The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch Part 6

It might have occurred to Charlie (as it did to me) that whatever sort of watch-owner the former might be, a boy who successively shook, tickled, and roasted me to get me to go, was hardly the one to lecture him on his failings; but my master was too delighted at the prospect of having his treasure cured to be very critical of the physician. And this time, at last, Tom Drift had found the real cause of my indisposition. In endeavouring to pa.s.s one another at half-past six, my two hands had become entangled, and refusing to proceed in company, had stopped where they were stopping my circulation and indeed my animation at the same time.

Once more the astute Tom produced his pin; and sticking it under the end of my minute-hand, disengaged it from its fellow and bent it back into its proper position. Instantly, as if by magic, the life rushed back into my body; my circulation started afresh, and my heart beat its old beat. Charlie set up a shout of jubilation, and almost hugged Tom in his grat.i.tude. The latter looked very wise and very condescending--as had he not a right?--and, handing me back to my master, said, with the air of a physician prescribing a course of treatment for a convalescent patient,--

"You'd better shove him on to the right time, and then keep him quiet, young un."

This Charlie did, and it would be hard to say which of us two was the happier at that moment.

I had scarcely been deposited once more into my accustomed pocket, when a loud bell sounded down the corridors, and made Tom Drift jump as if he had been shot.

"I say, that's the prayer-bell! Come on! unless you want to get into a jolly row."

And without further words he seized the astonished Charlie by the arm, and ran with him at full speed along one or two empty pa.s.sages, das.h.i.+ng at last in through a big door, which was in the very act of closing as the two reached it.

Charlie was so confused, and so out of breath with this astonis.h.i.+ng and frantic race, that for a minute he did not know whether he was standing on his head or his heels.

There was, however, no time for solving the problem just then, for Tom Drift, still retaining his grasp on his arm, dragged him forward, whispering,--

"This way; wasn't that a close shave? Get in here, and don't make a noise."

Charlie obeyed, and found himself in a pew, one of a congregation of some two hundred boys, a.s.sembled in the school chapel for evening prayers. At the far end of the chapel he could hear a man's voice, reading; but what it said it was impossible for him to make out, owing to the talking that was going on around him.

He looked eagerly and curiously down the long rows of his new schoolfellows, feeling half afraid at the sight of so many new faces, and half proud of being a Randlebury boy, with a right to a seat in the chapel. And as he looked he saw some faces he thought he should like, and some that he thought he would dislike; there were merry, bright-eyed boys, like himself, and there were ill-tempered, sullen-looking boys; there were boys haggard with hard-reading, and boys who looked as if their heads were altogether empty.

But what puzzled and troubled Charlie not a little was to notice, that though the school was supposed to be at prayers, and though most of them must have been within hearing of the reader's voice, a considerable proportion of the boys before him were neither listening nor evincing in their behaviour the slightest sign of reverence for the service in which they were engaged.

He was sorry to see that Tom Drift was laughing and whispering with his companions; entertaining them with an account of the way in which he had set the new "young un's" watch to rights, and what a shave they had from being shut out from prayers. (Charlie wondered, as he noticed all this, whether, after all, he would have lost much good if that misfortune had happened.) And one or two boys were chewing toffee; at least, Charlie thought it must be toffee, their mouths were so brown, and they made such a noise over the process of mastication; some, with their hands in their pockets, were listlessly staring up at the roof; and some were reading books, anything but prayer-books, under the desk.

Charlie did his best to attend to what the invisible and inarticulate voice was saying, and tried to recall what his father had told him about not letting new scenes and new companions tempt him to forget of neglect the lessons of duty and religion which he had learned at his parents'

home; but it was not easy work, and to him it was a relief when all was over, and the boys proceeded to file out of the chapel.

"Where are they all going?" he inquired, turning round to where Tom Drift had been standing.

That young man, however, was no longer there. He had gone off to enjoy the questionable luxury of roast potatoes in a friend's study, entirely forgetting his young and forlorn charge.

Charlie was puzzled. He was sure he could never find his way back to Mrs Packer's through such a maze of pa.s.sages, and he knew not where else to go.

As he stood watching in despair the last remnant of his fellow- wors.h.i.+ppers pa.s.sing out, and wondering what was to become of him, he became aware of two big boys stopping in front of him and looking at him.

"That's him!" said one, whose grammar was perhaps not his strongest point at this moment.

"Why, he's only a kid!" said the other, who, being sixteen, felt fully justified in so designating my young master.

"I can't help that, I know it's him," said the first.

"I say, you fellow," added he, addressing Charlie, "wasn't it you drove up to the front door in a cab this afternoon?"

Charlie trembled in his shoes. More than once had his heart misgiven him, he had committed an unpardonable offence in the mode of his advent to Randlebury; and now, with these two awful accusers before him, he felt as if his doom was come.

"I'm very sorry," he began; "yes, it was--I didn't mean, I'm sure."

"What did you do it for, if you didn't mean, you young m.u.f.f?--why don't you go off to bed?"

"Because I don't know where to go, and Tom Drift--"

"Do you know Tom Drift?"

"Yes--that is, I met his mother," stammered Charlie, becoming more and more embarra.s.sed.

Both the big boys burst out laughing. "What a treat for his mother!"

said one. "I suppose she told you Tom was a real nice boy?"

"Yes."

"I thought so; so he is, isn't he, Joe?" and both boys laughed again.

"And she gave you a kiss to take to him?"

"No," said Charlie, blus.h.i.+ng scarlet; "she did give me a kiss, but not for him."

It was a hard effort for the poor boy to come out with this admission, but candour compelled it.

"Oh, she gave you one for yourself, did she?" and again they laughed.

"What a dear old noodle she must be!"

"She was very kind to me," said Charlie, not liking to hear his friend made fun of.

Just then a master came by.

"What are you three boys doing here?" he asked.

"Please, sir, this is a new boy," replied he who had been called Joe, "and he doesn't know where to go."

"Hum!" said the master, "I thought Mrs Packer would have seen after that. Let me see. You had better take him to your dormitory to-night, Halliday; there's a vacant bed there. Bring him to the doctor's room after breakfast to-morrow," and he pa.s.sed on.

"Here's a treat!" exclaimed Joe, with a not ill-natured grin. "This comes of stopping and talking to young scarecrows. Come along, youngster; think yourself lucky you've been handed over to me. I wear patent leather boots, and they don't need as much blacking as some of the fellows'."

Charlie was at a loss to understand what the material of Master Halliday's boots had to do with his own alleged good fortune in falling into the hands of such a guardian; but he said nothing, and, rea.s.sured by the good-humoured face of his conductor, followed him cheerfully from the chapel.

"Hullo, Joe! got a donkey at last?" cried some one, as the two wended their way up the stairs leading to the dormitories.

"Looks like it," was Joe's reply.

It was not very long before Charlie learned that the four-footed beast thus vaguely referred to was a polite term which the big boys at Randlebury used to designate their f.a.gs.

"Come in here," said his conductor, turning in at a small door.

Charlie found himself inside a small apartment, measuring about ten feet square, lighted by a small window, warmed by a small fire, decorated with a small bookcase, and furnished with a small table, two small chairs, and a small cupboard.