"It"s a good one," I replied.
"No," she insisted, shaking her head.
"You have been good to the boy, Let.i.tia," I explained. "This is only a way of saying that I know."
"You do not need to say it," she replied. "I have done nothing."
"You have done everything, Let.i.tia--for us both."
The tears ran down her cheeks. My own eyes--
"You have loved Dove"s husband and son," I told her. "We shall not forget it."
Her face was radiant.
"It has been nothing for me to do," she said. "Loving no one in particular, I have had the time to love every one, don"t you see? Why, all my life, Bertram, I"ve loved other people"s dogs, and other people"s children"--she paused a moment and added, smiling through her tears--"and other people"s husbands, I suppose."
"You will go?" I asked.
"I should love to go."
"You will go, Let.i.tia?"
"I will go," she said.
That evening I took from my pocket a brand-new map of the British Isles--I mean brand-new last fall. Many a pleasant hour I had spent that winter at the office with a red guide-book and the map before me on my desk. With no little pride I spread it now on the sitting-room table which Let.i.tia had cleared for me.
"What are the red lines, father?" asked my son. He had returned breathless from telling the Parker girl.
"Those in red ink," I replied, "I drew myself. It is your route. There"s Southampton--where you land--and there"s London--and there"s Windsor and Oxford and Stratford and Warwick and Kenilworth--and here," I cried, sweeping my hand suddenly downward to the left--"here"s Devonshire!"
"Where father was a boy," Let.i.tia murmured, touching the pinkish county tenderly with her hand.
Ah, I was primed for them! There was not a question they could ask that I could not answer. There was not a village they could name, I could not instantly put my finger on. Those winter hours had not been spent in vain. I knew the inns--the King"s Arms, the Golden Lion, the White Hart, the Star and Anchor, the George and Dragon, the Ring o" Bells! I knew where the castles were--I had marked them blue. I knew the battle-fields--I had made them crimson. For each cathedral--a purple cross. Each famous school--a golden star. Never, I believe, was there such a map before--for convenience, for ready reference: one look at the margin where I made the notes--a glance at the map--and there you were!
"Oh, it is beautiful!" exclaimed Let.i.tia.
"Isn"t it?" I cried.
"You should have it patented," said my son.
"Suppose," I suggested, "you ask me something--something hard now. Ask me something hard."
I took a turn with my cigar. Robin knitted his brows, but could think of nothing. Let.i.tia pondered.
"Where"s--"
She hesitated.
"Out with it!" I urged.
"Where"s Tavistock?" she asked.
I thought a moment.
"Is it a castle?"
She shook her head.
"Is it a battle-field?"
"No."
"Is it just a town, then?"
"Yes, just a town."
"Did anything famous happen there?"
She hesitated.
"Well," she said, "perhaps nothing very famous--but it"s an old little town--one that I"ve heard of, that is all."
Well, she did have me. It was not very famous, and only a--an idea came to me.
"Oh," I said, shutting my eyes a moment, "that town"s in Devon."
Let.i.tia nodded.
"See," I said. Adjusting my gla.s.ses, and peering a moment at the pinkish patch, I tapped it, Tavistock, with my finger-nail. "Right here," I said.
We made a night of it--that is, it was midnight when I folded my map and locked it away with the guide-book and the table of English money I had made myself. There was one in the book, it is true, but for ready reference, for convenience in emergencies, it did not compare with mine--mine worked three ways.
A fortnight later I had the tickets in my hand--ss. _Atlantis_, date of sailing, the tenth of June. I myself was to steal a day or two and wave farewell to them from the pier. Robin already had packed his grip; indeed, he repacked it daily, to get the hang of it, he said. It was a new one which I had kept all winter at the office in the bottom of a cupboard, and it bore the initials, R. W., stamped on the end. And he had a housewife--a kind of cousin to a needle-book--stuffed full of handy mending-things, presented by the Parker girl. The boy was radiant, but as June drew nigh I saw he had something heavy on his mind. A dozen times he had begun to speak to me, privately, but had changed the subject or had walked away. I could not imagine what ailed the fellow.
He seemed restless; even, as I fancied, a little sad at times, which troubled me. I made opportunities for him to speak, but he failed to do so, either through neglect or fear. I saw him often at the office, where he was always bursting in upon me with some new plan or handy matter for his precious bag. He had bought a razor and a brush and strop.
"But what are they for?" I asked, amazed. A blush mantled his beardless cheeks.
"Those? Oh--just to be sure," he said.
Now what could be troubling the lad, I wondered? It was something not always on his mind, for he seemed to forget it in preparations, but it lurked near by to spring out upon his blithest moments. His face would be shining; an instant later it would fall, and he would walk to the window and gaze out thoughtfully into the street, in a way that touched me to the heart, for, remember, this was to be my first parting with the boy. The more I thought of it, the more perplexed I was; and the more I wondered, the more I felt it might be my duty to speak myself.
"Robin," I said one day, and as casually as I could make my tone, "did you want to tell me anything? What is it? Speak, my boy."
We were alone together in my inner office and the door was shut. He walked resolutely to the desk where I was sitting.
"Father," he said, "I have."