Page 129 - Fairbrass

And well he might be. He had been
at that funeral of forty years ago, and his

father’s hand had held his hand just as he
now held that of his own boy. Back came

the whole scene to him, and with the picture

regrets — vain regrets — and a hopeless
longing to recall the past. Well, the service

was soon over, and when the weeping

housekeeper had caused the now-faded
flowers that Fairbrass had gathered, to be

placed 011 the coffin, they all walked away.
The lawyer came up to Fairbrass and

his father.
1 Now,’ he said to the latter, ‘ I want

you to alter your obstinate mind, and come

back to the house and hear the will read ;
but I suppose I might as well speak to the

churchyard wall. ’
* If you wish it, I wull come/ said the

father in a voice so strangely softened that
the other started ; ‘ though, mind you,’ he

hastily added, ‘ I know—for you have told

me so over and over again— that I am not
mentioned in iL ’