Mrs. Darrell, therefore, could do nothing but submit; in the hope that for once her son might consent to be governed by his interests, rather than by those erratic impulses which had led him in the reckless and riotous days of his early youth.
She pleaded with him; entreating him to be prudent and thoughtful for the future.
“You have suffered so much from poverty, Launcelot,” she urged, “that surely you will lose no opportunity of improving your position. Look back, my boy; remember that bitter time in which you were lost to me, led away by low and vicious companions, and only appealing to me when you found yourself in debt and difficulty. Think of your Indian life, and the years you have wasted,—you who are so clever and accomplished, and who ought to have been so fortunate. Oh, Launcelot, if you knew what a bitter thing it is to a mother to see her idolized child waste every opportunity of winning the advancement which should be his by right,—yes, by right, Launcelot, by the right of your talents. I never reproached you, my boy, for coming home to me penniless. Were you to return to me twenty times, as you came back that night, you would always find the same welcome, the same affection. My love for you will never change, my darling, till I go to my grave. But I suffer very bitterly when I think of your wasted youth. You must be rich, Launcelot; you cannot afford to be poor. There are some men to whom poverty seems a spur that drives them on to greatness; but it has clogged your footsteps, and held you back from the fame you might have won.”
“Egad, so it has, mother,” the young man answered, bitterly; “a shabby coat paralyzes a man’s arm, to my mind, and it’s not very easy for a fellow to hold his head very high when the nap’s all worn off his hat. But I don’t mean to sit down to a life of idleness, I can tell you, mother. I shall turn painter. You know I’ve got on with my painting pretty well during the last few years.”
“I’m glad of that, my dear boy. You had plenty of time to devote to your painting, then?”
“Plenty of time; oh, yes, I was pretty well off for that matter.”
“Then you were not so hard worked in India?”
“Not always. That depended upon circumstances,” the young man answered, indifferently. “Yes, mother, I shall turn painter, and try and make a fortune out of my brush.”
Mrs. Darrell sighed. She wished to see her son made rich by a quicker road than the slow and toilsome pathway by which an artist reaches fortune.
“If you could make a wealthy marriage, Launcelot,” she said, “you might afford to devote yourself to art, without having to endure the torturing anxieties which must be suffered by a man who has only his profession to depend upon. I wouldn’t for the world wish you to sell yourself for money, for I know the wretchedness of a really mercenary marriage; but if——”