Christopher Hibbault, Roadmaker Part 26

Aymer held out his hand.

"Yes, I've heard of you, Sam. Sit down, won't you?"

Sam sat down, his hands on his knees, and tried to find a safe spot on which to focus his eyes.

"Now, isn't it a jolly room," began Christopher triumphantly, "didn't I tell you?"

"It's big," said Sam cautiously.

"Christopher, behave yourself. Don't mind his bad manners, Sam. It's sheer nervousness on his part, he can't help it."

A newspaper was flung dexterously across his face.

"Which gives point to my remark," continued Aymer, calmly folding it.

"Well, have you enjoyed your day? Madness, I call it, the river in March!"

Christopher plunged into an account of their jaunt to which his companion listened in complete bewilderment, hardly recognising the simple pleasures of their holiday in their dress of finished detail and humour.

"Is that a true account?" asked Aymer, catching the tail of a broad grin.

"I didn't see the water-rat dressing himself, or the girl with the red shoes," said Sam slowly. "My, what a chap you are, Christopher, to spin a yarn. Wish I could reel it off to mother and the kids like that."

He found himself in a few minutes discoursing with Aymer on the variety and history of his family. It was not for some minutes or so that the great subject was approached.

"I suppose," said Aymer at last, "I need not ask if you and Christopher have been discussing his little plan for your future. What do you think of it, Sam?"

Christopher got up and walked to the window. Minute by minute a sense of overwhelming disappointment and shame obliterated the once plausible idea. It was not only an opportunity missed, it was wasted, thrown away. What glory or distinctions, what ambitions could be fulfilled in the narrow confines of a grocer's shop--a nightmare vision of an interminable vista of red canisters, mahogany counters, biscuit boxes and marble slabs, swam before his eyes. It was no use denying it. It was a cruel disappointment ... and what would Caesar think?

Meanwhile Sam, in answer to Aymer's questions, had stumbled out the statement he thought it a rattling fine thing for him and was very much obliged.

"And you know your own mind on the point?" demanded Aymer, watching him closely.

Sam coughed nervously. "Yes, I always knew what I wanted to be. I told him," with a backward jerk of his head towards Christopher.

This was better than Aymer had expected. A boy with an ambition and a mind of his own was worth a.s.sisting.

"Well, what is it. Will you tell me too?"

Sam looked at him out of the corner of his shrewd eyes. "It's you as is really doing it, sir?"

"What is it?"

"It's like this," began Sam, hesitating; "it costs money,--my top ambition; but it's a paying thing and if anyone would be kind enough to start me on it I'd work off the money in time. I know I could."

"I'm afraid Christopher hasn't quite explained," said Aymer quietly; "it's not a question of investing money on your industry. I don't expect him to pay back the cost of starting him in life. You are to start on precisely the same ground."

Sam got red. "He--he belongs to you--it's different," he began.

"What is your ambition?"

"Grocery business. I've told him. Ever since I was a bit of a chap that high I've wanted it. I never could get a job in a shop, but if I was regularly apprenticed now--if that wasn't too much?"

Aymer's glance meandered thoughtfully to the distant Christopher, still staring out of the window; a shadow of a smile rose to his lips.

"Yes, that would not be difficult to manage, Sam. How old are you?"

"Over sixteen, sir. There's money in grocery, sir. I could pay it back. I'm sure I could."

Aymer lay still, thinking. "What sort of schooling have you had? Not much? Pa.s.sed the fifth standard young?"

"But it takes a long time for a 'prentice to work up," said Sam, watching him eagerly.

"I'm thinking of another way," said Aymer slowly. "Christopher."

He rejoined them, standing by the grate and kicking the logs into place. He did not look at Aymer.

"Sam has been telling me of his wishes," said Aymer. "I think them quite excellent, but I've not quite decided on the best way to carry them out. Go away and get your dinner and come back to me afterwards."

The boys departed, and once in Christopher's den, the host turned to his guest questioningly.

"Well, what do you think of Caesar?"

"He's a stunner, a jolly sight more sensible than you, Chris. But I say," he added in a grumpy, husky voice, "is he always like that?"

"Like what?"

"On a sofa. Lying down."

"Yes," said Christopher shortly. He had become almost as sensitive on that point as Aymer himself.

"He must get a bit tired of it. Didn't he ever walk?"

"Yes, of course. It was a shooting accident. Shut up, Sam, we all hate talking of it."

The dinner that was served immediately somehow impressed Sam more than any other event of the day. He had occasionally had a meal in a restaurant with Christopher, and once had been in a dining-room at an hotel, but it all seemed different to this intimate, comfortable dinner. The white napery, the s.h.i.+ning silver and delicate gla.s.s and china, the serving of the simple meal was a revelation of his friend's life, for Christopher took it all as a matter of course and was unabashed by the presence of the second footman who waited on them.

There was soup, and cutlets in little paper dresses, tomatoes and potatoes that bore no resemblance to the grimy vegetables Sam dispensed daily. Then came strange bird-shaped things, about the size of sparrows which Christopher called chicken and which had no bones in them, cherry tart, with innumerable trifles with it, afterwards something that looked like a solid browny-yellow cake, which gave way to nothing when cut, and tasted of cheese. Finally there was fruit, that was a crowning point, for Sam knew what pears cost that time of year, and said so.

Christopher laughed. "These come from Marden," he explained. "Marden's noted for pears; they have storages of different temperatures and keep them back or ripen them as wanted. The fire's jolly after all, isn't it?"

He stretched out his long legs to the fender, a very contented young Sybarite for the moment.

"I say, Chris," said Sam abruptly, "I must tell you though you'll think it pretty low of me. But after you came and told us you were living here with Mr. Aston I used to ask people about him. One day I came round here and ... somehow I never took it in. I knew in a way you lived here, but I didn't know it was like this...." He stumbled over his words in an embarra.s.sed fas.h.i.+on.

"Like what?" demanded Christopher shortly.

"Well, I thought you was here like a sort of servant--not with them exactly--I see now, I never took it in before--you with your own rooms and walking in at the front door and ordering dinner and them blokes in the hall saying 'sir' to you--oh, lor'."