The six months' passion had aged him very considerably. There was an
immense gulf between Pen the victim of love, and Pen the innocent boy of
eighteen, sighing after it: and so Arthur Pendennis had all the
experience and superiority, besides that command which afterwards conceit
and imperiousness of disposition gave him over the young men with whom he
now began to live.
He and his uncle passed the morning with great satisfaction in making
purchases for the better comfort of the apartments which the lad was
about to occupy. Mr. Spicer's china and glass was in a dreadfully
dismantled condition, his lamps smashed, and his bookcases by no means so
spacious as those shelves which would be requisite to receive the
contents of the boxes which were lying in the hall at Fairoaks, and which
were addressed to Arthur in the hand of poor Helen.
The boxes arrived in a few days, that his mother had packed with so much
care. Pen was touched as he read the superscriptions in the dear
well-known hand, and he arranged in their proper places all the books,
his old friends, and all the linen and table-cloths which Helen had
selected from the family stock, and all the jam-pots which little Laura
had bound in straw, and the hundred simple gifts of home.
Pages:
380
381
382
383
384
385
386
387
388
389
390
391
392
393
394
395
396
397
398
399
400
401
402
403
404