His mother's arms were round his neck as soon as the last words were uttered, and she said, half-crying, `O my boy, I knew you'd make iverything right again, when you got a man.'
But his father was silent: the flood of emotion hemmed in all power of speech.Both Tom and Maggie were struck with fear lest the shock of joy might even be fatal.But the blessed relief of tears came.The broad chest heaved, the muscles of the face gave way, and the grey-haired man burst into loud sobs.The fit of weeping gradually subsided and he sat quiet, recovering the regularity of his breathing.At last he looked up at his wife and said, in a gentle tone, `Bessy, you must come and kiss me now - the lad has made y' amends.
You'll see a bit o' comfort again belike.'
When she had kissed him and he had held her hand a minute, his thoughts went back to the money.
`I wish you'd brought me the money to look at, Tom,' he said, fingering the sovereigns on the table.`I should ha' felt surer.'
`You shall see it tomorrow, father,' said Tom.`My uncle Deane has appointed the creditors to meet tomorrow at the Golden Lion, and he has ordered a dinner for them at two o'clock.My uncle Glegg and he will both be there.
It was advertised in the Messenger on Saturday.'
`Then Wakem knows on't!' said Mr Tulliver, his eye kindling with triumphant fire.`Ah!' he went on, with a long-drawn guttural enunciation, taking out his snuff-box, the only luxury he had left himself, and tapping it with something of his old air of defiance.`I'll get from under his thumb now - though I must leave th' old mill.I thought I could ha' held out to die here - but I can't...We've got a glass o' nothing in the house, have we, Bessy?'
`Yes,' said Mrs Tulliver drawing out her much-reduced bunch of keys, `there's some brandy sister Deane brought me when I was ill.'
`Get it me, then, get it me.I feel a bit weak.'
`Tom, my lad,' he said, in a stronger voice, when he had taken some brandy and water, `You shall make a speech to 'em.I'll tell 'em it's you as got the best part o' the money.They'll see I'm honest at last, and ha' got an honest son.Ah! Wakem 'ud be fine and glad to have a son like mine - a fine straight fellow - i'stead o' that poor crooked creatur! You'll prosper i' the world, my lad; you'll maybe see the day when Wakem and his son 'ull be a round or two below you.You'll like enough be ta'en into partnership, as your uncle Deane was before you - you're in the right way for't; and then there's nothing to hinder your getting rich...And if ever you're rich enough - mind this - try and get th' old mill again.'
Mr Tulliver threw himself back in his chair - his mind, which had so long been the home of nothing but bitter discontent and foreboding suddenly filled, by the magic of joy, with visions of good fortune.But some subtle influence prevented him from foreseeing the good fortune as happening to himself.
`Shake hands wi' me, my lad,' he said, suddenly putting out his hand.
`It's a great thing when a man can be proud as he's got a good son.I've had that luck.'
Tom never lived to taste another moment so delicious as that, and Maggie couldn't help forgetting her own grievances.Tom was good; and in the sweet humility that springs in us all in moments of true admiration and gratitude, she felt that the faults he had to pardon in her had never been redeemed, as his faults were.She felt no jealousy this evening that for the first time, she seemed to be thrown into the background in her father's mind.
There was much more talk before bed-time.Mr Tulliver naturally wanted to hear all the particulars of Tom's trading adventures, and he listened with growing excitement and delight.He was curious to know what had been said on every occasion - if possible, what had been thought; and Bob Jakin's part in the business threw him into peculiar outbursts of sympathy with the triumphant knowingness of that remarkable packman.Bob's juvenile history so far as it had come under Mr Tulliver's knowledge was recalled with that sense of astonishing promise it displayed, which is observable in all reminiscences of the childhood of great men.
It was well that there was this interest of narrative to keep under the vague but fierce sense of triumph over Wakem which would otherwise have been the channel his joy would have rushed into with dangerous force.
Even as it was, that feeling from time to time gave threats of its ultimate mastery, in sudden bursts of irrelevant exclamation.
It was long before Mr Tulliver got to sleep that night, and the sleep, when it came, was filled with vivid dreams.At half past five o'clock in the morning, when Mrs Tulliver was already rising, he alarmed her by starting up with a sort of smothered shout, and looking round in a bewildered way at the walls of the bedroom.
`What's the matter, Mr Tulliver?' said his wife.He looked at her, still with a puzzled expression and said at last, `Ah! - I was dreaming...did I make a noise?...I thought I'd got hold of him.'