The child broke off suddenly, looking wistfully at his mother.
“You know I love you just the same,” he said, simply; “but the Squire is so lonely, and he has been so very good to me. They have all died and left him alone, and he says I have been like one of them—the child of his old age—I don’t know how to go away and leave him.”
Bertie’s lip quivered, and the tears stood in Mrs. Arbuthnot’s eyes, as she stooped to kiss him.
“My dear little boy,” she said, very tenderly, “I think you and I both feel alike about this. I did not tell you what Uncle Fred and I have said, because I wanted to learn your own feelings first. We do not want you to do anything to darken the life of one who has been like a father to you when you were so sadly in need of love and care. My darling, we think that your place is still here with the Squire, if you are content to stay. We shall see you every day; you will always be our little boy too. You will have two homes instead of one, and loving parents in both. But, as you say yourself, I have Uncle Fred to take care of me now, and be my companion always, whilst he has nobody but his little Bertie.”
Bertie kissed his mother’s hand again, and looked at her with loving eyes.
“You always understand, mother dear. Some day I will tell you all about things—about the Squire, I mean, and how they all died,—Tom and Charley, and Mary and Violet, and even little Donald,—and then you will understand better still. But please may I see him now? I think he has been looking rather sad these last few days. He has not talked to me quite in the same way, quite as if I belonged to him now. I should like to see him and tell him what we have arranged. Please may I see him all by myself?”
Bertie’s quick instincts had not deceived him. These last few days had been rather sad ones for the good Squire. He had been trying to resign himself to the loss of the child, feeling that it would be ungenerous to take advantage of the mother’s concession, made in a moment of deep emotion, and being of opinion that the child would himself be unwilling to remain beneath his roof when the mother he evidently so truly loved had a home to offer him herself.
Trouble had so far weighed upon the Squire’s mind, that he was inclined to expect more, and to prepare himself for adverse fortune. It seemed more natural to him now to lose than to gain, and he had no real hope of keeping the child beneath his own roof much longer. Some compromise might possibly be made for the present; but his sense of ownership, of fatherhood, would be gone, and the sense of warmth and light that had slowly crept into his lonely life would be as slowly extinguished.
When he came and stood beside Bertie’s couch,—the child was up and dressed for the first time to-day,—his face showed some faint reflection of the trouble of his mind, and Bertie’s quick eyes detected it instantly.
The little boy got up and pushed him gently towards Mrs. Pritchard’s great easy chair that stood beside the fire. It was May, but the cold east winds were blowing, and made fires very pleasant companions, especially when the light began to wane in the sky and the dusk crept into the corners of the room, as it was doing now.