“There is no reason why he should be embarrassed. I am not his judge. But I must see him,” Gervase said. They spent a disturbed and anxious night, so disturbed by the strange discovery, so startled by the circumstances, that neither slept much. And in the morning, notwithstanding Madeline’s opposition, Gervase set out to see the lost father, who had thus reversed all natural circumstances. Hillhead looked brighter than ever in the morning sunshine. The lake lay at the foot of the knoll, like a sheet of silver. Two or three tiny children were playing upon the lawn. As Gervase approached the door, the master of the house came out with a newspaper in his hand and a cigar. He sat down in a wicker chair upon the lawn. He cast a glance upon the lovely landscape and the playing children. The air of a man entirely at his ease, under his own vine and his own fig-tree, was in every movement. Gervase’s step, in his agitation, was very quick and light. Apparently it was not till he was quite near that it was heard by the comfortable paterfamilias with his newspaper. Then one of the children, a little girl of four or five, startled by the sight of the stranger, ran and stood by her father’s knee. “What is it?” Gervase heard him say. And then he looked up from behind the newspaper, and the father and son met. Mr Burton was evidently much startled. He rose hastily from his chair, dropping his paper. A curious tremor seemed to come over his solid well-set-up figure, that of a vigorous man of sixty or so. Men do not blush easily at that age; but there came a wave of hot colour over his face. He seemed to hesitate a moment, then—“Why, Gervase, how have you managed to find me out at the end of the world?” he said, with a nervous attempt at a laugh. Gervase saw, agitated as he himself was, the hurried glance at the children, which made his father look like a prodigal discovered.
He explained hurriedly that it was mere chance which had brought him here, and with great embarrassment, that he had tried every means of discovering his father’s whereabouts for years, but in vain.
“That is strange,” Mr Burton said. He had, in the meantime, reassured himself by seeing that the embarrassment was fully more great on the part of Gervase than on his own. “That is strange: for I have attempted no concealment. I have been living here, as you may have discovered, ever since I—left London.”
“Yes,” said Gervase, “we have heard. I saw you last night, sir, coming home—though too far off to be more than startled by your walk and figure, which I felt I recognised—but Madeline met you in the road.”
“Madeline! To be sure, you are married! I have to congratulate you, Gervase.”
“And I,” said the young man, “have to thank you, father. But for the money you sent me so generously—so opportunely——”
“The money I sent you!”
“That ten thousand pounds——”
“Ten thousand pounds! You must be dreaming. I have not ten thousand pence—more than I require for myself.”
“Then it was not from you?”