“ `The Master' is your name for him,'' he had explained at the beginning. “And I can't call him just `Mister' Loristan. It sounds like cheek. If he was called `General' or `Colonel' Icould stand it--though it wouldn't be quite right. Some day Ishall find a name. When I speak to him, I say `Sir.' ''
The walks were taken every day, and each day were longer. Marco found himself silently watching The Rat with amazement at his determination and endurance. He knew that he must not speak of what he could not fail to see as they walked. He must not tell him that he looked tired and pale and sometimes desperately fatigued. He had inherited from his father the tact which sees what people do not wish to be reminded of. He knew that for some reason of his own The Rat had determined to do this thing at any cost to himself. Sometimes his face grew white and worn and he breathed hard, but he never rested more than a few minutes, and never turned back or shortened a walk they had planned.
“Tell me something about Samavia, something to remember,'' he would say, when he looked his worst. “When I begin to try to remember, I forget--other things.''
So, as they went on their way, they talked, and The Rat committed things to memory. He was quick at it, and grew quicker every day. They invented a game of remembering faces they passed.
Both would learn them by heart, and on their return home Marco would draw them. They went to the museums and galleries and learned things there, making from memory lists and descriptions which at night they showed to Loristan, when he was not too busy to talk to them.
As the days passed, Marco saw that The Rat was gaining strength.
This exhilarated him greatly. They often went to Hampstead Heath and walked in the wind and sun. There The Rat would go through curious exercises which he believed would develop his muscles.
He began to look less tired during and after his journey. There were even fewer wrinkles on his face, and his sharp eyes looked less fierce. The talks between the two boys were long and curious. Marco soon realized that The Rat wanted to learn--learn--learn.
“Your father can talk to you almost as if you were twenty years old,'' he said once. “He knows you can understand what he's saying. If he were to talk to me, he'd always have to remember that I was only a rat that had lived in gutters and seen nothing else.''
They were talking in their room, as they nearly always did after they went to bed and the street lamp shone in and lighted their bare little room. They often sat up clasping their knees, Marco on his poor bed, The Rat on his hard sofa, but neither of them conscious either of the poorness or hardness, because to each one the long unknown sense of companionship was such a satisfying thing. Neither of them had ever talked intimately to another boy, and now they were together day and night. They revealed their thoughts to each other; they told each other things it had never before occurred to either to think of telling any one. In fact, they found out about themselves, as they talked, things they had not quite known before. Marco had gradually discovered that the admiration The Rat had for his father was an impassioned and curious feeling which possessed him entirely. It seemed to Marco that it was beginning to be like a sort of religion. He evidently thought of him every moment. So when he spoke of Loristan's knowing him to be only a rat of the gutter, Marco felt he himself was fortunate in remembering something he could say.
“My father said yesterday that you had a big brain and a strong will,'' he answered from his bed. “He said that you had a wonderful memory which only needed exercising. He said it after he looked over the list you made of the things you had seen in the Tower.''
The Rat shuffled on his sofa and clasped his knees tighter.
“Did he? Did he?'' he said.
He rested his chin upon his knees for a few minutes and stared straight before him. Then he turned to the bed.
“Marco,'' he said, in a rather hoarse voice, a queer voice;“are you jealous?''
“Jealous,'' said Marco; “why?''
“I mean, have you ever been jealous? Do you know what it is like?''
“I don't think I do,'' answered Marco, staring a little.
“Are you ever jealous of Lazarus because he's always with your father--because he's with him oftener than you are--and knows about his work--and can do things for him you can't? I mean, are you jealous of--your father?''
Marco loosed his arms from his knees and lay down flat on his pillow.
“No, I'm not. The more people love and serve him, the better,'' he said. “The only thing I care for is--is him. I just care for HIM. Lazarus does too. Don't you?''
The Rat was greatly excited internally. He had been thinking of this thing a great deal. The thought had sometimes terrified him. He might as well have it out now if he could. If he could get at the truth, everything would be easier. But would Marco really tell him?
“Don't you mind?'' he said, still hoarse and eager--“don't you mind how much I care for him? Could it ever make you feel savage? Could it ever set you thinking I was nothing but--what Iam--and that it was cheek of me to push myself in and fasten on to a gentleman who only took me up for charity? Here's the living truth,'' he ended in an outburst; “if I were you and you were me, that's what I should be thinking. I know it is. Icouldn't help it. I should see every low thing there was in you, in your manners and your voice and your looks. I should see nothing but the contrast between you and me and between you and him. I should be so jealous that I should just rage. I should HATE you--and I should DESPISE you!''
