The afternoon train from London brought David Salmon to Durlston. He put up at the best hotel in the town, and, after having refreshed himself from the effects of the journey, started off for the Towers, wearing a black tie and a mourning-band on his hat. He was in very exuberant spirits, and walked along the High Road whistling and humming the latest music-hall tunes; then suddenly recollected his rôle as mourner and sympathizer, and managed to assume the requisite amount of gravity. He had been to the Towers once before, for the purpose of making Herbert Karne’s acquaintance, so did not consider himself a stranger there. Judging by the way he made his entrance, the house might have been his own property, and the home of his ancestors.
A little boy, in a man-of-war suit, was playing about the hall when he arrived, and watched him take off his hat and overcoat with a show of interest. He had put his own hat on the head of a statue which held an electric lamp, and looked as if he expected David to do the same.
“Cely’s papa is dead,” he informed him gravely. “An’ my papa is dead, and Mr. Karne’s papa is dead. Is your papa dead too?”
“Yes, my papa is dead too,” answered David with mock gravity. He wondered what the youngster was doing there.
“It’s very funny, isn’t it?” said the little boy, looking up into his face with round solemn eyes. “They fasten all the papas up tight in a box, and put ’em in a long hole in the ground, and then they go to Heaven. But when old Patrick died—that’s our gardener—I stood by the hole ever such a long time after they putted him down, an’ I didn’t see him go to Heaven. Perhaps he wasn’t good enough, though—he used to swear at me drefful sometimes in Irish, and vicar says it’s only good people that go to Heaven. Do you know what I fink?” he added, putting his finger in his mouth and looking very wise. “I fink that, instead of putting them down a hole, they ought to put them on top of the church tower, so that they wouldn’t have so far to go to get up to Heaven; and then, if they rang the church bells, the angels might hear, and come down and carry them away.”
David smiled, and patted the child’s head indulgently.
“He’s a rum ’un, is Master Bobbie,” said the butler in parenthesis. “He’d keep you chatting all day if you would stay. Is it Mr. Karne you wish to see, sir, or Miss Celia?”
“You can’t see Mr. Karne,” put in the little boy, decidedly. “I wanted to ask him lots of fings, but he is busy writing letters, an’ he told me to run away and play. You had better come up and see Cely. Mother’s up there with her, and lots more ladies. Cely looks drefful sad; I fink she’s going to cry. That’s why I comed out; I don’t like to see growed people cry—do you?”
He danced up the stairs and across the landing, his chubby face aglow with vivacity and health.
“It’s all right, Higgins,” he called out to the butler. “I’ll show the gentleman the way. What is your name—Mr. Salmon? How funny! We eat salmon, don’t we, an’ it’s pink?”