Launcelot Darrell came straight to his uncle’s chair.
“You remember Launcelot, Uncle Maurice,” Mrs. Darrell said, entreatingly; “I’m sure you remember Launcelot.”
The two maiden sisters watched their uncle’s face with eager and jealous glances. It seemed as if the thick clouds were clearing away from the old man’s memory, for a faint light kindled in his faded eyes.
“Launcelot!” he said; “yes, I remember Launcelot. In India, poor lad, in India.”
“He went to India, dear uncle, and he has been away some years. You remember how unfortunate he was: the indigo planter to whom he was to have gone failed before he got to Calcutta, so that my poor boy could not even deliver the one letter of introduction which he took with him to a strange country. He was thrown upon his own resources, therefore, and had to get a living as he could. The climate never agreed with him, Uncle Maurice, and he was altogether very unhappy. He stayed in India as long as he could endure a life that was utterly unsuited to him; and then flung everything up for the sake of returning to England. You must not be angry with my poor boy, dear Uncle Maurice.”
The old man seemed to have brightened up a good deal by this time. He nodded perpetually as his niece talked to him, but there was a look of intelligence in his face now.
“I am not angry with him,” he said; “he was free to go; or free to return. I did the best I could for him; but of course he was free to choose his own career, and is so still. I don’t expect him to defer to me.”
Mrs. Darrell turned pale. This speech appeared to express a renunciation of all interest in her son. She would almost rather that her uncle had been angry and indignant at the young man’s return.
“But Launcelot wishes to please you in all he does, dear uncle,” pleaded the widow. “He will be very, very sorry if he has offended you.”
“He is very good,” the old man answered; “he has not offended me. He is quite free, quite free to act for himself. I did the best I could for him—I did the best; but he is perfectly free.”