What Will He Do with It — Volume 05 eBook

“I thank you earnestly, sincerely,” said Waife, brightening up.  “One favour more:  if you saw in the formal document shown to you, or retain on your memory, the name of—­of the person authorized to claim Sophy as his child, you will not mention it to Lady Montfort.  I am hot sure if ever she heard that name, but she may have done so, and—­and—­” he paused a moment, and seemed to muse; then went on, not concluding his sentence.  “You are so good to me, Mr. Morley, that I wish to confide in you as far as I can.  Now, you see, I am already an old man, and my chief object is to raise up a friend for Sophy when I am gone,—­a friend in her own sex, sir.  Oh, you cannot guess how I long, how I yearn, to view that child under the holy fostering eyes of a woman.  Perhaps if Lady Montfort saw my pretty Sophy she might take a fancy to her.  Oh, if she did! if she did!  And Sophy,” added Waife, proudly, “has a right to respect.  She is not like me,—­any hovel is good enough for me; but for her!  Do you know that I conceived that hope, that the hope helped to lead me back here when, months ago, I was at Humberston, intent upon rescuing Sophy; and saw—­though,” observed Waife, with a sly twitch of the muscles round his mouth, “I had no right at that precise moment to be seeing anything—­Lady Montfort’s humane fear for a blind old impostor, who was trying to save his dog—­a black dog, sir, who had dyed his hair—­from her carriage wheels.  And the hope became stronger still, when, the first Sunday I attended yon village church, I again saw that fair—­wondrously fair—­face at the far end,—­fair as moonlight and as melancholy.  Strange it is, sir, that I—­naturally a boisterous, mirthful man, and now a shy, skulking fugitive—­feel more attracted, more allured towards a countenance, in proportion as I read there the trace of sadness.  I feel less abased by my own nothingness, more emboldened to approach and say, ‘Not so far apart from me:  thou too hast suffered.’  Why is this?”

George Morley.—­“‘The fool hath said in his heart that there is no God;’ but the fool hath not said in his heart that there is no sorrow,—­pithy and most profound sentence; intimating the irrefragable claim that binds men to the Father.  And when the chain tightens, the children are closer drawn together.  But to your wish:  I will remember it.  And when my cousin returns, she shall see your Sophy.”

CHAPTER V.

Mr. Waife, being by nature unlucky, considers that, in proportion as fortune brings him good luck, nature converts it into bad.  He suffers Mr. George Morley to go away in his debt, and Sophy fears that he will be dull in consequence.

George Morley, a few weeks after the conversation last recorded, took his departure from Montfort Court, prepared, without a scruple, to present himself for ordination to the friendly bishop.  From Waife he derived more than the cure of a disabling infirmity;