His last sleepy recollection of that night was of standing with his aunt in the hall, where she was bidding her guests good-night, with the summer-night wind blowing in upon them through the open door, and the lights of the carriages outside, while every man gravely shook hands with him, and every woman insisted on kissing him. He wondered then what they would have thought if he had suddenly saluted in the fashion the captain had taught him. And with that thought he wondered what the captain was doing then, and whether he had missed his small boy friend. CHAPTER XII. THE CAPTAIN SPEAKS HIS MIND. If Miss Charlotte Carlaw, through all her strange life, had lived for such pleasures as she might manage to squeeze out of each day, with the aid of her wealth, it may be said that with Comethup's appearance she began to live for the gratification of her vanity in regard to the boy. She was fiercely jealous of him--jealous almost of any thought he gave to any one but herself; and yet she was as jealous, on the other hand, for his success in attracting notice, and in winning that very admiration the expression of which aroused her jealousy. She was torn always between two feelings in regard to him: she must be first and everything in his life; and yet others must worship him, and hold him, if possible, to be first in theirs. It was a strange, unnatural life for a child. He saw no one of his own age; he was waited on, at every hour of the day, by bowing, obsequious men and women, to whom often he would have been glad, but for the fear of his aunt, to be on a more friendly footing, and to have chatted naturally with; he met strange people, day after day, who talked of things he could not understand; and, despite all that was done for him, it must be confessed that he was often desperately lonely. Tutors had been provided for him, not only for elementary subjects, but for music and painting and other accomplishments. He had a passionate desire to learn, to become a great and clever man, if it were possible, although, of course, with the inconstancy of childhood, he changed his ideas of a profession at least once in every twenty-four hours. But of all the strange, unnatural life he led, perhaps the strangest and most unnatural times of all were some of the nights he spent with his aunt's guests. For it must be said at once that Miss Charlotte Carlaw had not been dubbed eccentric for nothing. The one passion of her life had been to be amused. A creature of moods, subject to horrible fits of depression and melancholy, she sought eagerly, and had sought all her days, for something to keep her mind employed and to drive away dulness. Her first dinner party had been highly respectable, because it was necessary that Comethup should be seen and valued by the best people; but some of the subsequent ones were of a different order altogether.