CHAPTER VIII.

"GOOD-BYE."

"I am rather glad to have found you alone, Clem," said Lord Loughton, as he walked into his son's studio in the course of the day following that on which he had received Mr. Flicker's check for a hundred and fifty pounds. "I have something rather particular to say to you."

Clem knew of old that his father's "something particular" generally took the shape of a request for a loan, so he merely said, "Macer won't be back for a couple of hours. Will you have a weed and some bottled ale?"

"Thank you, no. I can't stay many minutes. How are you progressing with your Academy picture? That, of course, is the most important affair in the universe just now. I believe, if there were an earthquake to-morrow that swallowed up a thousand people, all that you painter fellows would do would be to cry, 'Save my pictures.' The egotism of art is something sublime."

"We dignify it with another name," answered Clem, with a laugh. "With us it becomes 'devotion to art.'" He had had too much experience of his father's tirades to take much notice of them. "I shall get my picture done, I suppose, and send it in. Beyond that I know nothing. But as you don't care about modern paintings, I need not bore you by asking your opinion of it."

"Well, no, it's hardly worth while. I never see anything later than Sir Joshua that I care about. English art is dead--defunct as a door-nail."

"I am glad that the people with money don't all think as you do. But you had something particular to say to me."

"Yes; I am going to leave London for a time."

Clem suspended his brush in mid-air and stared at his father.

"A friend of mine, a gentleman whom I knew many years ago, has just succeeded to a very large property. As he is obliged to reside abroad on account of his health, he has asked me to undertake the management of his affairs for a time. He has extensive estates in different parts of the country, all of which require to be carefully looked after, so that I shall have no fixed location for any length of time. For reasons which you will not ask me to explain, I cannot give the name of my friend, nor can I tell you with certainty where I may be found at any particular date; but that will not matter, as I shall run up to London for a day or two to see _la mère_ and you every month or six weeks. Should any occasion arise for you to communicate with me while I am away, a letter will always find me, addressed 'John Fildew, Esquire, Post-office, Shallowford, Northamptonshire.' You had better put the address down in your pocket-book so as to make sure of it."

"Have you broken the news to my mother?" asked Clem, as he wrote down the address.

"Yes; I mentioned it to her this morning, and though, of course, poor creature, she was rather cut up at first, she soon recovered her equanimity and agreed with me that it was all for the best. You see, Clem, this is just the sort of thing I have been looking out for for years--gentlemanly, dignified, not too much to do, and yet with an honorarium attached to it that, in the present state of our finances, we cannot afford to despise. For one thing, my dear boy, there will no longer be any necessity for my imposing on your good-nature, in addition to which I shall be in a position to make your mother an allowance of five guineas per month. I gave her the first five guineas this morning before leaving home."

"You need not have done that, sir," interposed Clem. "My mother should not have wanted for anything during your absence."

"I am quite sure of that, my boy. But in making this little arrangement I feel that I am simply doing my duty--and what a luxury for one's conscience that is!" His lordship's conscience had not been used to such luxuries for a long time, and probably appreciated them all the more by reason of their rarity.

"In addition to my allowance of five guineas per mensem," continued the earl, "your mother will have her own private income of fifty pounds a year, and will no longer have me for an encumbrance; so that, all things considered, she ought to be, and doubtless will be, tolerably comfortable. There is one thing, however, Clem, that she wishes you to do. After I am gone she would like you to go back and sleep in your old room. She is rather timorous, poor thing, at the thought of being left alone."

"Of course I shall do that, sir," said Clem.

"Then I need not detain you longer. If you have half an hour to spare this evening before your mother's bedtime, look in and we will talk these matters over more in extenso." And extending a couple of fingers to his son and nodding a good-morning, the earl went, leaving Clem at a loss whether to be more pleased or sorry at what he had just heard.

The private income of fifty pounds a year to which Lord Loughton had referred when speaking of his wife was all that was now left of the fortune he had received with her on her wedding-day. It would hardly be too much to say that it was on account of that fortune he had married her. She was an orphan, the daughter of English parents who had emigrated to America. Her father had been originally a poor man, but had made a fortune during the last three or four years of his life. She fell in love with the handsome English scapegrace at a boarding-house where they happened to meet, and being her own mistress and well-to-do, and divining that he was poor--how poor she did not know till afterwards--she was not long in letting him see the preference which she felt for him. He, on his side, when once satisfied that her fortune was not a myth, was an ardent lover enough, and at the end of a few weeks they were married. Not till the wedding morn did the bride know that her husband's name was not John Fildew, but John Marmaduke Lorrimore, and that same evening she was made to take a solemn oath never to divulge to living soul the secret of her husband's real name. So faithfully had the promise then given been kept that not even her own son had the remotest suspicion that the name he called himself by was not his own. As years slipped away Mrs. Fildew's fortune also slipped away, till nothing of it was left save the aforesaid fifty pounds per year, the principal of which neither she nor her husband could touch. With the struggling, poverty-stricken years that followed when the bulk of the fortune was gone we have nothing here to do.

It was owing to Clem's persuasions that his father and mother had at length agreed to remove all the way from Long Island to London. The lad had developed a remarkable talent for painting, but had got the idea into his head that he could have better instruction and make more rapid progress in London than elsewhere. But, in addition to that, Mr. Fildew, senior, was heartily sick of the States. So to London they had come, and there they had lived ever since. Clem, what with painting and what with drawing on wood for the magazines, was slowly but surely making his way, and was not only able to keep himself--in very modest style, it is true--but could also spare his father a pound a week for pocket-money. What he did in the way of helping his mother at odd times was known to no one but him and her. He had lived at home till home was no longer comfortable for him; and even his mother had at length urged him to go into lodgings on his own account. That mother, whom he loved so well, was slowly but surely dying of an incurable complaint. She had been ill for years, and might be ill for years longer, before the end came; but that it was surely coming both she and those about her knew full well. And this knowledge it was that made the one great trouble of Clem's life.

The earl felt that he had much to do before his departure from London. After again seeing his son in the evening, but without giving him many more details as to his future proceedings than he had given him in the morning, he set out for the Brown Bear. This would be his last evening at the old haunt for a long time to come, if not forever; and when he called to mind the many pleasant hours he had spent in the little coffee-room, he felt quite sentimental--far more sentimental than he had felt at the thought of parting from his wife and son.

There was an extraordinary muster at the Brown Bear this evening, it having got noised about that it was Mr. Fildew's farewell visit. As a consequence, Mr. Fildew had to enter into particulars, which he detested doing, as to the why and the wherefore of his going away. He told them the same story that he had told to his son, with certain variations, the gist of it being that a very old friend of his had come into a large fortune and needed his, Mr. Fildew's, services as guide, philosopher, and friend.

Mr. Nutt was unanimously voted into the chair, and a very pleasant and convivial evening followed. Mr. Fildew's health was drunk with musical honors, to which "His Grace" responded in a few well-chosen sentences, and wound up by ordering the landlord to bring in his biggest punch-bowl filled to the brim. On the heels of the first bowl came another; and when twelve o'clock struck several of the gentlemen present were hardly in a condition to find their way unaided to their homes, so that, as several of them afterwards averred, it was one of the pleasantest evenings they ever remembered to have spent.

At dusk, next afternoon, Lord Loughton bade farewell to his humble lodgings. His last words to his wife were to the effect that she might expect to see him again in three weeks or a month. Clem's offer to accompany him to the station was firmly negatived. However, Clem saw him into the cab, and heard him give instructions to be driven to King's Cross. Then there was a last wave of the hand and he was gone.