The Admiral hung an ear, and looked up sidelong with a glimmer of suspicion.
“Good-night,” said Dick; “I’m tired.”
“So English!” cried Van Tromp, clutching him by the hand. “So English! So blasé! Such a charming companion! Let me see you home.”
“Look here,” returned Dick, “I have said good-night, and now I’m going. You’re an amusing old boy; I like you, in a sense; but here’s an end of it for to-night. Not another cigar, not another grog, not another percentage out of me.”
“I beg your pardon!” cried the Admiral with dignity.
“Tut, man!” said Dick; “you’re not offended; you’re a man of the world, I thought. I’ve been studying you, and it’s over. Have I not paid for the lesson? Au revoir.”
Van Tromp laughed gaily, shook hands up to the elbows, hoped cordially they would meet again and that often, but looked after Dick as he departed with a tremor of indignation. After that they two not unfrequently fell in each other’s way, and Dick would often treat the old boy to breakfast on a moderate scale and in a restaurant of his own selection. Often, too, he would lend Van Tromp the matter of a pound, in view of that gentleman’s contemplated departure for Australia; there would be a scene of farewell almost touching in character, and a week or a month later they would meet on the same boulevard without surprise or embarrassment. And in the meantime Dick learned more about his acquaintance on all sides: heard of his yacht, his chaise and four, his brief season of celebrity amid a more confiding population, his daughter, of whom he loved to whimper in his cups, his sponging, parasitical, nameless way of life; and with each new detail something that was not merely interest nor yet altogether affection grew up in his mind towards this disreputable stepson of the arts. Ere he left Paris Van Tromp was one of those whom he entertained to a farewell supper; and the old gentleman made the speech of the evening, and then fell below the table, weeping, smiling, paralysed.