Little Lord Fauntleroy Frances Hodgson Burnett (best english novels to read txt) 📖

with such goodwill. The Earl, too, looked rather queer, once, as he glanced sidewise down at the flushed little face. When they entered the room where they were to dine, Cedric saw it was a very large and imposing one, and that the footman who stood behind the chair at the head of the table stared very hard as they came in.

But they reached the chair at last. The hand was removed from his shoulder, and the Earl was fairly seated.

Cedric took out Dick’s handkerchief and wiped his forehead.

“It’s a warm night, isn’t it?” he said. “Perhaps you need a fire because⁠—because of your foot, but it seems just a little warm to me.”

His delicate consideration for his noble relative’s feelings was such that he did not wish to seem to intimate that any of his surroundings were unnecessary.

“You have been doing some rather hard work,” said the Earl.

“Oh, no!” said Lord Fauntleroy, “it wasn’t exactly hard, but I got a little warm. A person will get warm in summer time.”

And he rubbed his damp curls rather vigorously with the gorgeous handkerchief. His own chair was placed at the other end of the table, opposite his grandfather’s. It was a chair with arms, and intended for a much larger individual than himself; indeed, everything he had seen so far⁠—the great rooms, with their high ceilings, the massive furniture, the big footman, the big dog, the Earl himself⁠—were all of proportions calculated to make this little lad feel that he was very small, indeed. But that did not trouble him; he had never thought himself very large or important, and he was quite willing to accommodate himself even to circumstances which rather overpowered him.

Perhaps he had never looked so little a fellow as when seated now in his great chair, at the end of the table. Notwithstanding his solitary existence, the Earl chose to live in some state. He was fond of his dinner, and he dined in a formal style. Cedric looked at him across a glitter of splendid glass and plate, which to his unaccustomed eyes seemed quite dazzling. A stranger looking on might well have smiled at the picture⁠—the great stately room, the big liveried servants, the bright lights, the glittering silver and glass, the fierce-looking old nobleman at the head of the table and the very small boy at the foot. Dinner was usually a very serious matter with the Earl⁠—and it was a very serious matter with the cook, if his lordship was not pleased or had an indifferent appetite. Today, however, his appetite seemed a trifle better than usual, perhaps because he had something to think of beside the flavor of the entrées and the management of the gravies. His grandson gave him something to think of. He kept looking at him across the table. He did not say very much himself, but he managed to make the boy talk. He had never imagined that he could be entertained by hearing a child talk, but Lord Fauntleroy at once puzzled and amused him, and he kept remembering how he had let the childish shoulder feel his weight just for the sake of trying how far the boy’s courage and endurance would go, and it pleased him to know that his grandson had not quailed and had not seemed to think even for a moment of giving up what he had undertaken to do.

“You don’t wear your coronet all the time?” remarked Lord Fauntleroy respectfully.

“No,” replied the Earl, with his grim smile; “it is not becoming to me.”

“Mr. Hobbs said you always wore it,” said Cedric; “but after he thought it over, he said he supposed you must sometimes take it off to put your hat on.”

“Yes,” said the Earl, “I take it off occasionally.”

And one of the footmen suddenly turned aside and gave a singular little cough behind his hand.

Cedric finished his dinner first, and then he leaned back in his chair and took a survey of the room.

“You must be very proud of your house,” he said, “it’s such a beautiful house. I never saw anything so beautiful; but, of course, as I’m only seven, I haven’t seen much.”

“And you think I must be proud of it, do you?” said the Earl.

“I should think anyone would be proud of it,” replied Lord Fauntleroy. “I should be proud of it if it were my house. Everything about it is beautiful. And the park, and those trees⁠—how beautiful they are, and how the leaves rustle!”

Then he paused an instant and looked across the table rather wistfully.

“It’s a very big house for just two people to live in, isn’t it?” he said.

“It is quite large enough for two,” answered the Earl. “Do you find it too large?”

His little lordship hesitated a moment.

“I was only thinking,” he said, “that if two people lived in it who were not very good companions, they might feel lonely sometimes.”

“Do you think I shall make a good companion?” inquired the Earl.

“Yes,” replied Cedric, “I think you will. Mr. Hobbs and I were great friends. He was the best friend I had except Dearest.”

The Earl made a quick movement of his bushy eyebrows.

“Who is Dearest?”

“She is my mother,” said Lord Fauntleroy, in a rather low, quiet little voice.

Perhaps he was a trifle tired, as his bedtime was nearing, and perhaps after the excitement of the last few days it was natural he should be tired, so perhaps, too, the feeling of weariness brought to him a vague sense of loneliness in the remembrance that tonight he was not to sleep at home, watched over by the loving eyes of that “best friend” of his. They had always been “best friends,” this boy and his young mother. He could not help thinking of her, and the more he thought of her the less was he inclined to talk, and by the time the dinner was at an end the Earl saw that there was a faint shadow on his face. But Cedric bore himself with excellent