,” he said. “But there is no doubt he is a good man, Gabriel.”