in an off-hand way.

"H'm--so so," said the Major. Whereupon this colloquy came to an end.
And Arthur Pendennis got into the postchaise with his uncle never to
come back to school any more.

As the chaise drove through Clavering, the hostler standing whistling
under the archway of the Clavering Arms, winked the postilion ominously,
as much as to say all was over. The gardener's wife came and opened the
lodge-gates, and let the travellers through with a silent shake of the
head. All the blinds were down at Fairoaks--the face of the old footman
was as blank when he let them in. Arthur's face was white too, with
terror more than with grief. Whatever of warmth and love the deceased
man might have had, and he adored his wife and loved and admired his son
with all his heart, he had shut them up within himself; nor had the boy
been ever able to penetrate that frigid outward barrier. But Arthur had
been his father's pride and glory through life, and his name the last
which John Pendennis had tried to articulate whilst he lay with his
wife's hand clasping his own cold and clammy palm, as the flickering
spirit went out into the darkness of death, and life and the world
passed away from him.

The little girl, whose face had peered for a moment under the blinds as
the chaise came up, opened the door from the stairs into the hall, and
taking Arthur's hand silently as he stooped down to kiss her, led him
upstairs to his mother. Old John opened the dining-room door for the
Major. The room was darkened with the blinds down, and surrounded by all
the gloomy pictures of the Pendennises. He drank a glass of wine. The
bottle had been opened for the Squire four days before. His hat was
brushed, and laid on the hall table: his newspapers, and his letter-bag,
with John Pendennis, Esquire, Fairoaks, engraved upon the brass plate,
were there in waiting. The doctor and the lawyer from Clavering, who had
seen the chaise pass through, came up in a gig half an hour after
the Major's arrival, and entered by the back door. The former gave a
detailed account of the seizure and demise of Mr. Pendennis, enlarged on
his virtues and the estimation in which the neighbourhood held him; on
what a loss he would be to the magistrates' bench, the County Hospital,
etc. Mrs. Pendennis bore up wonderfully, he said, especially since
Master Arthur's arrival. The lawyer stayed and dined with Major
Pendennis, and they talked business all the evening. The Major was