"Do you know that some day it will all belong to you--that and a
great deal more?"
"To me!" exclaimed Fauntleroy in rather an awe-stricken voice.
"When?"
"When I am dead," his grandfather answered.
"Then I don't want it," said Fauntleroy; "I want you to live
always."
"That's kind," answered the Earl in his dry way;
"nevertheless, some day it will all be yours--some day you will
be the Earl of Dorincourt."
Little Lord Fauntleroy sat very still in his saddle for a few
moments. He looked over the broad moors, the green farms, the
beautiful copses, the cottages in the lanes, the pretty village,
and over the trees to where the turrets of the great castle rose,
gray and stately. Then he gave a queer little sigh.
"What are you thinking of?" asked the Earl.
"I am thinking," replied Fauntleroy, "what a little boy I am!
and of what Dearest said to me."
"What was it?" inquired the Earl.
"She said that perhaps it was not so easy to be very rich; that
if any one had so many things always, one might sometimes forget
that every one else was not so fortunate, and that one who is
rich should always be careful and try to remember. I was talking
to her about how good you were, and she said that was such a good
thing, because an earl had so much power, and if he cared only
about his own pleasure and never thought about the people who
lived on his lands, they might have trouble that he could
help--and there were so many people, and it would be such a hard
thing. And I was just looking at all those houses, and thinking
how I should have to find out about the people, when I was an
earl. How did you find out about them?"
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