But after the break between the two firms, there was
a rupture between Hobson's family and Colonel Newcome. The exasperated
Colonel vowed that his brother and his nephew were traitors alike, and
would have no further dealings with one or the other. Even poor innocent
Sam Newcome, coming up to London from Oxford, where he had been plucked,
and offering a hand to Clive, was frowned away by our Colonel, who spoke
in terms of great displeasure to his son for taking the least notice of
the young traitor.
Our Colonel was changed, changed in his heart, changed in his whole
demeanour towards the world, and above all towards his son, for whom he
had made so many kind sacrifices in his old days. We have said how, ever
since Clive's marriage, a tacit strife had been growing up between father
and son. The boy's evident unhappiness was like a reproach to his father.
His very silence angered the old man. His want of confidence daily chafed
and annoyed him. At the head of a large fortune, which he rightly
persisted in spending, he felt angry with himself because he could not
enjoy it, angry with his son, who should have helped him in the
administration of his new estate, and who was but a listless, useless
member of the little confederacy, a living protest against all the
schemes of the good man's past life.
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