And Bertie’s face would put on a grave, far-away look as he would answer,—
“I want Him to do just what He thinks best. He’s given me such a lot of things that I know He’s not forgotten me; and I’d like to leave it all to Him.”
“Maybe that’s best,” David would say. “I do be glad He’s made thee so happy.”
The Squire, who took an interest in everything and everybody that made a part of Bertie’s life, began to take notice of David now, and found out from his mother that he did not seem physically adapted for the seafaring life that would naturally fall to his lot.
He loved his home near the sea, and the sea itself, but he had no taste for the career of fisherman or sailor, and when the Squire asked the good dame if she would like to see him employed about the garden or farm connected with the Manor House her eyes brightened with pleasure, and she answered, that there was nothing in all the world he would like so well; it would keep him at home, and yet near Master Bertie.
Every one round and about Arlingham knew the substantial advantage of entering the Squire’s service. None of his laborers or workpeople were ever “turned off” when work was slack, none were dismissed when old age robbed them of their former powers. If they behaved themselves well, they might stay upon the place from early youth to hoary old age. Such had been the traditions of the house for many generations, and many were the men who had grown grey-headed in the service of the Squires of Arlingham, and who had learned to love and revere the masters who were always just, yet always generous, and who looked after them in sickness and in health with a quiet, kindly sovereignty that never became tyrannical and never degenerated into undue familiarity. The master was always the master, and yet each one of his servants, even if they feared him a little, knew that he was at heart the staunchest friend they need wish to have, so long as they earned his good-will by quiet attention to duty.
So David’s mother was deeply delighted at the prospect of seeing her son enter the Squire’s service, knowing well that an opening in life would be thus secured which would afford him a means of livelihood for as long as he cared to remain.
The next step was to speak to the lad himself and discover the bent of his tastes. It would be hard to say which of the boys was most pleased at the prospect thus held out—David or Bertie. The Squire was a good deal amused by the animation of his little adopted son, and was pleased at David’s visible gratitude and eagerness. A few questions soon elicited the fact that the farm attracted him more than the garden. He had a great love for all live animals, and had been more or less used to cows and pigs all his life, having often been employed by one or another of the village folks to look after their beasts when they themselves were too busy to do so.
So David was promoted to be a cow-boy at the Manor Farm, and greatly did both he and Bertie rejoice in the new dignity thus conferred upon him. He had a certain number of cows to milk and look after, and the favorite Alderney was amongst these. Bertie began now to haunt the farm like a little “Squire born,” as the men used to say among themselves: “For all the world like poor Master Tom,” the elder laborers would add. And they all looked kindly upon the little boy, who on his side always spoke nicely and courteously to every one of the people, and they sometimes said amongst themselves that if Master Bertie succeeded in his day as Squire of Arlingham, there would be no fear but that the old traditions would be kept up. He was not the sort to let them die out.
So Bertie went about very much as if he had been born and bred upon the place. He learned to milk the cows and to understand their ways. He had his own chickens and turkeys, and was fattening one of the latter with untiring assiduity for the Squire’s Christmas dinner. He could talk quite gravely and knowingly about the price of corn or the quality of hay, and modelled himself in all things upon the Squire in a way that often provoked a smile.