"No, boy; nothing now, for some time; I only know that he has been very successful over his ventures; has large works, and is prospering mightily, but, like the rest of the world, he forgets those by whose help he has risen."

"Oh, I don't think he is that sort of man, uncle. Of course, he is horribly busy."

"A man ought not to be too busy to recollect those who held the ladder for him to climb, Vane," said the doctor, warmly. "You saved him when he was in the lowest of low water."

"Oh, nonsense, uncle, I only saw what a muddle his work-people had made, just as they did with our greenhouse, and besides, don't you remember it was settled that I was to carve--didn't we call it--my own way."

The doctor uttered a grunt.

"That's all very well," began the doctor, but Vane interrupted him.

"I say, uncle, I've been thinking very deeply about my going to college."

"Well, what about it. Time you went, eh?"

"No, uncle, and I don't think I should like to go. Of course, I know the value of the college education, and the position it gives a man; but it means three years' study--three years waiting to begin, and three years--"

"Well, sir, three years what?"

"Expense to you, uncle."

"Now, look here, Vane," said the doctor, sternly, "when I took you, a poor miserable little fatherless and motherless boy, to bring up--and precious ugly you were--I made up my mind to do my duty by you."

"And so you have, uncle, far more than I deserved," said Vane, merrily.

"Silence, sir," cried the doctor, sternly. "I say--"

But whatever it was, he did not say it, for something happened.

Strange coincidences often occur in everyday life. One thinks of writing to a friend, and a letter comes from that friend, or a person may have formed the subject of conversation, and that person appears.

Somehow, just as the doctor had a.s.sumed his sternest look, the door of Vane's little atelier was darkened, and Mr Deering stood therein, looking bright, cheery of aspect, and, in appearance, ten years younger than on the night when he upset the table, and the Little Manor House was within an inch of being burned down.

"Mrs Lee said I should find you here," he said. "Why, doctor, how well you look. I'll be bound to say you never take much of your own physic.

Glad to see you again, old fellow," he cried, shaking hands very warmly.

"But, I beg your pardon, I did not know you were engaged with a stranger. Will you introduce me?"

"Oh, I say, Mr Deering," cried Vane.

"It is! The same voice grown gruff. The weatherc.o.c.k must want oiling.

Seriously, though, my dear boy, you have grown wonderfully. It's this Greythorpe air."

The doctor welcomed his old friend fairly enough, but a certain amount of constraint would show, and Deering evidently saw it, but he made no sign, and they went into the house, where Aunt Hannah met them in the drawing-room, looking a little fl.u.s.tered, consequent upon an encounter with Martha in the kitchen, that lady having declared that it would be impossible to make any further preparations for the dinner, even if a dozen gentlemen had arrived, instead of one.

"Ah, my dear Mrs Lee," said Deering, "and I have never kept my word about the refurnishing of this drawing-room. What a scene we had that night, and how time has gone since!"

Vane looked on curiously all the rest of that day, and could not help feeling troubled to see what an effort both his uncle and aunt made to be cordial to their guest, while being such simple, straightforward people, the more they tried, the more artificial and constrained they grew.

Deering ignored everything, and chatted away in the heartiest manner; declared that it was a glorious treat to come down in the country; walked in the garden, and admired the doctor's flowers and fruit, and bees, and made himself perfectly at home, saying that he had come down uninvited for a week's rest.

Vane began at last to feel angry and annoyed; but seizing his opportunity, the doctor whispered:--

"Don't forget, boy, that he is my guest. Prosperity has spoiled him, but I am not entertaining the successful inventor; I am only thinking of my old school-fellow whom I helped as a friend."

"All right, uncle, I'll be civil to him."

Six days glided slowly by, during which Deering monopolised the whole of everybody's time. He had the pony-carriage out, and made Vane borrow Miller Round's boat and row him up the river, and fish with him, returning at night to eat the doctor and Mrs Lee's excellent dinner, and drink the doctor's best port.

And now the sixth day--the evening--had arrived, and Aunt Hannah had said to Vane:--

"I am so glad, my dear. To-morrow, he goes back to town."

"And a jolly good job too, aunt!" cried Vane.

"Yes, my dear, but do be a little more particular what you say."

They were seated all together in the drawing-room, with Deering in the best of spirits, when all of a sudden, he exclaimed:--

"This is the sixth day! How time goes in your pleasant home, and I've not said a word yet about the business upon which I came. Well, I must make up for it now. Ready, Vane?"

"Ready for what, sir,--game at chess?"

"No, boy, work, business; you are rapidly growing into a man. I want help badly and the time has arrived. I've come down to settle what we arranged for about my young partner."

Had a sh.e.l.l fallen in the little drawing-room, no one could have looked more surprised.

Deering had kept his word.

In the course of the next morning a long and serious conversation ensued, which resulted evidently in Deering's disappointment on the doctor's declining to agree to the proposal.

"But, it is so quixotic of you, Lee," cried Deering, angrily.

"Wrong," replied the doctor, smiling in his old school-fellow's face; "the quixotism is on your side in making so big a proposal on Vane's behalf."

"But you are standing in the boy's light."

"Not at all. I believe I am doing what is best for him. He is far too young to undertake so responsible a position."

"Nonsense!"

"I think it sense," said the doctor, firmly. "Vane shall go to a large civil engineer's firm as pupil, and if, some years hence, matters seem to fit, make your proposition again about a partnership, and then we shall see."

Deering had to be content with this arrangement, and within the year Vane left Greythorpe, reluctantly enough, to enter upon his new career with an eminent firm in Great George Street, Westminster.

But he soon found plenty of change, and three years later, long after the rector's other pupils had taken flight, Vane found himself busy surveying in Brazil, and a.s.sisting in the opening out of that vast country.

It was hard but delightful work, full at times of excitement and adventure, till upon one unlucky day he was stricken down by malarious fever on the sh.o.r.es of one of the rivers.