"Come up, my boy! Felix, go before us with the light to the room prepared for Mr. Worth," he said to a mulatto boy who was waiting in the hall.
Felix immediately led the way upstairs to a large back room, whose windows overlooked the star-lit, dew-spangled garden, and which Ishmael at once recognized as the happy schoolroom of his boyhood, now transformed into his bedroom. He welcomed the old familiar walls with all his heart; he was glad to be in them.
Mr. Brudenell himself took care that Ishmael had everything he was likely to want, and then he left him.
When Ishmael had changed his dress he went below to the drawing room, where he found his father waiting. The late dinner was immediately served.
Old Jovial, who on account of his age and infirmity had been left to vegetate on the estate, waited on the table.
He stole wistful glances at the strange young man who was his master's guest, and who somehow or other reminded him of somebody whom he felt he ought to remember, but knew he could not.
At length Ishmael, attracted by his covert regards, looked at him in return, and in spite of his bowed and shrunken form and thinned and whitened hair, recognized the old friend of his boyhood, and exclaimed, as he offered his hand:
"Why, Jovial, it is never you!"
"Mr. Ishmael, sir, it's never you!" returned the old man with a grin of joyful recognition.
They shook hands then and there.