"This is Mr. Canby, Christopher, Master Jeremiah's new tutor."
"Yes, sir, you'll find Miss Redwood and Master Jerry in the library."
We went up the steps while the aged butler (who had lived with John Benham) followed with the valises, and were ushered into the library, where my pupil and his governess awaited us.
I am a little reluctant to admit at this time that my earliest impression of the subject of these memoirs was disappointing. Perhaps the dead man's encomiums had raised my hopes. Perhaps the barriers which hedged in this most exclusive of youngsters had increased his importance in my thoughts. What I saw was a boy of ten, well grown for his years, who ambled forward rather sheepishly and gave me a moist and rather flabby hand to shake.
He was painfully embarrassed. If I had been an ogre and Jerry the youth allotted for his repast, he could not have shown more distress. He was distinctly nursery-bred and, of course, unused to visitors, but he managed a smile, and I saw that he was making the best of a bad job. After the preliminaries of introduction, amid which Mr. Radford, the steward of the estate, appeared, I managed to get the boy aside.
"I feel a good deal like the Minotaur, Jerry. Did you ever hear of the Minotaur?"
He hadn't, and so I told him the story. "But I'm not going to eat you," I laughed.
I had broken the ice, for a smile, a genuine joyous smile, broke slowly and then flowed in generous ripples across his face.
"You're different, aren't you?" he said presently, his brown eyes now gravely appraising me.
"How different, Jerry?" I asked.