For a quarter of an hour he paced restlessly in the cold passage outside; then, as his pupil did not appear, he returned to the chamber of death. Roger Ingleton, as he expected, had fallen asleep where he knelt.
The wretched days between the death and the funeral dragged on in the usual dismal fashion. Mrs Ingleton kept her room; the domestics took the occasion to neglect their work, and Roger Ingleton, minor, passed through all the stages from inconsolable misery to subdued cheerfulness. Mr Armstrong alone went through no stages, but remained the same unimpassioned individual he had been ever since he became a member of the Maxfield household.
“Armstrong,” said the boy, the day before the funeral, “do you know, I’m the only male Ingleton left?”
“I didn’t know it. Have you no uncles or cousins?”
“None on our side. Some distant cousins on, mother’s side, but they’re abroad. We were going over the lot yesterday, mother and I; but we couldn’t scrape up a single relation to come to-morrow. We shall have to get you and Brandram and fathers solicitor to come to the funeral, if you don’t mind.”
“Of course I shall come,” said Mr Armstrong.
“And, by the way, it seems rather queer, doesn’t it, that I shall have charge of all this big property, and, I suppose, be master of all the people about the place.”
“Naturally. Amongst your humble and obedient servants the present tutor of Maxfield will need to be included.”
“Oh, you!” said Roger, smiling; “yes, you’ll need to look out how you behave, you know, or I shall have to terminate our engagement. Isn’t it queer?”
Queer as it was, the tutor winced at the jest, and screwed his eye-glass a little deeper into his eye.