Mildred Arkell Volume Iii Part 13

Henry put his hand to his ear, then higher up, then to his temple. "It was somewhere here--all about here--I cannot tell the exact spot."

As he spoke, a tribe of college boys was heard to clatter in at the gate. Henry would have risen, but Mr. St. John laid his arm across him.

"You are not going to those boys. I will send them off. Lie still and go to sleep, and dream of pleasant things."

"Pleasant things!" echoed Henry Arkell, in a tone full of pain. Mr. St.

John leaned over him.

"Henry, I have never had a brother of my own; but I have almost loved you as such. Treat me as one now. What tale is it those demons of mischief have got hold of, about your watch and medal?"

With a sharp cry, Henry Arkell turned his face to the pillow, hiding its distress.

"I suppose old Rutterley has got them. But that's nothing; it's the fas.h.i.+on in the school: and I expect you had some urgent motive."

"Oh, Mr. St. John, I shall never overget this day's shame: they told Georgina Beauclerc! I would rather die this moment, here, as I lie, than see her face again."

His tone was one of suppressed anguish, and Mr. St. John's heart ached for him: though he chose to appear to make light of the matter.

"Told Georgina Beauclerc: what if they did? She is the very one to glory in such exploits. Had she been the dean's son, instead of his daughter, she would have been in Rutterley's sanctum three times a week. I don't think she would stand at going, as it is, if she were hard up."

"But why did they tell her! I could not have acted so cruelly by them.

If I could but go to some far-off desert, and never face her, or the school, again!"

"If you could but work yourself into a brain fever, you had better say!

that's what you seem likely to do. As to falling in Georgina Beauclerc's opinion, which you seem to estimate so highly (it's more than I do), if you pledged all you possess in a lump, and yourself into the bargain, she would only think the better of you. Now I tell you so, for I know it."

"I could not help it; I could not, indeed. Money is so badly wanted----"

He stopped in confusion, having said more than he meant: and St. John took up the discourse in a careless tone.

"Money is wanted badly everywhere. I have done worse than you, Harry, for I am p.a.w.ning my estate, piecemeal. Mind! that's a true confession, and has never been given to another soul: it must lie between us."

"It was yesterday afternoon when college was over," groaned Henry. "I only thought of giving Rutterley my watch: I thought he would be sure to let me have ten pounds upon it. But he would not; only six: and I had the medal in my pocket; I had been showing it to you. I never did such a thing in all my life before."

"That is more than your companions could say. How did it get to their knowledge?"

"I cannot think."

"Where's the----the exchange?"

"The what?" asked Henry.

"How dull you are!" cried Mr. St. John. "I am trying to be genteel, and you won't let me. The ticket. Let me see it."

"They are in my jacket-pocket. Two." He languidly reached forth the pieces, and Mr. St. John slipped them into his own.

"Why do you do that, Mr. St. John?"

"To study them at leisure. What's the matter?"

"My head is beginning to ache."

"No wonder, with, all this talking. I'm off. Good-bye. Get to sleep as fast as you can."

The boys were in the garden and round the gate still, when he went down.

"Oh, if you please, sir, is he half killed? Edwin Wilberforce says so."

"No, he is not half killed," responded Mr. St. John. "But he wants quiet, and you must disperse, that he may have it."

"My brother, the senior boy, says he must have fallen down from vexation, because his tricks came out," cried Prattleton junior.

Mr. St. John ran his eyes over the a.s.semblage. "What tricks?"

"He has been p.a.w.ning the gold medal, Mr. St. John," cried Cookesley, the second senior of the school. "Aultane junior has told the dean: Bright Vaughan heard him."

"Oh, he has told the dean, has he?"

"The dean was going into the deanery, sir, and Miss Beauclerc was standing at the door, waiting for him," explained Vaughan to Mr. St.

John. "Something she said to Aultane put him in a pa.s.sion, and he took and told the dean. It was his temper made him do it, sir."

"Such a disgrace, you know, Mr. St. John, to take the dean's medal _there_," rejoined Cookesley. "Anything else wouldn't have signified."

"Oh, been rather meritorious, no doubt," returned Mr. St. John. "Boys!"

"Yes, Mr. St. John."

"You know I was one of yourselves once, and I can make allowance for you in all ways. But when I was in the school, our motto was, Fair play, and no sneaking."

"It's our motto still," cried the flattered boys.

"It does not appear to be. We would rather, any one of us, have pitched ourselves off that tower," pointing to it with his hand, "than have gone sneaking to the dean with a private complaint."

"And so we would still, in cool blood," cried Cookesley. "Aultane must have been out of his mind with pa.s.sion when he did it."

"How does Aultane know that Arkell's medal is in p.a.w.n?"

"He does not say how. He says he'll pledge his word to it."

"Then listen to me, boys: my word will, I believe, go as far with you as Aultane's. Yesterday afternoon I met Henry Arkell at the gate here; I asked to see his medal, and he brought it out of the house to show me.

He is in bed now, but perhaps if you ask him to-morrow, he will be able to show it to you. At any rate, do not condemn him until you are sure there's a just reason. If he did pledge his medal, how many things have you pledged? Some of you would pledge your heads if you could. Fair play's a jewel, boys--fair play for ever!"

Off came the trenchers, and a shout was being raised for fair play and Mr. St. John; but the latter put up his hand.

"I thought it was Sunday. Is that the way you keep Sunday in Westerbury?

Disperse quietly."

"I'll clear him," thought Mr. St. John, as he walked home. "Aultane's a mean-spirited coward. To tell the dean!"