Harry roused himself at last, though, from his reverie as Lionel spoke.
“See you at dinner, I suppose, old fellow?”
“Are you going away? Anywhere in particular?”
“No—no—no!” was the reply. “May perhaps take the dog in the Park for a swim. Change for him, poor fellow!”
Harry hesitated, as if about to speak, and then they parted, taking different directions, but with thoughts centring at the same spot.
Involuntarily Harry glanced over his shoulder, when he had gone about fifty yards, and then he bit his lip with annoyance, for he had turned to encounter the sharp glance of Lionel, who was also looking back.
The young men then walked hastily on, each moody and frowning, and thinking that the possibility of their continuing to be dwellers beneath the same roof was hourly diminishing; for though Harry would gladly have stayed, there seemed to be a rock springing up between them, momentarily dividing more and more their course; and Harry began now to recapitulate the past, and to recollect that Lionel had during the last fortnight been growing more impatient of the slight control placed upon him.
“I shall be answerable to the father for the escapades of the son,” muttered Harry. “He trusts me, and I cannot shut my eyes to all the follies I shall be called upon to witness.”
He bit his lip again here, and asked himself if he were not becoming a hypocrite, and drawing too largely upon the future?
“We shall have to part,” he said, half aloud. “I can’t help it—we shall never get on together now. What a fool! what a weak idiot I am growing!” he exclaimed. “It will take very little to bring about a rupture now. Well, the sooner perhaps the better!” he added, moodily; and then he walked on and on, with the threatening rupture nearer at hand than he thought for, as, in spite of himself, he made his way back to Brownjohn Street, eliciting from D. Wragg the words uttered at the end of a previous chapter—