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He must take his own course," declared Wisbech. Gordon grinned as he turned to Nasmyth. "There will be no reinforcements. You have to win your spurs." Then he looked at Wisbech. "If you will not be offended, sir, I would like to say I'm pleased to notice that your ideas coincide with mine. He'll be the tougher afterwards if you let him put up his fight alone."
Acton's gesture was expressive of resignation. "I guessed it. However, it seems to me that young man has quite enough friends to give him a shove here and there already. To begin with, there's Wisbech." "What would Wisbech do?" "Not much." And Acton smiled understandingly. "He means to let his nephew feel his own feet. He's a sensible man.
It was in most respects a fortuitous moment for Wisbech's nephew to meet him, and the older man smiled as Nasmyth strode along the track to grasp his outstretched hand. "I'm glad to see you, Derrick," said Wisbech, who drew back a pace and looked at his nephew critically. "You have changed since I last shook hands with you in London, my lad," he continued.
The wind was contrary, and it was not until the last day of August that he dropped anchor in the Medway. After spending a night at Chatham, he posted up to London the next morning, and, finding convenient chambers in the Savoy, he installed himself there, and then proceeded to the house of the Earl of Wisbech, to whom he was the bearer of a letter from his son.
He would not have done this to everybody, though they are a hospitable people in the West, but he had recognized in the unostentatious Wisbech one or two of the characteristics that were somewhat marked in himself, and his wife, as it happened, extended her favour to Nasmyth as soon as she saw him.
The man, who paid no attention to him, stopped close by, and shouted to some of his comrades below. "You ought to get that beam fixed before the fast freight comes through, boys. There's no sign of her yet," he called in a loud voice. Somebody answered him, and the man turned to Wisbech. "Now, sir," he replied tardily, "you were asking for Nasmyth?"
Wisbech said he wished to see Derrick Nasmyth, and the man nodded. "Well," said he, "you'll have to wait a few minutes, I guess he's busy. There's a log they want to put into the trestle before the train comes along. It's not his particular business, but we're rather anxious to get through with our contract." "Ah," returned Wisbech, "then I fancy I know who you must be.
Two men in a Hamburg ship refused to give him a passage, but a third, for the price of his silver-gilt bowl, let him come aboard. Harrison was landed, without even his bowl, at Lisbon, where he instantly met a man from Wisbech, in Lincolnshire.
"The assurance is naturally satisfactory," said Wisbech with quiet amusement. Then he held up one hand. "It seems to me the person at the piano is playing exceptionally well."
He would not hasten to remove a wrong impression concerning himself. "Well," resumed Wisbech, seeing he did not answer, "if you care to go back and take up your profession in England again, I think I can contrive to give you a fair start. You needn't be diffident. I can afford it, and the thing is more or less my duty." Nasmyth sat silent.
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