Little Lord Fauntleroy
dog's neck. It pleased the grim old nobleman that the child should show
no shyness or fear, either of the dog or of himself.
Cedric looked at him just as he had looked at the woman at the lodge and
at the housekeeper, and came quite close to him.
“Are you the Earl?” he said. “I'm your grandson, you know, that Mr.
Havisham brought. I'm Lord Fauntleroy.”
He held out his hand because he thought it must be the polite and proper
thing to do even with earls. “I hope you are very well,” he continued,
with the utmost friendliness. “I'm very glad to see you.”
The Earl shook hands with him, with a curious gleam in his eyes; just at
first, he was so astonished that he scarcely knew what to say. He stared
at the picturesque little apparition from under his shaggy brows, and
took it all in from head to foot.
“Glad to see me, are you?” he said.
“Yes,” answered Lord Fauntleroy, “very.”
There was a chair near him, and he sat down on it; it was a high-backed,
rather tall chair, and his feet did not touch the floor when he had
settled himself in it, but he seemed to be quite comfortable as he sat
there, and regarded his august relative intently but modestly.
“I've kept wondering what you would look like,” he remarked. “I used to
lie in my berth in the ship and wonder if you would be anything like my
father.”
“Am I?” asked the Earl.
“Well,” Cedric replied, “I was very young when he died, and I may not
remember exactly how he looked, but I don't think you are like him.”
“You are disappointed, I suppose?” suggested his grandfather.
“Oh, no,” responded Cedric politely. “Of course you would like any one
to look like your father; but of course you would enjoy the way your
grandfather looked, even if he wasn't like your father. You know how it
is yourself about admiring your relations.”
The Earl leaned back in his chair and stared. He could not be said to
know how it was about admiring his relations. He had employed most of
his noble leisure in quarreling violently with them, in turning them out
of his house, and applying abusive epithets to them; and they all hated
him cordially.
“Any boy would love his grandfather,” continued Lord Fauntleroy,
“especially one that had been as kind to him as you have been.”
Another queer gleam came into the old nobleman's eyes.
“Oh!” he said, “I have been kind to you, have I?”
“Yes,” answered Lord Fauntleroy brightly; “I'm ever so much obliged to
you about Bridget, and the apple-woman, and Dick.”
“Bridget!” exclaimed the Earl. “Dick! The apple-woman!”
“Yes!” explained Cedric; “the ones you gave me all that money for--the
money you told Mr. Havisham to give me if I wanted it.”
“Ha!” ejaculated his lordship. “That's it, is it? The money you were
to spend as you liked. What did you buy with it? I should like to hear
something about that.”
He drew his shaggy eyebrows together and looked at the child sharply. He
was secretly curious to know in what way the lad had indulged himself.
“Oh!” said Lord Fauntleroy, “perhaps you didn't know about Dick and the
apple-woman and Bridget. I forgot you lived such a long way off from
them. They were particular friends of mine. And you see Michael had the
fever----”
“Who's Michael?” asked the Earl.
“Michael is Bridget's husband, and they were in great trouble. When a
man is sick and can't work and has twelve children, you know how it is.
And Michael has always been a sober man. And Bridget used to come to our
house and cry. And the evening Mr. Havisham was there, she was in the
kitchen crying, because they had almost nothing to eat and couldn't pay
the rent; and I went in to see her, and Mr. Havisham sent for me and he
said you had given him some money for me. And I ran as fast as I could
into the kitchen and gave it to Bridget; and that made it all right; and
Bridget could scarcely believe her eyes. That's why I'm so obliged to
you.”
“Oh!” said the Earl in his deep voice, “that was one of the things you
did for yourself, was it? What else?”
Dougal had been sitting by the tall chair; the great dog had taken its
place there when Cedric sat down. Several times it had turned and looked
up at the boy as if interested in the conversation. Dougal was a
solemn dog, who seemed to feel altogether too big to take life's
responsibilities lightly. The old Earl, who knew the dog well, had
watched it with secret interest. Dougal was not a dog whose habit it was
to make acquaintances rashly, and the Earl wondered somewhat to see how
quietly the brute sat under the touch of the childish hand. And, just
at this moment, the big dog gave little Lord Fauntleroy one more look
of dignified scrutiny, and deliberately laid its huge, lion-like head on
the boy's black-velvet knee.
The small hand went on stroking this new friend as Cedric answered:
“Well, there was Dick,” he said. “You'd like Dick, he's so square.”
This was an Americanism the Earl was not prepared for.
“What does that mean?” he inquired.
Lord Fauntleroy paused a moment to reflect. He was not very sure himself
what it meant. He had taken it for granted as meaning something very
creditable because Dick had been fond of using it.
“I think it means that he wouldn't cheat any one,” he exclaimed; “or
hit a boy who was under his size, and that he blacks people's boots
very well and makes them shine as much as he can. He's a perfessional
bootblack.”
“And he's one of your acquaintances, is he?” said the Earl.
“He is an old friend of mine,” replied his grandson. “Not quite as old
as Mr. Hobbs, but quite old. He gave me a present just before the ship
sailed.”
He put his hand into his pocket and drew forth a neatly folded red
object and opened it with an air of affectionate pride. It was the red
silk handkerchief with the large purple horse-shoes and heads on it.
“He gave me this,” said his young lordship. “I shall keep it always. You
can wear it round your neck or keep it in your pocket. He bought it with
the first money he earned after I bought Jake out and gave him the new
brushes. It's a keepsake. I put some poetry in Mr. Hobbs's watch. It
was, 'When this you see, remember me.' When this I see, I shall always
remember Dick.”
The sensations of the Right Honorable the Earl of Dorincourt could
scarcely be described. He was not an old nobleman who was very easily
bewildered, because he had seen a great deal of the world; but here was
something he found so novel that it almost took his lordly breath away,
and caused him some singular emotions. He had never cared for children;
he had been so occupied with his own pleasures that he had never had
time to care for them. His own sons had not interested him when they
were very young--though sometimes he remembered having thought Cedric's
father a handsome and strong little fellow. He had been so selfish
himself that he had missed the pleasure of seeing unselfishness in
others, and he had not known how tender and faithful and affectionate a
kind-hearted little child can be, and how innocent and unconscious are
its simple, generous impulses. A boy had always seemed to him a most
objectionable little animal, selfish and greedy and boisterous when not
under strict restraint; his own two eldest sons had given their tutors
constant trouble and annoyance, and of the younger one he fancied he had
heard few complaints because the boy was of no particular importance. It
had never once occurred to him that he should like his grandson; he had
sent for the little Cedric because his pride impelled him to do so. If
the boy was to take his place in the future, he did not wish his name
to be made ridiculous by descending to an uneducated boor. He had been
convinced the boy would be a clownish fellow if he were brought up in
America. He had no feeling of affection for the lad; his only hope was
that he should find him decently well-featured, and with a respectable
share of sense; he had been so disappointed in his other sons, and had
been made so furious by Captain Errol's American marriage, that he had
never once thought that anything creditable could come of it. When the
footman had announced Lord Fauntleroy, he had almost dreaded to look at
the boy lest he should find him all that he had feared. It was because
of this feeling that he had ordered that the child should be sent to
him alone. His pride could not endure that others should see his
disappointment if he was to be disappointed. His proud, stubborn old
heart therefore had leaped within him when the boy came forward with his
graceful, easy carriage, his fearless hand on the big dog's neck. Even
in the moments when he had hoped the most, the Earl had never hoped that
his grandson would look like that. It seemed almost too good to be true
that this should be the boy he had dreaded to see--the child of the
woman he so disliked--this little fellow with so much beauty and such
a brave, childish grace! The Earl's stern composure was quite shaken by
this startling surprise.
And then their talk began; and he was still more curiously moved, and
more and more puzzled. In the first place, he was so used to seeing
people rather afraid and embarrassed before him, that he had expected
nothing else but that his grandson would be timid or shy. But Cedric was
no more afraid of the Earl than he had been of Dougal. He was not bold;
he was only innocently friendly, and he was not conscious that there
could be any reason why he should be awkward or afraid. The Earl could
not help seeing that the little boy took him for a friend and treated
him as one, without having any doubt of him at all. It was quite plain
as the little fellow sat there in his tall chair and talked in his
friendly way that it had never occurred to him that this large,
fierce-looking old man could be anything but kind to him, and rather
pleased to see him there. And it was plain, too, that, in his childish
way, he wished to please and interest his grandfather. Cross, and
hard-hearted, and worldly as the old Earl was, he could not help feeling
a secret and novel pleasure in this very confidence. After all, it was
not disagreeable to meet some one who did not distrust him or shrink
from him, or seem to detect the ugly part of his nature; some one who
looked at him with clear, unsuspecting eyes,--if it was only a little
boy in a black velvet suit.
So the old man leaned back in his chair, and led his young companion
on to telling him still more of himself, and with that odd gleam in his
eyes watched the little fellow as he talked. Lord Fauntleroy was quite
willing to answer all his questions and chatted on in his genial little
way quite composedly. He told him all about Dick and Jake, and the
apple-woman, and Mr. Hobbs; he described the Republican Rally in all
the glory of its banners and transparencies, torches and rockets. In
the course of the conversation, he reached the Fourth of July and
the Revolution, and was just becoming enthusiastic, when he suddenly
recollected something and stopped very abruptly.
“What is the matter?” demanded his grandfather. “Why don't you go on?”
Lord Fauntleroy moved rather uneasily in his chair. It was evident to
the Earl that he was embarrassed by the thought which had just occurred
to him.
“I was just thinking that perhaps you mightn't like it,” he replied.
“Perhaps some one belonging to you might have been there. I forgot you
were an Englishman.”
“You can go on,” said my lord. “No one belonging to me was there. You
forgot you were an Englishman, too.”
“Oh! no,” said Cedric quickly. “I'm an American!”
“You are an Englishman,” said the Earl grimly. “Your father was an
Englishman.”
It amused him a little to say this, but it did not amuse Cedric. The lad
had never thought of such a development as this. He felt himself grow
quite hot up to the roots of his hair.