The Magnificent Ambersons - Booth Tarkington (top novels of all time TXT) 📗

back on if you get too pinched, until I can begin to send you a dribble now and then.”

George’s “little tiny bit” was six hundred dollars which had come to him from the sale of his mother’s furniture; and the “little tiny salary” was eight dollars a week which old Frank Bronson was to pay him for services as a clerk and student-at-law. Old Frank would have offered more to the Major’s grandson, but since the death of that best of clients and his own experience with automobile headlights, he was not certain of being able to pay more and at the same time settle his own small bills for board and lodging. George had accepted haughtily, and thereby removed a burden from his uncle’s mind.

Amberson himself, however, had not even a “tiny bit”; though he got his consular appointment; and to take him to his post he found it necessary to borrow two hundred of his nephew’s six hundred dollars. “It makes me sick, George,” he said. “But I’d better get there and get that salary started. Of course Eugene would do anything in the world, and the fact is he wanted to, but I felt that⁠—ah⁠—under the circumstances⁠—”

“Never!” George exclaimed, growing red. “I can’t imagine one of the family⁠—” He paused, not finding it necessary to explain that “the family” shouldn’t turn a man from the door and then accept favours from him. “I wish you’d take more.”

Amberson declined. “One thing I’ll say for you, young George; you haven’t a stingy bone in your body. That’s the Amberson stock in you⁠—and I like it!”

He added something to this praise of his nephew on the day he left for Washington. He was not to return, but to set forth from the capital on the long journey to his post. George went with him to the station, and their farewell was lengthened by the train’s being several minutes late.

“I may not see you again, Georgie,” Amberson said; and his voice was a little husky as he set a kind hand on the young man’s shoulder. “It’s quite probable that from this time on we’ll only know each other by letter⁠—until you’re notified as my next of kin that there’s an old valise to be forwarded to you, and perhaps some dusty curios from the consulate mantelpiece. Well, it’s an odd way for us to be saying goodbye: one wouldn’t have thought it, even a few years ago, but here we are, two gentlemen of elegant appearance in a state of bustitude. We can’t ever tell what will happen at all, can we? Once I stood where we’re standing now, to say goodbye to a pretty girl⁠—only it was in the old station before this was built, and we called it the ‘depot.’ She’d been visiting your mother, before Isabel was married, and I was wild about her, and she admitted she didn’t mind that. In fact, we decided we couldn’t live without each other, and we were to be married. But she had to go abroad first with her father, and when we came to say goodbye we knew we wouldn’t see each other again for almost a year. I thought I couldn’t live through it⁠—and she stood here crying. Well, I don’t even know where she lives now, or if she is living⁠—and I only happen to think of her sometimes when I’m here at the station waiting for a train. If she ever thinks of me she probably imagines I’m still dancing in the ballroom at the Amberson Mansion, and she probably thinks of the Mansion as still beautiful⁠—still the finest house in town. Life and money both behave like loose quicksilver in a nest of cracks. And when they’re gone we can’t tell where⁠—or what the devil we did with ’em! But I believe I’ll say now⁠—while there isn’t much time left for either of us to get embarrassed about it⁠—I believe I’ll say that I’ve always been fond of you, Georgie, but I can’t say that I always liked you. Sometimes I’ve felt you were distinctly not an acquired taste. Until lately, one had to be fond of you just naturally⁠—this isn’t very ‘tactful,’ of course⁠—for if he didn’t, well, he wouldn’t! We all spoiled you terribly when you were a little boy and let you grow up en prince⁠—and I must say you took to it! But you’ve received a pretty heavy jolt, and I had enough of your disposition, myself, at your age, to understand a little of what cocksure youth has to go through inside when it finds that it can make terrible mistakes. Poor old fellow! You get both kinds of jolts together, spiritual and material⁠—and you’ve taken them pretty quietly and⁠—well, with my train coming into the shed, you’ll forgive me for saying that there have been times when I thought you ought to be hanged⁠—but I’ve always been fond of you, and now I like you! And just for a last word: there may be somebody else in this town who’s always felt about you like that⁠—fond of you, I mean, no matter how much it seemed you ought to be hanged. You might try⁠—Hello, I must run. I’ll send back the money as fast as they pay me⁠—so, goodbye and God bless you, Georgie!”

He passed through the gates, waved his hat cheerily from the other side of the iron screen, and was lost from sight in the hurrying crowd. And as he disappeared, an unexpected poignant loneliness fell upon his nephew so heavily and so suddenly that he had no energy to recoil from the shock. It seemed to him that the last fragment of his familiar world had disappeared, leaving him all alone forever.

He walked homeward slowly through what appeared to be the strange streets of a strange city; and, as a matter of fact, the city was strange to him. He had seen little of it during his years in college, and then had followed