The doctor was not in his room when the boy was ushered in, and it seemed an age before he entered.
"You are Mr Cruden's son?" said he gravely.
"He was brought here about half-past three, insensible, with apoplexy."
"Is he better now?" asked Horace again, knowing perfectly well what the dreaded answer would be.
"He is not, my boy," said the doctor gravely. "We telegraphed to your mother at once, as you know--but before that telegram could have reached her your poor father--"
It was enough. Poor Horace closed his ears convulsively against the fatal word, and dropped back on his chair with a gasp.
The doctor put his hand kindly on the boy's shoulder.
"Are you here alone?" said he, presently.
"My mother and brother will be here directly."
"Your father lies in a private ward. Will you wait till they come, or will you go up now?"
A struggle passed through the boy's mind. An instinctive horror of a sight hitherto unknown struggled hard with the impulse to rush at once to his father's bedside. At length he said, falteringly,--
When Mrs Cruden and Reginald arrived half an hour later, they found Horace where the doctor had left him, on his knees at his father's bedside.
Mr Cruden had the reputation of being one of the most respectable as well as one of the richest men in his part of the county. And it is fair to say he took far more pride in the former quality than the latter. Indeed, he made no secret of the fact that he had not always been the rich man he was when our story opens. But he was touchy on the subject of his good family and his title to the name of gentleman, which he had taught his sons to value far more than the wealth which accompanied it, and which they might some day expect to inherit.
His choice of a school for them was quite consistent with his views on this point. Wilderham was not exactly an aristocratic school, but it was a school where money was thought less of than "good style," as the boys called it, and where poverty was far less of a disgrace than even a remote connection with a "shop." The Crudens had always been great heroes in the eyes of their schoolfellows, for their family was unimpeachable, and even with others who had greater claims to be considered as aristocratic, their ample pocket-money commended them as most desirable companions.