“I would get a gun, or a sword; but first,” said Nello, calming down, “I would tell him to go away, because I should not wish to kill him. I have seen people fighting with guns and swords—have you?”
Here Randolph, being obliged to own himself inferior, fell back upon what was right, as he ought to have done before.
“Fighting is very wrong,” he said. “It is dreadful to think of people cutting each other to pieces, like wild beasts; but it is not so bad if you defend yourself with your fists. Only foreigners fight with swords; it is thoroughly un-English. You should never fight; but you would have to defend yourself if you were at school.”
Nello looked at his uncle with an agreeable sense of superiority. “But I have seen real fighting,” he said; “not like children. I saw them fighting the Austrians—that was not wrong. Papa said so. It was to get back their houses and their country. I was little then, and I was frightened. But they won!” cried the boy, with a gleam in his dark eyes. What a little savage he was! Randolph was startled by the sudden reference to “papa,” and this made him more warm and eager in his turn.
“Whoever has trained you to be a partisan has done very wrong,” he said. “What do you know about it? But look here, my little man. I am going away on Friday, and you are to come with me. It will be a great deal better for you than growing up like a little girl here. You are exactly like a little girl now, with your long hair and your name which is a girl’s name. You would be Jack if you were at school. I want to make a man of you. You will never be anything but a little lady if you don’t go to school. Come; you have only to put on a frock like your sister. Nelly! Why, that’s a girl’s name! You should be Jack if you were at school.”
“I am not a girl!” cried Nello. His face grew crimson, and he darted his little brown fist—not so feebly as his size promised—in his uncle’s face. Randolph took a step backwards in his surprise. “I hate you!” cried the child. “You shall never, never come here when I am a man. When the old gentleman is dead, and papa is dead, and everything is mine, I will shut up all the doors, I will turn out the dogs, and you shall never come here. I know now it is true what Lily says—you are the bad uncle that killed the babes in the wood. But when I am a big man and grown up, you shall never come here!”
“So!” said Randolph, furious but politic; “it is all to be yours? I did not know that. The castle, and the woods, and everything? How do you know it will be yours?”
“Oh! everybody knows that,” said Nello, recovering his composure as lightly as he had lost it; “Martuccia and every one. But first the old gentleman must be dead, and, I think, papa. I am not so sure about papa. And do you think they would teach me cricket at school, and to fight? I don’t really care for cricket, not really. But Johnny Pen and the rest, they think so much of it. I should like to knock down all their wickets, and get all the runs; that would teach them! and lick them after!” said the bloodthirsty Nello, with gleaming eyes.
CHAPTER XXVII.
AN APPARITION.
Thus Randolph overcame Nello’s opposition to school, to his own extreme surprise. Though he had a child of his own, and all the experiences of a middle-aged clergyman, he had never yet learned the A B C of childhood. But it may be supposed that the conversation generally had not made him love his nephew more dearly. He shook his fist at the boy as he ran along the water-side, suddenly seized by the delight of the novelty and the thought of Johnny Pen’s envy. “If I had you, my boy!” Randolph said, between his teeth, thinking grimly of the heirship which the child was so sure of. Pride would have a fall in this as in other cases. The child’s pretensions would not count for very much where he was going. To be flogged out of all such nonsense would be far the best thing for him; and a good flogging never did a boy much harm. Randolph, though he was not a bad man, felt a certain gratification in thinking of the change that would occur in Nello’s life. There was nothing wrong about the school; it was a very humble place, where farmers’ sons were trained roughly but not unkindly. It would make a man of the delicate little half-foreign boy, who knew nothing about cricket. No doubt it would be different from anything he was used to; but what of that? It was the best thing for him. Randolph was not cruel, but still it gave him a little pleasure to think how the impudent little wretch would be brought to his senses; no harm done to him—no real harm—but only such a practical lesson as would sweep all nonsense out of his head. If Nello had been a man of his own age, a rival, he could not have anticipated his humiliation with more zest. He would have liked to be a boy himself to fag the little upstart. There would be probably no fagging at the farmers’ school, but there would be—well! he smiled to himself. Nello would not like it; but it would bring the little monkey to his senses, and for that good purpose there was no objection to be taken to the means.