“Yes, but is it likely a woman of that class would keep her word?”
“Griselda, you will be shocked with me for saying so, but the young woman who came here on the day our father died was a lady.”
“Katharine! she served in a shop.”
“No matter, she was a lady; her word to her would be sacred. I don’t believe she is dead. I am sure she will come here on the 5th of May.”
[CHAPTER XXII.—RIGHT IS RIGHT.]
When Rupert Lovel and his boy left the gloomy lodgings where Rachel’s and Kitty’s mother was spending a few days, they went home in absolute silence. The minds of both were so absorbed that they did not care to speak. Young Rupert was a precocious lad, old and manly beyond his years. Little Phil scarcely exaggerated when he drew glowing pictures of this fine lad. The boy was naturally brave, naturally strong, and all the circumstances of his bringing-up had fostered these qualities. His had been no easy, bread-and-butter existence. He had scarcely known poverty, for his father had been well off almost from his birth; but he had often come in contact with danger, and latterly sorrow had met him. He loved his mother passionately; even now he could scarcely speak of her without a perceptible faltering in his voice, without a dimness softening the light of his bright eagle eyes. Rupert at fifteen was in all respects some years older than an English boy of the same age. It would have struck any parent or guardian as rather ridiculous to send this active, clever, well-informed lad to school. The fact was, he had been to Nature’s school to some purpose, and had learned deeply from this most wonderful of all teachers.
When Rupert and his father reached the hotel in Jermyn Street where they were staying, the boy looked the man full in the face and broke the silence with these words:
“Now, father, is it worth it?”
“Is it worth what, my son?”
“You know, father. After hearing that lady talk I don’t want Avonsyde.”