Kitabı oku: «Nurse Heatherdale's Story», sayfa 5

'You needn't scold me about spilling the ink on Francis's book!' she said angrily. 'You know that was an accident.'

'There's accidents and accidents,' I replied, which I know wasn't wise; but the child had tried my temper too, I won't deny.

I took Miss Lally into a corner of the day nursery and talked to her in a low voice, not to disturb Master Francis, who was still busy writing.

'My dear,' I said, 'so far as I can put a stop to it, I won't have Miss Bess teasing you, but all the same I can't have you screaming in that terrible way for really nothing at all. Your own sense might tell you that there's no such things as fairies changing babies in that way. Miss Bess only said it to tease.'

She was still sobbing, but all the same she had not forgotten to wrap up her precious knitting in her little apron, so that her cousin shouldn't catch sight of it, and her heart was already softening to her sister.

'Queen didn't mean to make me cry,' she said. 'But I can't bear that story; nobody would love me if I was only a pertence little girl.'

'But you're not that, my dear; you're a very real little girl,' I said. 'You're your papa's and mamma's dear little daughter and God's own child. That's what your christening meant.'

Miss Lally's sobs stopped.

'I forgot about that,' she said very gravely, seeming to find great comfort in the thought. 'If I had been a pertence little girl, I couldn't have been took to church like Baby was. Could I? And I know I was, for I have got godfather and godmother and a silver mug wif my name on.'

'And better things than that, thank God, as you'll soon begin to understand, my dear Miss Lally,' I answered, as she held up her little face to be kissed.

'May I go back to Queen now?' she asked, but I don't think she was altogether sorry when I shook my head.

'Not just yet, my dear, I think,' I replied.

'Only where am I to do my knitting?' she whispered. 'I can't do it here; Francie would be sure to see,' and the corners of her mouth began to go down again. 'Oh! I know,' she went on in another moment, brightening up. 'I could work so nicely in the attic, there's a little seat in the corner, by the window, where Francie and I used to go sometimes when Sharp told us to get out of the way.'

'Wouldn't you be cold, my dear,' I said doubtfully. But I was anxious to please her, so I fetched a little shawl for her and we went up together to the attic.

It did not feel chilly, and the corner by the window – the kind they call a 'storm window,' with a sort of little separate roof of its own – was very cosy. You have a peep of the sea from that window too.

'Isn't it a good plan?' said Miss Lally joyfully. 'I can knit here so nicely, and I have been getting on so well this afternoon. There's no stitches dropped, not one, nursie. Mightn't I come here every day?'

'We'll see, my dear,' I said, thinking to myself that it might really be good for her – being a nervous child, and excitable too, for all she seemed so quiet – to be at peace and undisturbed now and then by herself. 'We'll see, only you must come downstairs at once if you feel cold or chilly.'

I looked round me as I was leaving the attic. There was a big cupboard, or closet rather, at the end near the door. Miss Lally's window was at this end too. The closet door stood half open, but it seemed empty.

'That's where we wait when we're playing "I spy" up here,' said Miss Lally. 'Mouses live in that cupboard. We've seen them running out of their holes; but I like mouses, they've such dear bright eyes and long tails.'

I can't say that I agreed with Miss Lally's tastes. Mice are creatures I've never been able to take to, still they'd do her no harm, that was certain, so seeing her quite happy at her work I went down to the nursery again.

CHAPTER VIII
THE OLD LATIN GRAMMAR

Master Francis was still writing busily when I went back to the nursery. He looked pale and tired, and once or twice I heard him sigh. I knew it was not good for him to be stooping so long over his lessons, especially as the children had not been out all that day.

'Really,' I said, half to myself, but his ears were quick and he heard me, 'Miss Bess has done nothing but mischief this afternoon. I feel sometimes as if I couldn't manage her.'

The boy looked up quickly.

'O nurse!' he said, 'please don't speak like that. I mean I wouldn't for anything have uncle or auntie think I had put her out, or that there had been any trouble. It just comes over her sometimes like that, and she's very sorry afterwards. I suppose Lally and I haven't spirits enough for her, she is so clever and bright, and it must be dull for her, now and then.'

'I'm sure, Master Francis, my dear,' I said, 'no one could be kinder and nicer with Miss Bess than you; and as for cleverness, she may be quick and bright, but I'd like to know where she'd be for her lessons but for you helping her many a time.'

I was still feeling a bit provoked with Miss Bess, I must allow.

'I'm nearly three years older, you know,' replied Master Francis, though all the same I could see a pleased look on his face. It wasn't that he cared for praise – boy or man, I have never in my life known any human being so out and out humble as Mr. Francis; it's that that gives him his wonderful power over others, I've often thought, – but he did love to think he was of the least use to any of those he was so devoted to.

'I'm so glad to help her,' he said softly. 'Nurse,' he added after a little silence, 'I do feel so sad about things sometimes. If I had been big and strong, I might have looked forward to doing all sorts of things for them all, but now I often feel I can never be anything but a trouble, and such an expense to uncle and aunt. You really don't know what my leg costs,' he added in a way that made me inclined both to laugh and cry at once.

'Dear Master Francis,' I said, 'you shouldn't take it so.' I should have liked to say more, but I felt I could scarcely do so without hinting at blame where I had no right to do so.

He didn't seem to notice me.

'If it had to be,' he went on in the same voice, 'why couldn't I have been a girl, or why couldn't one of them have been a boy? That would have stopped it being quite so bad for poor auntie.'

'Whys and wherefores are not for us to answer, my dear, though things often clear themselves up when least expected,' I said. 'And now I must see what Miss Bess is after, that's to say if you've got your writing finished.'

'It's just about done,' he said, 'and I'm sure Bess won't tease any more. Do fetch her in, nurse. Why, baby! what is it, my pet?' he added, for there was Miss Augusta standing beside him, having deserted her toys on the hearthrug. For, though without understanding anything we had been saying, she had noticed the melancholy tone of her cousin's voice.

'Poor F'ancie,' she said pitifully. 'So tired, Baby wants to kiss thoo.'

The boy picked her up in his arms, and I saw the fair shaggy head and fat dimpled cheeks clasped close and near to his thin white face, and if there were tears in Master Francis's eyes I am sure it wasn't anything to be ashamed of. Never was a braver spirit, and no one that knows him now could think him less a hero could they look back over the whole of his life.

I found Miss Bess sitting quietly with the pincushion on her lap, by the window, making patterns with the pins, apparently quite content. She had not been crying, indeed it took a great deal to get a tear from that child, she had such a spirit of her own. Still she was sorry for what she had done, and she bore no malice, that I could see by the clear look in her pretty eyes as she glanced up at me.

'Nurse,' she said, though more with the air of a little queen granting a favour than a tiresome child asking to be forgiven, 'I'm not going to tease any more. It's gone now, and I'm going to be good. I'm very sorry for making Lally cry, though she is a little silly – of course I wouldn't care to do it if she wasn't, – and I'm dreadfully sorry for poor old Franz's exercise. Look what I have been doing to make me remember,' and I saw that she had marked the words 'Bess sorry' with the pins. 'If you leave it there for a few days, and just say "pincushion" if you see me beginning again, it'll remind me.'

It wasn't very easy for me to keep as grave as I wished, but I answered quietly —

'Very well, Miss Bess, I hope you'll keep to what you say,' and we went back, quite friendly again, to the other room.

Master Francis and she began settling what games they would play, and I took the opportunity of slipping upstairs to the attic to call Miss Lally down. She came running out, as bright as could be, and gave me her knitting to hide away for her.

'Nursie,' she said, 'I really think there's good fairies in the attic. I've got on so well. Four whole rows all round and none stitches dropped.'

So that rainy day ended more cheerfully than it had begun.

Unluckily, however, the worst of the mischief caused by Miss Bess's heedlessness didn't show for some little time to come. The next Latin lesson passed off by all accounts very well, especially for Miss Bess. For, thanks to her new resolutions, she was in a most biddable mood, and quite ready to take her cousin's advice as to learning her list of words again, giving up half an hour of her playtime on purpose.

She came dancing upstairs in the highest spirits.

'Nursie,' she said, – and when she called me so I knew I was in high favour, – 'I'm getting so good, I'm quite frightened at myself. Papa said I had never known my lessons so well.'

'I am very glad, I am sure, my love; and I hope,' I couldn't help adding, 'that Master Francis got some of the praise of it.'

For Master Francis was following her into the room, looking not quite so joyful. Miss Bess seemed a little taken aback.

'Do you know,' she said, 'I never thought of it. I was so pleased at being praised.' And as the child was honesty itself, I was certain it was just as she said.

'I'll run down now,' she went on, 'and tell papa that it was Franz who helped me.'

'No, please don't,' said the boy, catching hold of her. 'I am as pleased as I can be, Bess, that you got praised, and it's harder for you than for me, or even for Lally, to try hard at lessons, for you've always got such a lot of other things taking you up; and I wouldn't like,' he added slowly, 'for uncle to think I wanted to be praised. You see I'm older than you.'

'I'm sure you don't get too much praise ever, poor Franz!' said Miss Bess. 'Your exercise was as neat as neat, and yet papa wasn't pleased with it.'

Then I understood better why Master Francis looked a little sad.

'It was the one I had to copy over,' he said.

All the same he wouldn't let Miss Bess go down to her papa. Sir Hulbert was busy, he knew; he had several letters to write, he had heard him say, so Miss Bess had to give in.

'I'll tell you what it is,' she said. 'People who are generally rather naughty, like me,' – Miss Bess was in a humble mood! – 'get made a great fuss about when they're good. But people who are always good, like Franz, never get any praise for it, and if ever they do the least bit wrong, they are far worse scolded.'

This made Master Francis laugh. It was something, as Miss Bess said, among the children themselves. Miss Lally, who was always loving and gentle to her cousin, he just counted upon in a quiet steady sort of way. But a word of approval from flighty Miss Bess would set him up as if she'd been the Queen herself.

That was a Friday. The next Latin day was Tuesday. Of course I don't know much about such things myself, but the lessons were taken in turns. One day they'd words and writing exercises out of a book on purpose, and another day they'd have regular Latin grammar, out of a thick old book, which had been Sir Hulbert's own when he was a boy, and which he thought a great deal of. Lesson-books were still expensive too, and even in small things money was considered at Treluan. It was on that Tuesday then that, to my distress, I saw that Master Francis had been crying when he came back to the nursery. It was the first time I had seen his eyes red, and he had been trying to make them right again, I'm sure, for he hadn't come straight up from the library. Miss Bess was not with him; it was a fine day and she had gone out driving with her mamma, having been dressed all ready and her lesson shortened for once on purpose.

I didn't seem to notice Master Francis, sorry though I felt, but Miss Lally burst out at once.

'Francie, darling,' she said, running up to him and throwing her arms round him. 'What's the matter? It isn't your leg, is it?'

'I wouldn't mind that, you know, Lally,' he said.

'But sometimes, when the pain's been dreadful bad, it squeezes the tears out, and you can't help it,' she said.

'No,' he answered, 'it isn't my leg. I think I'd better not tell you, Lally, for you might tell it to Bess, and I just won't have her know. Everything's been so nice with her lately, and it just would seem as if I'd got her into trouble.'

'Was papa vexed with you for something?' the child went on. 'You'd better tell me, Francie, I really won't tell Bess if you don't want me, and I'm sure nursie won't. I'm becustomed to keeping secrets now. Sometimes secrets are quite right, nursie says.'

I could scarcely help smiling at her funny little air.

'It wasn't anything very much, after all,' said Master Francis. 'It was only that uncle said – ,' and here his voice quivered and he stopped short.

'Tell it from the beginning,' said Miss Lally in her motherly way, 'and then when you get up to the bad part it won't seem so hard to tell.'

It was a relief to him to have her sympathy, I could see, and I think he cared a little for mine too.

'Well,' he began, 'it's all about that Latin grammar – no, not the lesson,' seeing that Miss Lally was going to interrupt him, 'but the book. Uncle's fat old Latin grammar, you know, Lally. We didn't use it last Friday, it wasn't the day, and we hadn't needed to look at it ourselves since last Wednesday – that was the ink-spilling day. So it was not found out till to-day; and – and uncle was – so – so vexed when he saw how spoilt it was, and the worst of it was I began something about it having been Bess, and that she hadn't told me, and that made uncle much worse – .' Here Master Francis stopped, he seemed on the point of crying again, and he was a boy to feel very ashamed of tears, as I have said.

'I don't think Miss Bess could have known the book had got inked,' I said. 'And I scarce see how it happened, unless the ink got spilt on the table, and it may have been lying open – I've seen Miss Bess fling her books down open on their faces, so to speak, many a time, – and it may have dried in and been shut up when all the books were cleared away, and no one noticed.'

'Yes,' said Master Francis eagerly, 'that's how it must have been. I never meant that Bess had done it and hidden it. I said it in a hurry because I was so sorry for uncle to think I hadn't taken care of his book, and I was very sorry about the book too. But I made it far worse. Uncle said it was mean of me to try to put my carelessness upon another, a younger child, and a girl; O Lally! you never heard him speak like that; it was dreadful.'

'Was it worse than that time when big Jem put the blame on little Pat about the dogs not being fed?' asked Miss Lally very solemnly.

Master Francis flushed all over.

'You needn't have said that, Lally,' he said turning away. 'I'm not so bad as that, any way.'

It was very seldom he spoke in that voice to Miss Lally, and she hadn't meant to vex him, poor child, though her speech had been a mistake.

'Come, come, Master Francis,' I said, 'you're taking the whole thing too much to heart, I think. Perhaps Sir Hulbert was worried this morning.'

'No, no,' said Master Francis, 'he spoke quite quietly. A sort of cold, kind way, that's much worse than scolding. He said whatever Bess's faults were, she was quite, quite open and honest, and of course I know she is; but he said that this sort of thing made him a little afraid that my being delicate and not – not like other boys, was spoiling me, and that I must never try to make up for not being strong and manly by getting into mean and cunning ways to defend myself.'

Young as she was, Miss Lally quite understood; she quite forgot all about his having been vexed with her a moment before.

'O Francie!' she cried, running to him and flinging her arms round him, in a way she sometimes did, as if he needed her protection; 'how could papa say so to you? Nobody could think you mean or cunning. It's only that you're too good. I'll tell Bess as soon as she comes in, and she'll tell papa all about it, then he'll see.'

'No, dear,' said Master Francis, 'that's just what you mustn't do. Don't you remember you promised?'

Miss Lally's face fell.

'Don't you see,' Master Francis went on, 'that would look mean? As if I had made Bess tell on herself to put the blame off me. And I do want everything to be happy with Bess and me ourselves as long as I am here. It won't be for so very long,' he added. 'Uncle says it will be a very good thing indeed for me to go to school.'

This was too much for Miss Lally, she burst out crying, and hugged Master Francis tighter than before. I had got to understand more of her ways by now, and I knew that once she was started on a regular sobbing fit, it soon got beyond her own power to stop. So I whispered to Master Francis that he must help to cheer her up, and between us we managed to calm her down. That was just one of the things so nice about the dear boy, he was always ready to forget about himself if there was anything to do for another.

Miss Bess came back from her drive brimming over with spirits, and though it would have been wrong to bear her any grudge, it vexed me rather to see the other two so pale and extra quiet, though Master Francis did his best, I will say, to seem as cheerful as usual.

Miss Bess's quick eyes soon saw there had been something amiss. But I passed it off by saying Miss Lally had been troubled about something, but we weren't going to think about it any more.

Think about it I did, however, so far as it concerned Master Francis, especially. Till now I had been always pleased to see that his uncle was really much attached to the boy, and ready to do him justice. But this notion, which seemed to have begun in Sir Hulbert's mind, that just because the poor child was delicate and in a sense infirm, he must be mean spirited and unmanly in mind, seemed to me a very sad one, and likely to bring much unhappiness. Nor could I feel sure that my lady was not to blame for it. She was frank and generous herself, but inclined to take up prejudices, and not always careful enough in her way of speaking of those she had any feeling against.

I did what I could, whenever I had any opportunity, to stand up for the boy in a quiet way, and with all respect to those who were his natural guardians. But, on the whole, much as I knew we should miss him in the nursery, I was scarcely sorry to hear not many weeks after the little events I have been telling about, that Master Francis's going to school was decided upon. It was to be immediately after the Christmas holidays, and we were now in the month of October.

CHAPTER IX
UPSET PLANS

But, as everybody knows, things in this world seldom turn out as they are planned.

There was a great deal of writing and considering about Master Francis's school, and I could see that both Sir Hulbert and my lady had it much on their minds. They would never have thought of sending him anywhere but of the best, but in those days schools, even for little boys, cost, I fancy, quite as much or more than now. And I can't say but what I think that the worry and the difficulty about it rather added to his aunt's prejudice against the boy.

However, before long, all was settled, the school was chosen and the very day fixed, and in our different ways we began to get accustomed to the idea. Master Francis, I could see, had two quite opposite ways of looking at it: he was bitterly sorry to go, to leave the home and those in it whom he loved so dearly, more dearly, I think, than any one understood. And he took much to heart also the fresh expenses for his uncle. But, on the other hand, he was eager to get on with his learning; he liked it for its own sake, and, as he used to say to me sometimes when we were talking alone —

'It's only by my mind, you know, nurse, that I can hope to be good for anything. If I had been strong and my leg all right, I'd have been a soldier like papa, I suppose.'

'There's soldiers and soldiers, you must remember, Master Francis,' I would reply. 'There's victories to be won far greater than those on the battlefield. And many a one who's done the best work in this world has been but feeble and weakly in health.'

His eyes used to brighten up when I spoke like that. Sometimes, too, I would try to cheer him by reminding him there was no saying but what he might turn out a fairly strong man yet. Many a delicate boy got improved at school, I had heard.

But alas! – or 'alas' at least it seemed at the time – everything was changed by what happened that winter.

It was cold, colder than is usual in this part of the world, and I think Master Francis had got it in his head to try and harden himself by way of preparing for school life. My lady used to say little things sometimes, with a good motive, I daresay, about not minding the cold and plucking up a spirit, and what her brothers used to do when they were young, all of which Master Francis took to heart in a way she would not then have believed if she had been told it. Dear me! it is strange to think of it, when I remember how perfectly in later years those two came to understand each other, and how nobody – after she lost her good husband – was such a staff and support to her, such a counsellor and comfort, as the nephew she had so little known – her 'more than son,' as I had often heard her call him.

But I am wandering away from my story. I was just getting to Master Francis's illness. How it came about no one could really tell. It is not often one can trace back illnesses to their cause. Most often I fancy there are more than one. But just after Christmas Master Francis began with rheumatic fever. We couldn't at first believe it was going to be anything so bad. For my lady's sake, and indeed for everybody's, I tried to cheer up and be hopeful, in spite of the doctor's gloomy looks. It was a real disappointment to myself and took down my pride a bit, for I had done my best by the child, hoping to start him for school as strong and well as was possible for him. And any one less just and fair than my lady might have had back thoughts, such as damp feet, or sheets not aired enough, or chills of some kind, that a little care might have avoided.

It was my belief that he had been feeling worse than usual for some time, but never a complaint had he made, perhaps he wouldn't own it to himself.

It wasn't till two nights after Christmas that, sitting by the nursery fire, just after Miss Augusta had been put to bed, he said to me —

'Nurse, I can't help it, my leg is so dreadfully bad, and not my leg only, the pain of it seems all over. I'm all bad legs to-night,' and he tried to smile. 'May I go to bed now, and perhaps it will be all right in the morning?'

I was frightened! Sir Hulbert and my lady were dining out that evening, which but seldom happened, and when I got over my start a little I wasn't sorry for it, hoping that a good night might show it was nothing serious.

We got him to bed as fast as we could. There was no going down to dessert that evening, so Miss Bess and Miss Lalage set to work to help me, like the womanly little ladies they were; one of them running downstairs to see about plenty of hot water for a good bath and hot bottles, and the other fetching the under housemaid to see to a fire in his room. I doubt if he had ever had one before. Bedroom fires were not in my lady's rule, and I don't hold with them myself, except in illness or extra cold weather.

He cheered up a little, and even laughed at the fuss we made. And before his uncle and aunt returned he was sound asleep, looking quiet and comfortable, so that I didn't think it needful to say anything to them that night. But long before morning, for I crept upstairs to his room every hour or two, I saw that it was not going off as I had hoped. He started and moaned in his sleep, and once or twice when I found him awake, he seemed almost lightheaded, and as if he hardly knew me. Once I heard him whisper: 'Oh! it hurts so,' as if he could scarcely bear it.

About five o'clock I dressed myself and took up my watch beside him. My lady was an early riser; by eight o'clock, in answer to a message from me, she was with us herself in her dressing-gown. Master Francis was awake.

'O my lady!' I said, 'I'd no thought of bringing you up so early, and you were late last night too.' For they had had a long drive. 'It was only that I dursn't take upon me to send for the doctor without asking.'

'No, no, of course not,' she said. And indeed that was a liberty my lady would not have been pleased with any one's taking. 'Do you really think it necessary?'

The poor child was looking a little better just then, the pain was not so bad. He seemed quiet and dreamy-like, though his face was flushed and his eyes very bright.

'Auntie!' he said, smiling a very little; 'how pretty you look!'

And so she did in her long white dressing-gown, with her lovely fair hair hanging about, for all the world like Miss Lally's.

I think myself the fever was on his brain a little already, else he would scarce have dared speak so to his aunt.

She took no notice, but drew me out of the room.

'What in the world's the matter with him?' she said, anxious and yet irritated at the same time. 'Has he been doing anything foolish that can have made him ill?'

I shook my head.

'It's seldom one can tell how illness comes, but I feel sure the doctor should see him,' I replied.

So he was sent for, and before the day was many hours older, there was little doubt left – though, as I said before, I tried for a bit to hope it was only a bad cold – that Master Francis was in for something very serious.

Almost from the first the doctor spoke of rheumatic fever. There was a sort of comfort in this, bad as it was – the comfort of knowing there was no infection to fear. It was a great comfort to Master Francis himself, whenever he felt the least bit easier, now and then to see his cousins for a minute or two at a time, without any risk to them. For one of his first questions to the doctor was whether his illness was anything the others could catch.

After that for a few days he was so bad that he could really think of nothing but how to bear the pain patiently. Then when he grew a shade better, he began thinking about going to school.

'What was the day of the month? Would he be well, quite well, by the 20th, or whatever day school began? Uncle would be so disappointed if it had to be put off' – and so on, over and over again, till at last I had to speak, not only to the doctor, but to Sir Hulbert himself, about the way the boy was worrying in his mind.

The doctor tried to put him off by saying he was getting on famously, and such-like speeches. A few quiet words from Sir Hulbert had far more effect.

'My dear boy,' he said gravely, 'what you have to do is to try to get well and not fret yourself. If it is God's will that your going to school should be put off, you must not take it to heart. You're not in such a hurry to leave us as all that, are you?'

The last few words were spoken very kindly and he smiled as he said them. I was glad of it, for I had not thought his uncle quite as tender of the boy as he had used to be. They pleased Master Francis, I could see, and another thought came into his mind which helped to quiet him.

'Anyway, nurse,' he said to me one day, 'there'll be a good deal of expense saved if I don't go to school till Easter.'

It never struck him that there are few things more expensive than illness, and as I had no idea till my lady told me that the term had to be paid for, whether he went to school or not, I was able to agree with him.

I was deeply sorry for my lady in those days. Some might be hard upon her, for not forgetting all else in thankfulness that the child's life was spared, and I know she tried to do so, but it was difficult. And when she spoke out to me one day, and told me about the schooling having to be paid all the same, I really did feel for her; knowing through Mrs. Brent, as I have mentioned, all the past history of the troubles brought about by poor Master Francis's father.

'I hope he'll live to be a comfort to you yet, if I may say so, my lady, and I've a strong feeling that he will,' I said (she reminded me of those words long after), 'and in the meantime you may trust to Mrs. Brent and me to keep all expense down as much as possible, while seeing that Master Francis has all he needs. I'm sure we can manage without a sick-nurse now.'

For there had been some talk of having one sent for from London, though in those days it was less done than seems the case now.

And after a while things began to mend. It was not a very bad attack, less so than we had feared at first. In about ten days' time Mrs. Brent and Susan the housemaid and I, who had taken it in turns to sit up all night, were able to go to bed as usual, only seeing to it that the fire was made up once in the night, so as to last on till morning, and the day's work grew steadily lighter.

Once they had finished their lessons, the little girls were always eager to keep their cousin company. He was only allowed to have them one at a time. Miss Bess used to take the first turn, but it was hard work for her, poor child, to keep still, though it grew easier for her when it got the length of his being able for reading aloud. But Miss Lally from the first was a perfect model of a little sick-nurse. Mouse was no word for her, so still and noiseless and yet so watchful was she, and if ever she was left in charge of giving him his medicine at a certain time, I could feel as sure as sure that it wouldn't be forgotten. When he was inclined to talk a little, she knew just how to manage him – how to amuse him without exciting him at all, and always to cheer him up.