"Kind is as kind does after all, and I expect the old gentleman is not as crusty as he looks."
Charlie had handed to Mr. Tufton a letter which his mother had given him, and when he returned from a ramble through the streets, he found that gentleman sitting by the fire, with lights upon a small table beside him. Upon this Mrs. Marryat's letter lay open.
"So you have soon become tired of the streets of London, Grandnephew!" he said.
"There is not much to see, sir. The lamps do not burn very brightly, and the fog is coming on. I thought that, if it grew thicker, I might lose my way, and in that case I might not have been in at the hour you named for supper."
"Humph!" the other gentleman grunted. "So your mother has taught you to be punctual to meals. But, no; boys' appetites teach them to be punctual then, if never at any other time.
"And why, sir?" he asked severely, "Did my niece not write to me before?"
"I don't know, sir," Charlie said. "I suppose she did not like—that is, she didn't think—that is—"
"Think, sir! Like, sir!" said his uncle. "What right had she either to think or to like? Her duty clearly was to have made me acquainted, at once, with all the circumstances. I suppose I had a right to say whether I approved of my grandnieces going tramping about the world as governesses, or not. It isn't because a woman chooses, by her folly, to separate herself from her family, that they are to be deprived of their rights in a matter of this kind. Eh, sir, what do you say to that?" and Mr. Tufton looked very angry, indeed.
"I don't know, sir," Charlie said. "I have never thought the matter over."
"Why, sir, suppose she had made you a tinker, sir, and you turned out a thief, as likely as not you would have done, and you'd been hung, sir, what then? Am I to have such discredit as this brought upon me, without my having any option in the matter?"