His father had once been engaged in mercantile business, but his health failed, his business suffered, and he found it best—indeed, necessary—to settle up his affairs altogether and live in quiet retirement in Norton.
The expenses of living there were small, but his resources were small, also, and he lived just long enough to exhaust them.
It was this thought that gave him solicitude on his death-bed, for he left a boy of fifteen wholly unprovided for.
Let us go back a week and record what passed at the last interview between Philip and his father before the latter passed into the state of unconsciousness which preceded death.
“Are you in pain, father?” asked Philip, with earnest sympathy, as his father lay outstretched on the bed, his face overspread by the deathly pallor which was the harbinger of dissolution.
“Not of the body, Philip,” said Mr. Gray. “That is spared me, but I own that my mind is ill at ease.”
“Do you mind telling me why, father!”
“No; for it relates to you, my son, or, rather, to your future. When my affairs are settled, I fear there will be nothing left for your support. I shall leave you penniless.”
“If that is all, father, don’t let that trouble you.”
“I am afraid, Philip, you don’t realize what it is to be thrown upon the cold charities of the world.”