Athelstane Ford Part 28

He gave a glance, half angry, half questioning, at my mother, as he concluded. I did the same, but was surprised to observe that her face was returned to its former placid composure, and she seemed not to heed my father's stern expressions.

Poor little Patience took them more to heart, and the tears shone in her eyes.

"Don't say you won't forgive him!" she implored. "Think, for aught we know he may now be pining in a Moorish dungeon, or lying wounded on the battle-field. Oh, Mr. Ford, he was your only son, and you loved him--you must love him still!"

"Silence, girl!" cried my father, very fierce. "How dare you tell me I love a rebellious child! I should wrong my conscience, and be false to my profession as a Christian man, if I were weak enough to do what you say."

Patience turned and appealed to my mother.

"Won't you speak to him, mother? Why do you sit there so quietly? You love Athelstane as much as--as much as any one."

My mother cast a tender glance at my father.

"Hush, child! There is no need to speak. Athelstane's father forgave him long ago."

I saw my father start and tremble.

"Woman! What is it you say? What do you know?" he exclaimed. "You saw me cross his name out of the Bible with my own hand!"

"Yes, dear," my mother answered very softly, "but you wrote it in again that very night, when you thought I was asleep."

And rising out of her chair she crossed over and took down the book from where it had lain those three years and more, and opened the page where, as I have often seen it since, my name was written in again in large letters, and underneath in a shaken hand, the words, "Oh, Athelstane, my son, my son!"

Then, whether because of the flickering of the firelight, or the steam of my breath upon the pane, I ceased to see very distinctly, and came away from the window, and went round to the door, where I gave a loud knock.

The door was opened by Patience, and seeing before her, as she thought, a stranger in a uniform coat, she uttered a cry of surprise.

"Who are you, sir?"

"I am an ensign in the East India Company's service, as you see," I answered, jesting to conceal the fullness of my heart.

But I suppose there was that within her which told her more quickly than her eyes who it was, for before I had spoken two words the little silly thing fell a-sobbing and crying, and I had to take her in my arms, without more ado, and bring her in with me.

My mother has always affirmed that she knew I was to return that night, even when I was outside by the window, and that the first step I made across the threshold told her all. But instead of running out to meet me, in her beautiful wisdom she went over to where my father sat still, and leant against his chair and put her arm round his neck.

So I found them when I came in alone, leaving Patience in the hall, and walked straight over, and would have knelt down before my father.

But he prevented me, and rose out of his chair with a great cry, and drew me to him, and so stood holding me in silence, while my mother wept; and presently I saw his lips moving, and found that he was whispering to himself, "This my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found."

Afterwards we all knelt down together, while Mr. Walpole offered up a prayer; and then I sat in the midst and told them the whole story of my wanderings and perils as I have written it here. And later on, noting that Patience was dressed in black, I inquired, and found that she had lost her father nearly a year before, and was become my father's ward till she should attain the age of twenty-one, or marry with his consent.

It was not for a long time after that I surprised her little secret, and discovered that depth of true affection which had been waiting for me all those years beside my own hearth, while I was pursuing phantoms far away. But being alone with her one day, and our talk turning on the riches I had brought back with me, and how I was to bestow them, I said to her--

"For one thing, I must buy you a fairing, Patience, like I used to do when we were children together. Have you forgotten, I wonder, the guinea which I gave you to spend, on the last day I ever spent at home?"

"No, indeed, I have not. I remember it very well," she answered, blus.h.i.+ng.

"Why, is that so? And pray what did you buy with it?" I asked smiling.

"Nothing at all," said Patience shortly.

"Nothing! What then----"

"I have it by me, somewhere." She pretended to speak carelessly, but my suspicions were aroused.

"I insist on knowing where, Patience," I said in a tone of command, such as I have never known her to resist.

"You must find out for yourself, then," says she, trying to defy me.

(For the first and last time, G.o.d bless her!)

I took her by the arms and held her firmly.

"Now, Patience, tell me what you have done with my guinea," I demanded, quite stern.

"I kept it--for a keepsake. Oh, Athelstane, don't laugh at me, I have it on the ribbon round my neck!"

I didn't laugh at her. But I kissed her, and--well, well!--she kissed me back. And I was surprised to find how little anybody else was surprised when they heard of it, and how they all seemed to take it as a matter of course, and my father told me quite coolly that he intended me to marry as soon as Patience should be eighteen, and to live on Abner Thurstan's farm, which she had inherited by his will.

Of Rupert, as well as of old Muzzy, I must briefly speak. I conducted my cousin to his father, as I had promised, and sought to reconcile them. But I found my uncle to be harsher than I had expected. He had, besides, married again, and his wife looked sourly on the blind man she was asked to entertain in her house. The upshot of it was that I told her if she would take care of Rupert till I was married I would then have him to live with me. And in our house he still abides, a much altered man, given to the hearing of sermons, and never so happy as when Patience sits down to read him a piece from the Bible or the _Norwich Journal_; though sometimes a flash of his old spirit returns when I sit beside him after supper and talk over our old adventures in the East.

I found it more difficult at first to befriend old Muzzy. For though the old man professed to be, and I am sure really was, anxious to reform and lead a better life, he made but a poor business of it, and his constant profane oaths and habits of rum-drinking proved a severe trial to my mother and Patience. I had told them of his many services to me, including his having saved my life, and therefore they made it a duty to show kindness to the old man, and endeavour to bear with his ways. But I think they would have failed, and I should have been obliged to find a home for him elsewhere, but for his having accidentally told them of the affair outside Calcutta. No sooner did these tender-hearted women learn that I had saved old Muzzy's life (as they chose to consider it) than they instantly conceived a strong affection for the old man, and instead of finding him a burden nothing pleased them better than to sit in his company while the boatswain related the story of my prowess, interrupting it at every minute to excuse himself for some dreadful expression which had brought the tears into their eyes. The tale lost nothing in the telling, and I am ashamed to say that he so improved upon it in course of time as to make it appear that I had marched single-handed through the Nabob's entire army, severely wounded the Nabob himself, and slain many of his princ.i.p.al generals, and finally emerged, carrying old Muzzy himself across my shoulders like a suckling lamb.

Peace to old Muzzy! His heart was as innocent as his life and conversation were depraved. I believe my mother used to buy tobacco for him; and I am certain I once detected my wife secretly giving him rum.

In this peaceful manner my adventures ended, and I found myself, far beyond my deserts, settled at last in the land where I was born, among those who loved me and whom I loved.

And we are so made, and this life of ours is so strange a thing, that sometimes, when I walk abroad in the evening, as I was wont to do in my boyhood, and stand beside the lonely, rippling water of the broad, and watch the reflection of the sunset upon the distant walls of Yarmouth town; sometimes, I say, I ask myself whether all this has really been as I have thus written it, or whether all these events from my first running away from my father's roof; and those nights and days in the streets of yonder town and beneath the roof of the old "Three-decker"; and the woman I loved and fought for; and my cousin Rupert's enmity; and the voyage which I took to the East Indies, and the battles and perils which I pa.s.sed through; and last of all that white tomb in the seraglio garden in far-off Moorshedabad; whether they are not dreams and visions which have come to me while I have slept.

UNWIN BROTHERS, THE GRESHAM PRESS, WOKING AND LONDON.

=A SELECTION FROM= =Messrs. C. ARTHUR PEARSON'S PUBLICATIONS.=

=FORTUNE'S MY FOE.=

By J. BLOUNDELLE BURTON, Author of "The Hispaniola Plate," "In the Day of Adversity," &c.

=DESPAIR'S LAST JOURNEY.=

By DAVID CHRISTIE MURRAY, Author of "Joseph's Coat," &c.

=ATHELSTANE FORD.=

By ALLEN UPWARD, Author of "A Crown of Straw," "A Bride's Madness," &c.