It spoke volumes for his innate sense of politeness. Sir Geoffry remembered that he had possessed the same when a child.
“Have you heard what papa has done?” asked Arthur, putting the question generally. “It has been in all the newspapers, and he is full colonel now. Did you read it, Sir Geoffry?”
“Yes, I read it, Arthur.”
“And the Queen’s going to thank papa when he comes to England, and to make him Sir Richard. Everybody says so. Dobbs thinks papa will be made general before he dies.”
Dobbs was the blacksmith. They smiled at this. Not at the possibility for Colonel Layne, but at Dobbs.
“And, with it all, Aunt Mary does not want me to be a soldier!” went on the boy in rather an aggrieved tone. “Richard’s enough, she says. Dick gets on well at King’s College: he is to go to Woolwich next. I don’t see the peacock!”
They had neared the house, but the gay plumaged bird, for which Arthur retained his full admiration, was nowhere in sight. Servants came forward and led the horses away. Mr. Duffham went on to see Lady Rachel: Arthur was taken into the garden-parlour by Sir Geoffry.
“And so you would like to be a soldier:” he said, holding the boy before him, and looking down at his bright, happy face.
“Oh, I should: very much. If papa says I’m not to be—or mamma—or Aunt Mary—if they should tell me ‘No, no, you shall not,’ why, it would be at an end, and I’d try and like something else.”
“Listen, Arthur,” said Sir Geoffry, in a low, earnest tone. “What you are to be, and what you are not to be, lie alike in the will of God. He will direct you aright, no doubt, when the time of choice shall come——”