Page:Our Grandfather by Vítězslav Hálek (1887).pdf/77

 I used to go pretty often to visit grandfather at a later period, particularly during the summer time. I knew where his gardens and shrubberies were, and thus made straight for him, for grandfather in summer time was head gardener.

Grey-haired Vorjech was there his inseparable companion. He always stood in front of his kennel and growled when he observed me, for he could not remember my face. Grandfather basked in the sun, scolded Vorjech for not knowing me, and welcomed me with immense satisfaction. Sometimes I also found old Kubista with him.

When I asked him how he felt, he only smiled and said—

“Ah! well a-day! I am not now what I used to be.” And in these words lay all his confession; his whole life—everything.

And then, when I described to him what went on in Prague, at school and elsewhere, he forgot for very pleasure everything else in the world. He would not let me leave him, and I had to give him an account of everything I had heard and seen. It seemed as though a new world unrolled itself before his eyes. He always said by way of supplement, “Ah, well, Pepik” (so he had named my father) “knows how to bring up children—he did not learn it from me.”

It was once more St. Lawrence’s Festival, and I was already in the bloom of manhood.

It was holiday time and I had just written to my parents to say that I was going to grandfather’s for the festival, where I hoped they would meet me, and then after the festival we could return home together.

Just then memories of early days and our visits to grandfather and grandmother, came upon me with uncom-