As each saw the other’s face, it was so very sad and worn and pale, that the young man started back; and the elder, with quite the tenderness of old days, cried, “God bless me, my boy, how ill you look! Come and warm yourself—look, the fire’s out. Have something, Clivy!”
For months past they had not had a really kind word. The tender old voice smote upon Clive, and he burst into sudden tears. They rained upon his father’s trembling old brown hand, and stooped down and kissed it.
“You look very ill too, father,” says Clive.
“Ill? not I!” cries the father, still keeping the boy’s hand under both his own on the mantelpiece. “Such a battered old fellow as I am has a right to look the worse for wear; but you, boy; why do you look so pale?”
“I have seen a ghost, father,” Clive answered. Thomas, however, looked alarmed and inquisitive as though the boy was wandering in his mind.
“The ghost of my youth, father, the ghost of my happiness, and the best days of my life,” groaned out the young man. “I saw Ethel to-day. I went to see Sarah Mason, and she was there.”
“I had seen her, but I did not speak of her,” said the father. “I thought it was best not to mention her to you, my poor boy. And are—are you fond of her still, Clive?”
“Still! once means always in these things, father, doesn’t it? Once means to-day, and yesterday, and forever and ever.”
“Nay, my boy, you mustn’t talk to me so, or even to yourself so. You have the dearest little wife at home, a dear little wife and child.”
“You had a son, and have been kind enough to him, God knows. You had a wife: but that doesn’t prevent other—other thoughts. Do you know you never spoke twice in your life about my mother? You didn’t care for her.”