“Mayster Frank,” was Jacob’s reply, “I’m not going to leave you now, unless you wish to part with me yourself. I don’t feel happy in leaving you to go by yourself nobody knows where.”
“Really, Jacob, you make a capital nurse,” said the other, laughing; “you seem to be quite convinced that I’m not to be trusted to run alone.”
“And it’s true, sir,” replied Jacob, seriously; “you need looking after, and I mustn’t be letting you get into the hands of any of those chaps as’ll hook all as you have out o’ you in no time—that is, if you’re going to stay by yourself in this big town.”
“Why, yes, Jacob; I shall not go down to my father’s at once. I don’t seem as if I could go. I’d better wait a little bit. I seem out of trim, and out of sorts altogether.”
“You must please yourself,” replied Jacob; “and you must know best, Mayster Frank, what you’re bound to do. But, if you’d take my advice, you’d go home at once, afore anything worse happens.”
“No, Jacob, I cannot yet, and so that’s settled. Now we must look-out for lodgings; they mustn’t be expensive ones, else the brass, as you call it, won’t hold out, and you can wait on me, and keep me in order, you know. But, by the way, I was forgetting that you have friends of your own to look after. Don’t let anything I’ve been saying prevent your going to them, and doing what’s right by them. I shall be quite willing to come into any arrangement you may like to make. Don’t consider yourself bound to me, Jacob, but just do whatever you feel to be your duty.”
“You’re very kind, Mayster Frank: it’s just this way with me. I should like to go and see arter them as I left behind when I sailed for Australia, and see how they’re coming on. But it don’t matter for a week or so, for they’re not looking for me. I’ll see you settled first properly, Mayster Frank, if you mean to settle here for a bit, and then I’ll just take a run over yonder for a few days, and come back to you again, and what I do afterwards’ll depend on how I find things yonder.”
And thus it was finally settled. Frank took quiet lodgings in a respectable by-street, in the house of an aged widow, who was delighted with his cheerful open manners, and did her best to make him and Jacob comfortable. But the time hung heavily on the hands of both master and man. Frank purposed daily writing home, and yet each to-morrow found him more reluctant to do so than the day before. Jacob loitered about the town and docks when his master did not want him, and got exceedingly weary of his idleness.
“Eh, ma’am,” he said one day to their landlady, “my arms fair ache with hanging down and doing nothing.”
Thus things went on for about a fortnight, when one evening at tea-time Frank failed to make his appearance. Seven o’clock, then nine and ten, but no master came to remove poor Jacob’s misgivings. At last, about midnight, a stumbling against the door and a violent knock made his heart die within him.