Were you really talking of it?’
‘Tom was, and if it is to put some substance into those long useless legs, I don’t care if you do start off.’
Aubrey flashed into a fresh being. He had just been reading a book about the Tyrol, and Tom not caring at all where they were to go, this gave the direction. Aubrey rushed to borrow a continental Bradshaw from Dr. Spencer, and the plan rapidly took form; with eager suggestions thrown in by every one, ending with the determination to start on the next Monday morning.
‘That’s settled,’ said Tom, wearily, when he and Ethel, as often happened, had lingered behind the rest; ‘only, Ethel, there’s one thing. You must keep your eye on the Vintry Mill, and fire off a letter to me if the fellow shows any disposition to bolt.’
‘If I can possibly find out—’
‘Keep your eyes open; and then Hazlitt has promised to let me know if that cheque of Bilson’s is cashed. If I am away, telegraph, and meantime set my father on the scent. It may not hang that dog himself, but it may save Leonard.’
‘Oh, if it would come!’
‘And meantime—silence, you know—’
‘Very well;’ then lingering, ‘Tom, I am sure you did the right thing by Aubrey, and so was papa afterwards.’
His brow darkened for a moment, but shaking it off he said, ‘I’ll do my best for your cosset lamb, and bring him back in condition.’
‘Thank you; I had rather trust him with you than any one.’
‘And how is it that no one proposes a lark for you, old Ethel?’ said Tom, holding her so as to study her face. ‘You look awfully elderly and ragged.’
‘Oh, I’m going to be left alone with the Doctor, and that will be the greatest holiday I ever had.’
‘I suppose it is to you,’ said Tom, with a deep heavy sigh, perhaps glad to have some ostensible cause for sighing.
‘Dear Tom, when you are living here, and working with him—’
‘Ah—h!’ he said almost with disgust, ‘don’t talk of slavery to me before my time. How I hate it, and everything else! Good night!’
‘Poor Tom!’ thought Ethel. ‘I wish papa knew him better and would not goad him. Will Averil ever wake to see what she has done, and feel for him? Though I don’t know why I should wish two people to be unhappy instead of one, and there is weight enough already. O, Leonard, I wonder if your one bitter affliction will shield you from the others that may be as trying, and more tempting!’
CHAPTER XVIII
All bright hopes and hues of day Have faded into twilight gray.—Christian Year
‘No fear of Aubrey’s failing,’ said Tom; ‘he has a better foundation than nine-tenths of the lads that go up, and he is working like a man.’
‘He always did work heartily,’ said Ethel, ‘and with pleasure in his work.’
‘Ay, like a woman.’
‘Like a scholar.’
‘A scholar is a kind of woman. A man, when he’s a boy, only works because he can’t help it, and afterwards for what he can get by it.’
‘For what he can do with it would have a worthier sound.’
‘Sound or sense, it is all the same.’
‘Scaffolding granted, what is the building?’
Tom apparently thought it would be working like a woman to give himself the trouble of answering; and Ethel went on in her own mind, ‘For the work’s own sake—for what can be got by it—for what can be done with it— because it can’t be helped—are—these all the springs of labour here? Then how is work done in that solitary cell? Is it because it can’t be helped, or is it ‘as the Lord’s freeman’? And when he can hear of Aubrey’s change, will he take it as out of his love, or grieve for having been the cause?’
For the change had been working in Aubrey ever since Leonard had altered his career. The boy was at a sentimental age, and had the susceptibility inseparable from home breeding; his desire to become a clergyman had been closely connected with the bright visions of the happy days at Coombe, and had begun to wane with the first thwarting of Leonard’s plans; and when the terrible catastrophe of the one friend’s life occurred, the other became alienated from all that they had hoped to share together. Nor could even Dr. May’s household be so wholly exempt from the spirit of the age, that Aubrey was not aware of the strivings and trials of faith at the University. He saw what Harvey Anderson was, and knew what was passing in the world; and while free from all doubts, shrank boyishly from the investigations that he fancied might excite them. Or perhaps these fears of possible scruples were merely his self-justification for gratifying his reluctance.
At any rate, he came home from his two months’ tour, brown, robust, with revived spirits, but bent on standing an examination for the academy at Woolwich. He had written about it several times before his return, and his letters were, as his father said, ‘so appallingly sensible that perhaps he would change his mind.’ But it was not changed when he came home; and Ethel, though sorely disappointed, was convinced by her own sense as well as by Richard’s prudence, that interference was dangerous. No one in Israel was to go forth to the wars of the Lord save those who ‘willingly offered themselves;’ and though grieved that her own young knight should be one of the many champions unwilling to come forth in the Church’s cause, she remembered the ordeal to Norman’s faith, and felt that the exertion of her influence was too great a responsibility.
‘You don’t like this,’ said Tom, after a pause. ‘It is not my doing, you know.’
‘No, I did not suppose it was,’ said Ethel. ‘You would not withhold any one in these days of exceeding want of able clergymen.’
