“No, sir, I haven’t told you; and I don’t
mean to tell you till I see fit.”
“And when, pray, will that be?”
“When I have your promise in writing that you
will give her no trouble about what is past and gone.”
“I will give you that promise—always
provided she can prove that what was past and gone
is come again. I shall insist upon that!”
“Most properly, sir I You shall not have to
wait for it.—And now, if you will take
me to the post-office, I will send a telegram to Richard,
warning him to hold his tongue.”
“Good! Come.”
They walked to the carriage, and Simon, displacing
the footman, got up beside the coachman. He was
careful, however, to be set down before they got within
sight of the post-office.
The message he sent was—
“I know all, and will write. Say nothing
but to your mother.”
UNCLE-FATHER AND AUNT-MOTHER.
When Richard reached London, he went straight to Clerkenwell.
There he found Arthur, in bed and unattended, but
covered up warm. Except one number of The
Family Herald, he had nothing to read. The
room was tidy, but very dreary. Richard asked
him why he did not move into the front room.
Arthur did not explain, but Richard understood that
the mother had left so many phantasms behind her that
he preferred his own dark chamber. When Richard
told him what he had done and the success he had had,
he thanked him with such a shining face that Richard
saw in it the birth of saving hope.
“And now, Arthur,” he said, “you
must get better as fast as you can; and the first
minute you are able to be moved, we’ll ship you
off to my grandfather’s, where Alice was.”
“Away from Alice?”
“Yes; but you must remember there will be so
much more for her to eat, and so much more money to
get things comfortable with by the time you come back.
Besides, you will grow well faster, and then perhaps
we shall find some fitter work for you than that hideous
clerking!”
The flush of joy on Arthur’s cheek was a divine
reward to Richard for what he had done and suffered
and sacrificed for the sake of his brother. He
made a fire, and having set on the kettle, went to
buy some things, that he might have a nice supper
ready for Alice when she came home. Next he found
two clean towels, and covered the little table, forgetting
all his troubles in the gladness of ministration,
and the new life that hope gives. If only we
believed in God, how we should hope! And what
would not hope do to reveal the new heavens and the
new earth—that is, to show us the real,
true, and gracious aspect of those heavens and that
earth in which we now live so sadly, and are not at
home, because we do not see them as they are, do not
recognize in them the beginning of the inheritance
we long for!
