“Take him away and give him something to eat,” said the patient, but not in a hospitable voice.
“I want to see it all done,” said Geoff, pressing closer. “Is that how you do it? Don’t you want another piece of plaster? Will you have to take it off again, or will it stay till it is all well? Oh, look, that corner isn’t fast. Press it there, a little farther. Oh, Theo, she has done it so nicely. You can’t see a bit of the bad place. It is all covered with plaster, like that, and then like this. I wish now it had been me, just to know how it feels.”
“Take him away, mother, for Heaven’s sake!” cried Warrender under his breath.
“My dear, you must not worry Theo. He is going to lie down now, and be quiet for a little. Go with Minnie, and have something to eat.”
“I am not so hungry now,” said the boy, “but very much interested. When you are interested you don’t feel hungry: and the old woman gave me something to eat. Would you pay her, please? Won’t you tie something on, Mrs. Warrender, to hide the plaster? It doesn’t look very nice like that.”
“Come,” said Chatty, taking him by the hand. The elder sister had thrown herself into a chair at the mention of the tutorship, and seemed unable for further exertion.
“Oh yes, I am coming; but I am most interested about Theo. Theo, you have got a stain upon your cheek; and your coat is torn, too, as bad as my—Well, but he did tear my knickerbockers. Look! I felt the cold wind, though I did not say anything; not upon the open road, but when we got among your trees. It is so dark among your trees. Theo!”
“Come, come; I want you to come with me,” Chatty said, hurrying Geoff away; and perhaps the sight of the table in the dining-room, and the tray which Joseph, not without a grumble, was placing upon it, became about this time as interesting as Theo’s wound.
“We ought to send and tell his mother that the child is here.”
“Or send him back,” said Minnie sharply, “and get rid of him. A little storyteller! Theo his tutor! If I were his mother, I should whip him, till he learned what lies mean!”
Mrs. Warrender looked with some anxiety at her son. “Children,” she said, “make such strange misrepresentations of what they hear. But we should send—”
“I have sent already,” said Theo. “She will probably come and fetch him: and, mother—”
“My dear, keep still, and don’t disturb yourself. There might be a little fever.”
“Oh, rubbish, fever! I shall not disturb myself, if you don’t disturb me. Look here. It is quite true; I’ve offered myself to be his tutor.”
“His tutor!” cried Minnie once more, in a voice which was like the report of a pistol. Mrs. Warrender said nothing, but looked at him with a boundless pity in her eyes, slightly shaking her head.
“Well! and what have you to say against it?” cried Theo, facing his sister, with a glow of anger mounting to the face which had been almost ghastly with loss of blood.
“This is not a moment for discussion. Go and see to the child, Minnie. Theo, my dear boy, if you care so much for Geoff as that—; at another time you must tell us all about it.”
“There is nothing to tell you, save that I have made up my mind to it,” he said, looking at her with that prompt defiance which forestalls remark. “Geoff! Do you think it is for Geoff? But neither at this time nor at any other time is there more to say.”
He looked at her so severely that Mrs. Warrender’s eyes fell. He felt no shame, but pride, in his self-sacrifice, and determination to stand by it and uphold his right to do it in the face of all the world. But this very determination, and a consciousness of all that would be said on the subject, gave Warrender a double intolerance in respect to Geoff himself. To imagine that it was for the boy’s sake was, he already felt, the most unbearable offence. For the boy’s sake! The boy would have been swept away before now if thought could have done it. From the first hour he had been impatient of the boy. The way in which he clung to his mother had been a personal offence. And his mother!—ah no, she could do no wrong. Not even in this matter, which sometimes tortured him, could he blame Lady Markland. But that she or anyone should imagine for a moment that he was ready to sacrifice his time, his independence, so much of his life, for the sake of Geoff! That was a misconception which Warrender could not bear. “Don’t let that little ⸻ come near me,” he said to his mother, as he finally went off, somewhat feebly, to the old library, where he could be sure of quiet. “Make the girls take care of him and amuse him. She will probably come and fetch him, and I will rest—till then.”—That little ⸻ Warrender did not add any epithet; the adjective was enough.
“Till then—till she comes! Is that all your thought?” said his mother. “Oh, my poor boy!”
He met her eyes with a pride which scorned concealment. Yes, he would own it here, where it would be in vain to deny it. He would not disavow the secret of his heart. Mothers have keen eyes, but hers were not keen, they were pitying—more sad than tears. She looked at him, and once more softly shook her head. The blood had rushed again to his face, dyeing it crimson for a moment, and he held his head high as he made his confession. “Yes, mother, that is all my thought.” And then he walked away, tingling with the first avowal he
