Cornwall (England : County) -- Fiction; Fathers and sons -- Fiction
"I'd been thinking about you a good bit already. You see you changed
after Aunt Clare spoke to you that morning and I began to be rather
afraid of you--and when a chap begins to be afraid of some one he
begins to like him. I got Aunt Clare and Uncle Garrett to go and speak
to Dahlia, and they couldn't get anything out of her at all; so, then,
I began to wonder whether you could do anything, and as soon as I began
to wonder that I began to want to talk to you. But I never got much
chance; you were always in grandfather's room, and you didn't give me
much encouragement, did you? and then--I began to be awfully miserable.
I don't want to whine--I deserved it all right enough--but I didn't
seem to have a friend anywhere and all my things that I'd believed in
seemed to be worth nothing at all. Then I wanted to talk to you
awfully, and when grandfather was worse and was dying I began to see
things straight--and then I saw Mary and she told me right out what I
was, and I saw it all as clear as daylight.
"And so; well, I've come--not to ask you to help me about Dahlia--but
whether you'll help me to play the game better. I wasn't always slack
and rotten like I am now. When I was in Germany I thought I was going
to do all sorts of things ... but anyhow I can't say exactly all that I
mean. Only I'm awfully lonely and terribly ashamed; and I want you to
forgive me for being so beastly to you----"
He looked wretched enough as he sat there facing the fire with his lip
quivering. He made a strong effort to control himself, but in a moment
he had broken down altogether and hid his head in the arm of the chair,
sobbing as if his heart would break.
Harry waited. The moment for which he had longed so passionately had
come at last; all those weary weeks had now received their reward. But
he was very tired and he could not remember anything except that his
boy was there and that he was crying and wanted some one to help
him--which was very sentimental.
He got up from his chair and put his hand on Robin's shoulder.
"Robin, old boy--don't; it's all right really. I've been waiting for
you to come and speak to me; of course, I knew that you would come.
Never mind about those other things--we're going to have a splendid
time, you and I."
He put his arm round him. There was a moment's silence, then the boy
turned round and gripped his father's coat--then he buried his head in
his father's knees.
Benham entered half an hour later with Harry's evening meal.
"I will have mine here, too, Benham," said Robin, "with my father."
"There is one thing, Robin," said Harry a little later, laughing--"what
about the letters?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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