CHAPTER II.
ONE MORE HOLIDAY.
The inevitable morning came, but the letter did not.
Harding was first incredulous, then when a light flashed upon him, he was at once amused and indignant.
"So! I kept you waiting till the latest day, and you are returning the compliment. I am given to understand that you can take your time as well as I? That's fair enough, no doubt, only it seems rather a small sort of revenge, and, as things have turned out, it's a nuisance. What is to be done now? Shall I wait another day for my instructions, or shall I go up to town at once? I told him to write here, but, after all, what is there to say, except, 'Be at the office on such a day?' Shall I go, or stay?"
He tossed up, not ill-pleased to decide his uncle's affairs so airily. The coin decreed that he should stay.
"It's just as well," he said to himself. "I don't want to seem impatient if he isn't."
But the additional day of idleness proved very burdensome. He fancied that the Mitchelhurst gossips watched his every movement; he felt himself in a false position; he shut himself up in his little sitting-room and asked for books. Mrs. Simmonds brought him all she had, but she looked upon reading as a penitential occupation for Sundays, and periods of affliction, and the volumes were well suited for the purpose. Harding thrust them aside. The local paper was nearly a week old, but he read every word of it.
"There'll be a new one to-morrow, sir," said his landlady, delighted to see that he enjoyed it so much.
"Thank you, Mrs. Simmonds, but I shall be far enough away by this time to-morrow," the young man replied.