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Nat the Naturalist: A Boy's Adventures in the Eastern Seas, a fiction by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 44. Home Again |
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_ CHAPTER FORTY FOUR. HOME AGAIN It was on a bright sunny day in July that my uncle and I jumped into a cab and bade the man drive us to the old house, where I had passed so many happy as well as unhappy days. "We will not stop to go and see barbers or to dress, Nat, but go and take them by surprise," said my uncle; and for the first time I began to wonder whether I had altered. "Am I very much more sunburnt than I used to be?" I said suddenly, as we drew near the door. "Well, you are not quite black," he said laughing, "but you have altered, Nat, since they saw you last." How my heart beat as we walked up to the front door, where the maid, a stranger, stared at us, and said that her mistress was out, and looked suspiciously at us, evidently, as she afterwards owned, taking us for sailor fellows with parrots and silk things for sale. "Where's Uncle Joseph?" I said sharply. "Oh, please, sir, are you Master Nathaniel, who's far away at sea?" she cried. "I am Nathaniel," I said laughing, "but I'm not far away at sea. Where's Uncle Joe?" "He's down the garden, sir, smoking his pipe in the tool-house," said the girl smiling; and I dashed through the drawing-room, jumped down the steps, and ran to the well-remembered spot, to find dear old Uncle Joe sitting there with all my treasures carefully dusted but otherwise untouched; and as I stood behind him and clapped my hands over his eyes, there was he with poor old Humpty Dumpty before him. "Who--who's that?" he cried. "Guess!" I shouted. "I--I can't guess," he said. "I don't know you. Let go or I shall call for help." "Why, Uncle Joe!" I cried, taking away my hands and clasping his. He stared at me from top to toe, and at last said in a trembling voice: "You're not my boy Nat?" "But indeed I am, uncle," I cried. "My boy Nat _was a boy_," he said nervously, "not a big six-foot fellow with a gruff voice, and--my dear Dick. Why, then, it is Nat after all." The old man hugged me in his arms, and was ready to shed weak tears, for Uncle Dick had followed me and was looking on. "Why, why, why--what have you been doing to him, Dick?" cried Uncle Joe excitedly. "Here, he can't be our Nat, and he has got a man's voice, and he is bigger than me, and he is nearly black. Why, here's Sophy-- Sophy, dear, who's this?" I caught her in my arms and kissed her, and she too stared at me in surprise, for I suppose I had altered wonderfully, though in my busy life of travel I had taken little note of the change. It was very pleasant to settle down once more in quiet and sort our specimens, or tell Uncle Joe of all our dangers by land and sea; but after a time, although Aunt Sophia was now very kind and different to what she had been of old, there came a strong feeling upon me at times that I should once more like to be wandering amidst the beautiful islands of the Eastern Seas, watching the wondrous beauties of the world beneath the shallow waters, or the glorious greens of the trees upon the tropic shores. The boy who loves nature goes on loving nature to the end, for I may say that Uncle Dick spoke the truth when he said that I ought to be called Nat the Naturalist, for I feel that I am Nat the Naturalist still. "Uncle Dick," I said one day, "shall we ever have another trip together collecting birds?" "Time proves all things, my boy," he said; "wait and see." [THE END] _ |
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