“Oh, Father, do speak cheerful. I’m that down-hearted.”
“Reckon you are, my poor lad—and the Lord rebuke me if I add to your burden. This looks a godly sort of a pastry-cook’s. Let’s go in and get some tea.”
The next day was the last of Jerry’s leave, and the one that he and his father spent most happily together. Mr. Sumption’s ideas of entertainment seemed quite hopeless to Jerry, but during those last hours he felt drawn closer to the being who he knew was the only friend he had. They spent the morning on the pier, listening to the band, and in the afternoon went by the motor-bus to Rottingdean—a trip so surprisingly expensive that there was no money left to pay for their tea, and while the other excursionists sat down to long tables, they had to wander upon the down, whence they watched the feasters, Jerry like a forlorn sparrow and Mr. Sumption like a hungry crow, till it was time to go home.
But all the while the minister could see his son growing more dependent on him, and in his heart he thanked the Lord. His delight at having won that much poor show of affection blinded him a little to the pathos of the outlaw clinging to his only prop, before he was flung to troubles and dangers which he realised in helpless foreboding. The chapel weed clung to the chapel stone before it was rudely torn up and thrown out to the burning.
Their final parting was abusive, owing to Mr. Sumption’s having left Jerry’s dinner of sandwiches behind at their rooms, but the father would always have a thankful memory of that evening when Jerry had been simple and grateful and rather childish, and had listened to his good advice, and had not interrupted with his cry for cheerfulness the stream of Calvinistic warning.
They had sat by the big ugly window of their room, looking out at the first dim stars pricking the sky above Kemp Town. Jerry’s eyes were full of a mysterious trouble as they pondered the new serenity of his father’s face.
“Father,” he said suddenly, “you’ll watch and pray that Satan don’t get me.”
“Satan can’t hurt the elect.”