Page:Adams - A Child of the Age.djvu/52

40 I found him in the study taking off his gown. He received me affably. Yes, he had received a letter (this was it!) from Mr. Mr. Cholmeley, yes Mr. Cholmeley—My uncle? Ah yes, my uncle!—asking permission from him to allow me to spend the first fortnight of my midsummer vacation with him at Seabay in the Isle of Wight. Colonel James had been good enough to make his (Craven's) permission a requisite? Well (looking up from his inspection of the letter), he had no objection to my going: no objection: No. Mr. Cholmeley was my uncle? Did I know if he was any relation of … Ah, it must be the same, he saw: Charles K. Cholmeley.—He had not noticed the initials.

'Are you aware, Leicester,' he said with his foolish blinking smile, 'that Mr. Cholmeley is one of the greatest authorities on the Greek tragedians that we have? What, what } You weren't aware of it?… Now I hope you'll be careful not to …' And so on. The end of it being that he informed me, after a pause, that he thought a fortnight at Seabay would do me good. I was not to forget to warn Mrs. Jones of the change in my plans. There were some charming pieces of scenery in the neighbourhood of Seabay.

' That is,' he said with another of his silly grins, 'if you care for charming pieces of scenery, Leicester? What, what?'

I thought that it would be purposeless to say to him that I did or how much I did: so kept silence with my eyes on the ground, waiting for the old fool to finish.

'Well, well!' he said. 'Perhaps that will come later on!—You may go, Leicester.'

I went out and up into my study, and sat down in a chair, tilting it back and putting my feet against the table by the window looking out on to the quad., and began to think whether I really wanted to go and see my uncle, or wasn't it foolish to give up the pleasure of an extra fortnight alone on the river? 'Well,' I said, getting up, 'I shall go now I suppose.'

The remaining week passed with imperceptible fleetness. I read a good deal: stalked out and over the fields to the bathing-place twice or three times, and sculled a little up the river.