up.  A good education was given him; and at the age of sixteen he went to London and to fortune.  The one was looked upon as a natural sequence to the other.  Some friend of Jabez Gum’s had interested himself to procure the lad’s admission into one of the great banks as a junior clerk.  He might rise in time to be cashier, manager, even partner; who knew?  Who knew indeed?  And Clerk Gum congratulated himself, and was more respectable than ever.

Better that Willy Gum had remained at Calne!  And yet, and again—­who knew?  When the propensity for ill-doing exists it is sure to come out, no matter where.  There were some people in Calne who could have told Clerk Gum, even then, that Willy, for his age, was tolerably fast and forward.  Mrs. Gum had heard of one or two things that had caused her hair to rise on end with horror; ay, and with apprehension; but, foolish mother that she was, not a syllable did she breathe to the clerk; and no one else ventured to tell him.

She talked to Willy with many sighs and tears; implored him to be a good boy and enter on good courses, not on bad ones that would break her heart.  Willy, the little scapegrace, was willing to promise anything.  He laughed and made light of it; it wasn’t his fault if folks told stories about him; she couldn’t be so foolish as to give ear to them.  London?  Oh, he should be all right in London!  One or two fellows here were rather fast, there was no denying it; and they drew him with them; they were older than he, and ought to have known better.  Once away from Calne, they could have no more influence over him, and he should be all right.

She believed him; putting faith in the plausible words.  Oh, what trust can be so pure, and at the same time so foolish, as that placed by a mother in a beloved son!  Mrs. Gum had never known but one idol on earth; he who now stood before her, lightly laughing at her fears, making his own tale good.  She leaned forward and laid her hands upon his shoulders and kissed him with that impassioned fervour that some mothers could tell of, and whispered that she would trust him wholly.

Mr. Willy extricated himself with as little impatience as he could help:  these embraces were not to his taste.  And yet the boy did love his mother.  She was not at all a wise woman, or a clever one; rather silly, indeed, in many things; but she was fond of him.  At this period he was young-looking for his age, slight, and rather undersized, with an exceedingly light complexion, a wishy-washy sort of face with no colour in it, unmeaning light eyes, white eyebrows, and ragged-looking light hair with a tawny shade upon it.

Willy Gum departed for London, and entered on his engagement in the great banking-house of Goldsworthy and Co.