“So that’s what you look like?” With a quick movement he reached for a photograph in a frame. Peer caught a glimpse of his father in uniform. The schoolmaster lifted his spectacles, stared at the picture, then let down his spectacles again and fell to scrutinising Peer’s face. There was a silence for a while, and then he said: “Ah, indeed—I see—h’m.” Then turning to Peer:
“Well, my lad, it was very sudden—your benefactor’s end—most unexpected. He is to be buried to-day.”
“Benefactor?” thought Peer. “Why doesn’t he say ‘your father’?”
The schoolmaster was gazing at the window. “He informed me some time ago of—h’m—of all the—all the benefits he had conferred on you—h’m! And he begged me to keep an eye on you myself in case anything happened to him. And now”—the spectacles swung round towards Peer—“now you are starting out in life by yourself, hey?”
“Yes,” said Peer, shifting a little in his seat.
“You will have to decide now what walk in life you are to—er—devote yourself to.”
“Yes,” said Peer again, sitting up straighter.
“You would perhaps like to be a fisherman—like the good people you’ve been brought up among?”
“No.” Peer shook his head disdainfully. Was this man trying to make a fool of him?
“Some trade, then, perhaps?”