“Yes.”
“And you’ll call and see my father pretty often, won’t you?”
“Yes.”
“And you’ll keep yourself free for a week’s jaunt at Easter?”
“Yes.”
They had much more talk that evening, which lasted till late. What they talked about it is not for me to repeat, and if it were it would probably not interest my reader. He would perhaps be disappointed to find that a considerable part of it related to a new suit of Tom’s, just arrived from the tailor’s, and that another part had reference to Tom’s intention to prevail on his landlady in London to allow him to support a bull-dog puppy on her premises. These subjects, deeply interesting to the two friends, would not improve with repetition; and neither would the rest of their talk, which was chiefly a going over of old times, and a laying of many a wondrous scheme for the future. Suffice it to say, on this last evening the two boys unbosomed themselves to one another, and if Tom Drift went off to bed in a sober and serious frame of mind, it was because he and Charlie both had thought and felt a great deal more than they had spoken during the interview. The packing went on at the same time as the talk, and then the two friends separated, only to meet once more on the morrow for a hurried farewell.
“Let’s have a last look at him,” said Charlie, as Tom was getting into the cab to go.
Tom took me out and handed me to him. Long and tenderly my dear young master looked at me, then, patting me gently with his hand as if I were a child, he said,—
“Good-bye, and be good to Tom Drift; do you hear?”
If a tick could express anything, my reply at that moment must have satisfied him his parting wish would not be forgotten. Then returning me to my new master, he said,—