“Why, it's only half-past nine,” he said.
Captain Zelotes, who also had been looking at the watch, which was a very fine and very expensive one, smiled slightly. “Half-past nine some nights,” he said, “is equal to half-past twelve others. This is one of the some. There, there, son, you're so sleepy this minute that you've got a list to starboard. When you and I have that talk that's comin' to us we want to be shipshape and on an even keel. Rachel, light that lamp.”
The housekeeper brought in and lighted a small hand lamp. Mrs. Snow took it and led the way to the hall and the narrow, breakneck flight of stairs. Captain Zelotes laid a hand on his grandson's shoulder.
“Good-night, son,” he said quietly.
Albert looked into the gray eyes. Their expression was not unkindly, but there was, or he imagined there was, the same quizzical, sardonic twinkle. He resented that twinkle more than ever; it made him feel very young indeed, and correspondingly obstinate. Something of that obstinacy showed in his own eyes as he returned his grandfather's look.
“Good-night—sir,” he said, and for the life of him he could not resist hesitating before adding the “sir.” As he climbed the steep stairs he fancied he heard a short sniff or chuckle—he was not certain which—from the big man in the dining-room.
His bedroom was a good-sized room; that is, it would have been of good size if the person who designed it had known what the term “square” meant. Apparently he did not, and had built the apartment on the hit-or-miss, higglety-pigglety pattern, with unexpected alcoves cut into the walls and closets and chimneys built out from them. There were three windows, a big bed, an old-fashioned bureau, a chest of drawers, a washstand, and several old-fashioned chairs. Mrs. Snow put the lamp upon the bureau. She watched him anxiously as he looked about the room.
“Do—do you like it?” she asked.
Albert replied that he guessed he did. Perhaps there was not too much certainty in his tone. He had never before seen a room like it.
“Oh, I hope you will like it! It was your mother's room, Albert. She slept here from the time she was seven until—until she went away.”