Part 109 (1/2)

'About the worst thing you could do to the poor boy, Cherry,' said Felix, 'when he is only lying there trying to get his head quiet enough to let him sleep.'

'Nor must you betray me,' added John, smiling at poor conscience- stricken Cherry.

'And it is a mercy the fiddle is gone!' said Alda. 'I used to hear him playing it somewhere among the out-houses in the spring, and it was enough to distract one, added to Theodore's dronings.'

'It must have been like parting with a bit of his life,' sighed Cherry; 'and yet Bernard would not mind him, and they did quarrel!'

'Boys who deal well with juniors at school do sometimes fail with little brothers,' said John. 'Besides, I observe that where there is pride there is always a distaste and dread of those who have much power of ridicule.'

'I suspect, too,' said Felix, 'that Lance has made the turn in life when one gets superfluously earnest, and nothing so upsets influence.

I have felt it myself.'

'So all this trouble and vexation has been weighing on the dear little fellow,' said Wilmet. 'No wonder he is not half so well as when he came home!'

'No,' said Felix; 'I wonder whether the Froggatts would let him come to them for a week or two, or whether it would be too dull to be good for him.'

'If his mind were settled about the future, it would be rest rather than dullness,' said John; 'but I think a good deal of his trouble is caused by Manby's verdict, and for that perhaps the best cure would be letting him have his wish.'

'You, John!' exclaimed Felix; 'I thought you would have put that out of his head!'

'On the contrary, he made me think there was a good deal in his arguments. First, as regards you, would he be of any real use?'

'Never mind that,' said Felix. 'I heard something to-day that would make it practicable; but I can't have that boy wasted.'

'The point is, what is waste? Now his strongest apt.i.tude never was for cla.s.sical work; and if he is not to touch a Latin book till Christmas, and then only cautiously, I do not see what chance he would have, even if Will were out of the way.

'And if not at Minsterham, so much the less anywhere else,' said Wilmet. 'Besides, it might be a dreadful risk if his head were to be overstrained.'

'And in the meantime, the being kept here doing nothing, and vexing himself, is wearing his spirits, and hurting him more than any light occupation, especially what he felt to be a labour of love.'

'That is quite true again,' said Felix. 'I quite believe he would be much happier if he began working with me to-morrow; but it might be letting a mere fit of impatience and despondency fix him for life in an uncongenial business.'

'I thought you preferred it!' exclaimed Wilmet.

'Oh yes,' said Felix, with a sort of half contempt in his tone; 'but these boys of ours are a different sort of stuff, and we have seen that it will never answer to pin them down to plod.'

'Lance would never be like Edgar!' exclaimed Wilmet; 'as if Edgar ever thought of doing anything so unselfish in his life!'

'O Wilmet! indeed he _thought_!' cried Cherry.

'Yes, but always of five or six years hence!' said Wilmet.

'Lance is very like Edgar,' said Felix. 'He has what I believe belongs to the artist temperament; and that he is the bravest, the most uncomplaining little fellow I ever came across, and probably would never break off what he had begun, makes me the more anxious not to let this access of generosity--ay, and tedium--lead to taking any decided step while he is so young.'