I did not want to go, for at that time I did not understand nor much like my father. But Deventer said that if I would not walk he would carry me, a threat which at any other time would have made me smile. However, to please him I walked carefully to the window. With his habitual thoughtlessness about external things, the sash swung a little open and the light air blew the curtains back. My father was sitting like a student, with a shawl over his knees, a quite necessary fire of olive roots smouldering on the andirons, and his head, shining and silvery, bent over a book in which he was making notes.
I did not wish to startle him, so I spoke in English, and in as commonplace a tone as I could muster.
"Father," I said, as if my calling hours were the most ordinary in the world, "will you come across to the window for a moment?"
He rose instantly and came over to the open window, one half of which I had pushed wide. The note-book was still in his hand, and the breeze ruffled its leaves so that he shut and clasped it.
"Why, Angus, where do you come from?" he said. "Is it late? Won't you come in? Are you on your way back to college?"
"No, father," I said; "I ought to be, but I have made up my mind to go to the war. I have had enough of learning, and examinations disgust me even when I come out first."
He looked at me long and quietly, and then nodded his head.
"I know—I know," he said, "it is the riot in the blood. I do not say that you do wrong to go, but you will need some money. I have a few hundred francs by me for which I have no use. They will not come amiss. Let me see—six, seven, eight hundred and fifty. Does Deventer go with you?"
"He is waiting on the road below."
"I thought as much—well, bid him good luck from me, and now good night, and God be with you, boy! Get your wild-oat sowing done as soon as possible and come back. You will find me waiting for you. You and I will do something yet."