Christian appeared on the threshold, and reeled back in delighted astonishment at beholding his master in the house at this unaccustomed hour.
"Now then, old friend," said Leo, filled with a strange tenderness; "won't those old pins of yours carry you any longer?"
And as Christian in his confusion stammer forth inarticulate sentences, Leo put a ten-mark piece into his hand.
"You have had to keep bad hours lately on my account. But in future, old man, you shall have your proper rest."
Christian wept tears of joy over his master's unlooked-for consideration, and shuffled away to superintend his supper.
The news he took to the kitchen soon ascended to the parlour, and the stir it caused in the house smacked somewhat of the prodigal's return. Doors were cautiously opened and shut, whispered conversations were held in the corridors, and now and then hesitating, hushed footsteps halted outside his room.
All this he heard and ground his teeth.
"Die, die, old boy!" cried a voice in his ears. "Die--die!"
Christian brought a tray groaning with good things, in the selection of which he could see that his mother had had a hand. He fell to, greedily. There was the favourite dish of his schoolboy days, of fried potatoes with jugged hare and baked slices of ham.
"Dear old girl," he thought; "this is her way of saying 'Stay with us.'" He laughed, but tears came into his eyes.