Read HF - 04 - Black Dawn for Free Online Page B

show a tithe of the ability, the character, I know you possess, and he hopes of you. He has selected you, and not Tony. He is a cunning man. It seems he has had his agents here in England carry out a secret investigation, into the pair of you. And T ony is dismissed for h is apparent weaknesses. The weaknesses of trying to be a gentleman. It is hard.' 'Mama . . .'
    'Listen a moment. I have told you enough of my brother for you to know that while he is a man of strong hates, he is a man of utter generosity as well, given the reason.'
    'Of course, Mama, but. . .'
    Suzanne dropped to her knees beside her son. 'And you'd not deny that Tony deserves his chance in the world. Listen to me. I would not interfere with your chance at wealth, your chance to inherit Hilltop. I am only asking you to give your brother at least half of your chance. He is bitterly disappointed. Well, who would not be. But his disappointment may take him into strange paths, drink, gambling. Oh, I know he already treads those paths. Here is our opportunity to free him from those vices. Take him with you, Dick.'
    'Tony? What will Uncle Robert say?'
    'I will give you a letter. I ask nothing for Tony save that he be employed as an overseer. But give him the opportunity, to prove what he can do.'
    'Well, I . . . anyway, he'd never agree.'
    'He has already agreed.'
    'Eh?'
    'I have put it to him very straight.'
    'And he agrees? He understands that. . . well, in view of the investigation you have just related, he must mend his ways.'
    'He understands. He has agreed to follow your wishes in everything.'
    Tony?'
    'Tony.' She got up again, went to the door, opened it. 'Come in here.'
    Tony Hilton came in, slowly. 'We adventure together, then, Dick.'
    Dick hesitated, then rose to his feet. 'Aye, well, I was wondering how I should survive the crossing, without company.' He held out his hand. 'Together then, Tony. With but one objective; to prove ourselves worthy of owning Hilltop.'
    Tony's lingers squeezed his. 'I'll say amen to that.'
    He was smiling. Even his eyes were smiling. When Tony Hilton smiled he was one of the handsomest men Dick could think of. Here was company, the best of company, to stand at your shoulder.
    But what had Mama just said of her brother? A man is what he is, and cannot change? My God, he thought; what have I done?
     
     
    3
     
    The Coward
     

    ' "It is convenient to divide the types of sugars into two main groups." ' Richard Hilton spoke the words slowly and carefully, and loudly, as the gusting wind whipped each syllable from his mouth before it was properly pronounced. ' "They are monosaccharoses, form erly called glucoses, and disac charoses, formerly called saccharoses." Eh?'
     
    Anthony Hilton yawned, and pulled his coat tighter. They sat on the poop deck, and faced aft, for the brig was beating into a stiff southwesterly; spray clouded over the bows with every dip into the rolling green of the waters, and often enough came flying the length of the deck, while astern of the ship, merging with the flowing white of the wake, the whitecaps pranced and broke, churned by the breeze which scattered the young men's hair, flapped their coats, ruffled the pages of Dick's book.
    ' "The first term," ' Dick continued, "includes the simple sugars, bearing the formula Ca(H 2 0)." We must remember that.'
    ‘ Oh, indeed,' Tony agreed. 'I am to plant Ca(H 2 0). That sounds uncommonly like water to me.'
    'Well,' Dick said thoughtfully. 'As in all plants, there must be a great deal of water in the average sugar stalk.'
    'Oh, quite,' Tony agreed. 'But not half so much as there was in that gale the other day. Did you watch it coming over the bow? I thought we were for the bottom.'
    'I was hanging on to Mistress Marjoribanks,' Dick said. ‘I thought she was for it, certainly. She puked green, at the end. I expected to see her gut, at any moment.'
    'Ugh,' Tony said. 'Do remember we don't all have a stomach like yours. Still, I suppose it pays to have a