‘Grandmamma,’ he said, coming forward to the sofa, ‘I don’t want to seem wiser than you, or as if I knew better; but why should you be so afraid to trust me? I have never done anything to make you afraid. I don’t think I want pleasure or anything that is wrong. I will try to do my duty either at Liverpool or anywhere else. Don’t, please, think that I shall forget everything you have taught me, and all that I have been brought up to, the moment I go away.’
Both the old people had their eyes fixed on him as he spoke, and then they looked at each other across him, with one of those looks which he had so often caught in the passing, looks which it had always been hard to understand. Whatever it was, their eyes spoke to each other, not to him, with a sort of troubled commentary between them on what he said. Grandfather shook his head slightly in answer to his wife’s look, and he cleared his throat as if for something he wanted, but did not know how, to say—but in the end it was she who spoke.
‘Oh, John, it is not that, my dear. We do trust you, both grandfather and I. It isn’t that. I’m always of a tremble when I see an innocent boy go out into the world. Oh, yes, I allow I am, John: and for you, because you’re so precious, most of all; but it’s not that—oh, no, it’s not that.’
‘What is it, then? What is there so dreadful about Liverpool?’
That look passed between them again—but this time there was a warning in the husband’s eyes. He turned round in his chair towards where John stood.
‘Grandmamma was always one of the nervous ones,’ he said, with a faint little laugh, ‘and the particular thing about Liverpool is that we once lived near it, and knew a great deal of what went on there. And there were some dreadful things happened—one above all. Oh, you need not be afraid, my dear. I’m not going to disturb the boy’s mind with any tales. But that’s how it is, John. We’ve seen such things happen under our very eyes.’
‘That is no reason, grandfather,’ said John, very gravely, ‘that anything bad should happen to me.’
‘Have I not been saying so? The best thing is to shut your ears to all idle tales. Don’t believe half you hear, and never go inquiring into trouble that is past. If you make up your mind to it, and never forget your duty, and keep steady—why, Liverpool is just the same as any other place.’
‘Not to us—not to anyone connected with us,’ Mrs. Sandford said.
It was all very strange to John. He could not think why they should distrust him, why they should have so little faith. Keep steady! That was a very low level of duty; he said to himself that he hoped he would do better than that. Any poor workman, or poor fellow without education or advantage of training, disgraced himself if he did not keep steady. How much more was required of one like himself! He had not time, however, to express these sentiments, for that was the night on which Mrs. Sandford had one of her attacks. She had never been in the way of having attacks as so many people have. But on that evening she was very ill, and John had to run for the doctor, and for medicines, and was kept perpetually in movement, not to say that he was in deep anxiety, altogether discouraged by the sight of her suffering, and jumping at once, as is usual to inexperience, to the awful idea of death. He did not know how hard that is of coming, and how many lingering preliminaries there are to go through. He thought that the dread presence might push through all human defences at once, as he does sometimes, and do his work in a moment. And he was awe-stricken, overwhelmed with terrible suspense. She was very ill all night, but in the morning began to get better.