His voice found its way to the fading memories of the dying man; Harry’s closed eyes opened and smiled at him.
“You dear little beggar!” he murmured. “How you’re grown! I’m glad——”
His strengthless hands tried to clasp the child and draw him closer.
“I’ve left you Cuckoopint, Jack,” he said faintly. “Don’t forget—what I told you—in the Park. Try and grow like your uncle Ronnie. He’ll help you to keep straight.”
His voice was scarce louder than a breath; his feeble heart was straining to force the blood through its vessels, the tired eyelids fell, and closed once more.
They gave him oxygen and he revived slightly, enough to know that Jack’s head was lying on the pillow by his own and that Jack’s arm was round his throat.
“Don’t cry,” he murmured. “Kiss the others for me. They never cared as you did.”
There was a long silence, only broken by the passionate sobbing of the child and the subdued weeping of those present.
“Keep clear of women, Jack,” he said huskily, painfully, as he tried to draw the boy still closer. “Tell your mother—no—never mind. Thank her for letting you come. Where are you, dear? I can’t see you. Kiss me again.”
Then his mouth opened, gasping, and his last breath passed out into the summer air.