ife had been all
very well, though she was penniless. She had been a curate's daughter,
educated to fill the post of governess in high families. She had died
young, without children, and he had filled her place with the farmer's
daughter, who was the mother of Tom. Thenceforth the Robinson's house,
a good, old-fashioned house, though not so handsome as the shop in an
adjacent street, was effaced, nominally, from the visiting-lists of
those who had visiting-lists in Redcross. The family were ostracised,
and left to their own devices, receiving their sentence, in the case of
the farmer's daughter and her husband, with apparent equanimity.

But there was an exception made in favour of Tom. He went to the Grammar
School along with the other better-class boys in the town and
neighbourhood, and was accepted as their companion and playfellow. He
was sent to college according to the traditions of his family, just as
Cyril Carey, of Carey's Bank, and Ned Hewett, of the Rectory, were sent
according to the traditions of theirs. Presumably the three young men
were on one footing at Cambridge, unless, indeed, Tom had the advantage.
He was slightly the elder of the three, and he took his degree with a
fair amount of honour; while, sad to say, for the credit of Redcross,
neither Cyril nor Ned made their last pass. It was confidently believed
that Tom Robinson would cut the shop, so far as any active management of
it was concerned, and enter either a gallant or a learned profession. If
he had ever entertained the intention, it was put a stop to in the first
place by the death of his father, followed within three months by that
of his mother, shortly after Tom had completed his course at the
university. He stayed at home for a time, to put his house in order it
was supposed. Then all at once, in the most cold-blooded fashion, he
told those who asked him that "Robinson's" was a good business, which he
did not see himself justified in throwing up in these hard times. He was
not such a conceited ass as to believe he must necessarily succeed in
the crowded ranks of the professions, for none of which had he any
particular bent, while he had, he added, with a certain manliness and
doggedness for a pacific fellow like Robinson, a considerable interest
in the great old shop. It had been in the family for three generations;
he had known it from childhood; many of his father's old trusted
servants still served in it. In short, he meant to keep it