Mrs. Stanburne expressed some surprise at this. "Boys in his rank in life don't often go to Eton, do they, Mr. Prigley?"
The clergyman smiled as he answered that little Jacob's rank in life was not yet definitively settled. Mrs. Stanburne replied that she thought it was, since his father was a retired tradesman.
"Yes, but his uncle, Mr. Jacob Ogden of Milend, has not left business; indeed he is greatly extending his business just now, for he has built an immense new factory. And this little boy is to be his heir—his uncle told me so himself three weeks since. This child will be a rich man—nobody can tell how rich. His uncle wishes him to be educated as a gentleman."
It is a great recommendation to a little boy to be heir to a large fortune, and Mrs. Stanburne's natural liking for little Jacob was by no means diminished by a knowledge of that fact. As he was going to Eton, too, she began to look upon him as already in her own rank of life, where boys were sent to Eton, and inherited extensive estates.
During Mr. Prigley's frequent absences with Colonel Stanburne at the Hall, Mrs. Stanburne undertook to hear little Jacob his lessons, and then the idea struck her that Jacob and Edith might both write together from her dictation. In this way the boy and the girl became class-fellows. Edith had a governess usually, but the governess had gone to visit her relations, and Miss Edith's education was for the present under the superintendence of her grandmamma.
So between these two children an intimacy rapidly established itself—an intimacy which affected the course of their whole lives.
One day when they had been left alone together in the drawing-room, little Jacob asked the young lady some question, and he began by calling her "Miss Edith."
"Miss Edith!" said she, pouting; "why do you call me Miss? The servants may call me Miss, but you mayn't. We're school-fellows now, and you must call me Edith. And I shall call you Jacob. Why haven't you got a prettier name for me to call you by? Jacob isn't pretty at all. Haven't you another name?"
Poor little Jacob was obliged to confess his poverty in names. He had but one, and that one uncouth and unacceptable!
"Only one name. Why, you funny little boy, only to have one name! I've got four. I'm called Edith Maud Charlotte Elizabeth. But I'll tell you what I'll do. As I've got four names and you've only one, I'll give you one of mine. I can't call you Charlotte, you know, because you're not a girl; but I can call you Charley, and I always will do. So now I begin. Charley, come here!"