Then he looked at the white moustache, the grizzled hair, the
bright brown eyes suffused with answering dimness, and said, almost
remorsefully, "Father, good-bye. You meant me well, no doubt. You
thought you were befriending me. But I wish to Heaven in my soul
you had meant me worse. It would have been easier for me to bear
in the end. If you'd brought me up as a nobody--as a younger son's
accustomed--" He paused and drew back, for he could see his words
were too cruel for that proud man's heart. Then he broke off
suddenly.
"But I CAN'T say good-bye to my mother," he went on, with a piteous
look. "If I tried to say good-bye to her, I must tell her all. I'd
break down in the attempt. I'll write to her from the Cape. It'll
be easier so. She won't feel it so much then."
"From the Cape!" Colonel Kelmscott exclaimed, drawing back in horror.
"Oh, Granville, don't tell me you're going away from us to Africa!"
"Where else?" his son asked, looking him back in the face steadily.
"Africa it is! That's the only opening left nowadays for a man
of spirit. There, I may be able to hew out a place for myself at
last, worthy of Lady Emily Kelmscott's son. I won't come back till
I come back able to hold my own in the world with the best of them.
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