When the meal was over, and Edward Webb was sitting again in the red-cushioned chair, while Clara washed the tea-things and her husband fetched more coal for the fire, Alexander approached, and gave him a furtive touch on the shoulder. "Here's the book," he said, "and thank you." "You've read it all?" "Twice." "What's your other name?" "Rutherford, we're called." Edward Webb took a pen from his waistcoat pocket and opened the book. "It is yours if you will have it," he said, and wrote the boy's name above his own. "I should like you to have it." He was deprecatingly courteous. "You have been very good to me, and I hope the book will be as good a friend to you." "I cannot thank you," said Alexander hesitatingly, twisting the book. He was blushing deeply and biting his lips, but the rush of his next words would not be stayed. "But I'll never forget you," he cried. "A thing like this hasn't happened to me before," and with that he sank to the fender and sat there, keeping his watchful dark gaze on Edward Webb's face. They fell into conversation after a time. "Do you go to school?" "Yes; over the hills to Browick. It's a good step. The Grammar School. There's nothing here but the Church School. I went there till I could walk to Browick, and glad I was to go." "Oh? What was the matter?" "Why," he cried, "he roared at us! He was that kind of man. He's there yet, but he's getting old." "Perhaps he doesn't roar so loudly now." "Oh yes, he does. I've heard him at it; but they tell me he's not quite so handy with the stick. It wasn't the stick I minded, though he had a strong arm. I'll tell you how it was. When he shouted at us, 'William the Conqueror, 1066,' or 'An island is a piece of land'--you know, anything--I felt it wasn't true, else why did he expect to be contradicted? It was a long time before I would believe my dates, but the island was simpler--I'd seen them." "You had no confidence in him, in fact." "That was it." "Things are different now, I suppose. But it's a rough walk in winter-time, isn't it?" "Yes." He was not ready to tell anyone of his joy in that daily walk, in summer and in winter, when hailstones pounded him in the face, when he was drenched with rain or scorched with sun. Moreover, reserve was not his only reason for silence. It seemed that always his father tried to thwart him, and if he knew how much he loved the hills and the mists and the sunshine, the rare birds and the smell of peat, the getting of knowledge from men who were not afraid of questions and did not roar, then, perhaps, with the perverseness that baffled and angered his son, he would take him from the school. So never a word of pleasure had Alexander let fall, for fear his happiness should be taken from him, and never a word of discontent, because he did not care to lie; but his passion for the hills grew stronger, and his analysis of his father's character became acute.