"Poor old governor," he thought to himself, "he has been watching for the coming of the train long before it had passed Wimbleton, I'll be sworn."
Then, in another moment, he was with his father and, their greeting over, was observing the look upon his face, which told as plainly as though written words had been stamped upon it of the doom that was about to fall.
"What is it?" he said a little later, almost in an awestruck manner. Awestruck because, when we stand in the presence of those whose sentence we know to be pronounced beyond appeal there falls upon us a solemnity almost as great as that which we experience when we gaze upon the dead. "What is it, father?"
"The heart," Mr. Ritherdon answered. "Valvular disease. Sir Josias Smith says. However, do not let us talk about it. There is so much else to be discussed. Tell me of the cruise in the Squadron, where you went to, what you saw----"
"But--your letter! Your hopes that I should soon be back. You have not forgotten? The--the--something--you have to tell me.
"No," Mr. Ritherdon answered. "I have not forgotten. Heaven help me! it has to be told. Yet--yet not now. Let us enjoy the first few hours together pleasantly. Do not ask to hear it now."
And Julian, looking at him, saw those signs which, when another's heart is no longer in its normal state, most of us have observed: the lips whitening for a moment, the left hand raised as though about to be pressed to the side, the dead white of the complexion.
"If," he said, "it pains you to tell me anything of the past, why--why--tell it at all? Is it worth while? Your life can contain little that must necessarily be revealed and--even though it should do so--why reveal it?"
"I must," his father answered, "I must tell you. Oh!" he exclaimed, "oh! if at the last it should turn you against me--make you--despise--hate--"
"No! No! never think that," Julian replied quickly, "never think that. What! Turn against you! A difference between you and me! It is impossible."