Aunt made no reply; she smiled sadly and kindly upon me, and her tacit approval sent me directly to my uncle. He was in his private office. I knocked gently at the door.
"Come in."
I did so; and there I stood, not a little confused and perplexed before him, with flushed cheeks and a fast-throbbing heart. It was the first complaint I had ever made to him in my life—the first time I had ever dared to enter his sanctum sanctorum; and I remained tongue-tied upon the threshold, without knowing how to begin. I thought he would have looked me down. I felt the blood receding from my face beneath his cold gaze, as he said—
"Geoffrey, what do you want here?"
"I came, sir," I at last faltered out, "to make a complaint against Mr. Jones."
"I never listen to complaints brought by a pupil against his teacher," he cried, in a voice which made me recoil over the door-step. "Be gone, sir! If you come into my presence again on such an errand, I will spurn you from the room."
This speech, meant to intimidate me, restored my courage. I felt the hot blood rush to my face in a fiery flood.
"Hear me, sir. Did not you place me under his care in order that I might learn?"
"And you refuse to do so?"
"No, sir: the reverse is the case: he refuses to teach me, and deprives me of my books, so that I cannot teach myself."