The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch

Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England

The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch

By Talbot Baines Reed ________________________________________________________________________ This is really a most unusual book. Told, we must imagine, by the watch, we are led through the owner's days at a boys' boarding school, to being stolen, pawned, auctioned, taken to quite another small town, given to a brilliant local boy when he left for Cambridge, lost in a field, found, and through further adventures being taken to India to fight in a battle near Lucknow, finally making its way into the pocket of its original owner, whose life was saved by the watch having deflected a bullet.

It's well-told, too, and not too long, at under ten hours.

The copy we worked from was very browned, and it was not too easy to do the transcription, but we have done our best: if you find anything obviously wrong, don't hesitate to tell us about it. NH. ________________________________________________________________________ THE ADVENTURES OF A THREE-GUINEA WATCH

By Talbot Baines Reed

Chapter One.

My Infancy And Education--How I Was Sold And Who Bought Me.

"Then you can guarantee it to be a good one to go?"

"You couldn't have a better, sir."

"And it will stand a little roughish wear, you think?"

"I'm sure of it, sir; it's an uncommon strong watch."

"Then I'll take it."

These few sentences determined my destiny, and from that moment my career may be said to have begun.

I am old, and run down, and good for nothing now; but many a time do I find my thoughts wandering back to this far-off day; and remembering all that has befallen me since that eventful moment, I humbly hope my life has not been one to disgrace the good character with which I went out into the world.

I was young at the time, very young--scarcely a month old. Watches however, as every one knows, are a good deal more precocious in their infancy than human beings. They generally settle down to business as soon as they are born, without having to spend much of their time either in the nursery or the schoolroom.

Indeed, after my face and hands had once been well cleaned, and a brand- new shiny coat had been put on my back, it was years before I found myself again called upon to submit to that operation which is such a terror to all mortal children.

As to my education, it lasted just a week; and although I am bound to say, while it lasted, it was both carefully and skilfully managed, I did not at all fancy the discipline I was subjected to in the process. I used to be handed over to a creature who took me up and examined me (as if he were a policeman and a magistrate combined), and according as I answered his questions he exclaimed, "You're going too fast," or "You're going too slow," and with that he set himself to "regulate" me, as he called it. I was ordered to turn round, take off my coat, and submit my poor shoulders to his instrument of correction. But why need I describe this experience to boys? They know what "regulating" means as well as I do!

Well in due time I profited by the instructions received, and one day my tutor, after the usual examination, grumpily told me, "You're right at last; you can go." And I did go, and I've been going ever since.

The troubles of my infancy however were not all over. I discovered at a very early age that the one thing a watch is never allowed to do is to go to sleep. They'd as soon think of leaving an infant to starve as of letting a watch go to sleep.

But to my story. Ever since I had left school--or, in other words, gone through my due course of regulation--I had remained shut up under a glass-case, lying comfortably upon a bed of purple velvet, and decorated with a little white label bearing the mysterious inscription, "Only Three Guineas." From this stately repose I was only once a day disturbed in order to be kept from sleeping, and had all the rest of my time to look about me and observe what went on in the world in which I found myself.

It was not a big world indeed, but I could see I was not the only inhabitant. All around me were watches like myself, some of a golden complexion, and some--of which I was one--of a silvery. Some were big, and made an awful noise, and some were tiny, and just whispered what they had to say. Some were very proud, and showed off their jewels and chains in a way which made me blush for the vanity of my fellow- creatures--"dear" watches, the ladies called these, and others were as plain as plain could be.

Every now and then our case would be opened, and one of my neighbours taken out and never put back. Then we knew he had been sold, and we who were left spent our time in gossiping about what had become of him, and speculating whose turn would come next. A gold repeater near me was very confident the turn would be his, and so impressed us with the sense of his "striking" importance and claims, that when the next time our glass house was entered, and a hand came groping in our direction, I at once concluded it was his summons into publicity and honour. Imagine my astonishment, then, when the hand, instead of reaching my gold neighbour, took hold of me and cautiously drew me out of the case! My heart leaped to my mouth--or whatever part of a watch's anatomy corresponds with that organ--and I was ready to faint with excitement. I had always imagined I was to lie in that case for years, but now, when I was barely a month old, here was I going out into the world.

It made me quite bashful to listen to all the flattering things my master said of me. I was worth twice the price he was selling me at, he said; in fact, if trade had been good he would not have parted with me under three times that price. It was a relief to think the repeater could not overhear this, or he would have sneered in a way to extinguish me altogether. As it was, no other watch was by, so that I was not very much embarrassed.

After turning me over, and feeling my pulse, and listening to the beating of my heart, and taking off my coat and waistcoat to inspect my muscle, my master's customer at last laid me down on the counter and pronounced the sentences with which I have begun my story.

"Then I'll take it," he said, and pulled out his purse. "Stop a bit, though!" exclaimed he; "I'd better have a chain too, my little chap will think more of that than the watch. Let me see some silver chains, will you?"

So my master went and fetched a tray containing a large number of tempting-looking chains.

While he was gone my new owner took me up again in his hand and turned me over and put me to his ear; then as he laid me down again he smiled to himself and murmured.

"Bless his little heart! how proud he'll be!"

I was quite taken aback. Who was this taking upon himself to bless my little heart and prophesy that I should be proud? Then all of a sudden it occurred to me this remark may have been intended to refer not to me, but to the "little chap" the gentleman had just now spoken of. So I recovered my composure, especially when I saw what a kind, gentle face my purchaser had.

He chose a neat, strong silver chain which was forthwith, in accordance with the barbarous practice of the age, fixed to my poor neck. I could not help sighing as I felt for the first time the burden of bondage.

What had I done to be thus chained like a Roman captive, like a dog, like a parrot? But it was no use being in a rage. I swallowed my indignation as well as I could, and consoled myself with the reflection that every watch, even gold repeaters themselves, are subject to the same hardship.

Ah! I was young then, and my knowledge of the world was small. Many a time since I have blessed the chain that held me, just as the ship, could it speak, would bless the cable that saved it from the rocks. Take the advice of an old ticker, you young watches, and instead of rebelling against your chains, rather hope they may be strong and sound in every link!

"That will be just five pounds, won't it?" said my purchaser. "Here is a bank note. Never mind about doing it up, I'll just slip it into my pocket. Good-morning."

And with that I was conscious of being lowered into a dark, deep pit, and without time to bid my comrades good-bye, or to take a last look at my old master, I felt myself hurried away I knew not whither.

This, then, was my first step into the world.

I lay untouched and apparently forgotten for several hours. Gradually getting my eyes accustomed to the darkness, and looking about me as far as I was able, I heard a ticking going on in a pocket not very far from the one I was in, which I at once concluded to proceed from the watch of my new master. Thinking I might be able to gain some information from him, I groped about till I found a small hole in my lodgings through which I was able to peep, and call.

"Tick!" said I, as loud as I could, to secure the attention of my fellow-watch.

"Who's that?" at once exclaimed the other.

"I'm a new watch, bought to-day."

"Humph! How much?"

"Three guineas."

"Chain and all?"

"No; five pounds with the chain."

"Humph, I cost thirty guineas. Never mind, you're for the boy."

"What boy?"

"The governor's. I heard him say he was going to get him one. That boy will be spoiled, as sure as I go on springs; he's made such a lot of. Have you been regulated?"

"I should think I have!" exclaimed I, in indignant recollection of my education.

"All right; keep your temper. What time are you?"

"Seven minutes to six."

"Wrong! It's seven and three-quarters!"

"How do you know?"

"Because that's what I make it."

"How do you know you are right?" I asked, wondering at my own impudence in thus questioning an old ticker.

"Look here, young fellow," said the other in an awful voice; "you don't seem to know you are addressing a gold watch that has neither gained nor lost a minute for five years! There! You may think yourself clever; but you're too fast."

"I'm sure I beg your--"

"That'll do!" said the offended veteran. "I want no more words."

I was completely shut up at this, and retired back to my pocket very crestfallen.

Presently I began to feel drowsy; my nerves seemed to get unstrung, and my circulation flagged. It was long after the time I had generally been in the habit of being wound up; and I began to be afraid I was really going to be left to go to sleep. That, by this time, I knew would be nothing short of a calamity. I therefore gave a slight tug at my chain.

"What's the matter?" it said, looking down.

"I've not been wound up."

"I can't help that," said the chain.

"Can't you let him know somehow?" I gasped, faintly.

"How can I? He's busy packing up books."

"Couldn't you catch yourself in his fingers or something? I'm in a bad way."

"I'll see," said the chain.

Presently I felt an awful tug at my neck, and I knew the chain had managed to entangle itself somehow with his fingers.

"Hullo!" I heard my master exclaim, "I mustn't smash Charlie's chain before I give it to him. I'd better put it and the watch away in my drawer till the morning. Heigho! it'll be a sad day for me to-morrow!"

As he spoke he drew me from the pocket, and, disengaging the chain from his button-hole, he laid us both in a drawer and shut it up. I was in despair, and already was nearly swooning from weakness.

He had shut the drawer, and his hand was still on the knob, when all of a sudden he exclaimed,--

"By the way, I must wind it up, or it'll stop!"

With what joy and relief I saw the drawer again opened, and felt myself taken out and wound up! Instantly new life seemed to infuse itself through my frame; my circulation revived, my nerves were strung again, and my drooping heart resumed its usual healthy throb. Little did my master think of the difference this winding up made to my health and comfort.

"Now you're happy!" said the chain, as we found ourselves once more in the drawer.

"Yes; I'm all right now, I'm glad to say," said I. "What's going to happen to us to-morrow?" I asked presently.

"We're going to be given to the boy, and he's going to school;" so the silver chain told me. "Nice time we shall have of it, I expect."

After that he went to sleep, and I fell to counting the seconds, and wondering what sort of life I was destined to lead.

About an hour after I heard two voices talking in the room.

"Well," said one, and I recognised it at once as my master's, "the packing's all finished at last."

"Ah, Charles," said the other, and it seemed to be a woman's voice speaking amid tears, "I never thought it would be so hard to part with him."

"Tut, tut!" said the first, "you mustn't give way, Mary. You women are so ready to break down. He'll soon be back;" but before my master had got to the end of his sentence he too had broken down.

For a long time they talked about their boy, their fine boy who had never before left his parents' roof, and was about now to step out into the treacherous world. How they trembled for him, yet how proudly and confidently they spoke of his prospects; how lovingly they recalled all their life together, from the days when he could first toddle about, down to the present.

Many tears were mingled with their talk, and many a smothered sob bespoke a desperate effort to subdue their common sorrow. At last they became quieter, then I heard my master say,--

"I positively have never shown you the watch I got for him," and with that he opened the drawer and produced me.

"Oh, Charles," cried the mother, "how delighted he will be, and what a capital watch it is!"

And she looked at me affectionately for a long time, for her son's sake, smiling through her tears, and then put me back.

Need I say that as these two knelt together that night, their only son was not forgotten in their prayers?

So ended the first day of my adventures.

Chapter Two.

How I Was Presented To A Boy, And Of A Certain Journey We Took Together.

Very early next morning, when my hands scarcely pointed to five o'clock, the little household was astir. There was a noise of hurried going and coming, and of trunks being carried down stairs, and for the first time I heard mingled with the sedate voices of my master and his wife, another voice, cheery and musical, which I at once guessed to belong to my future lord and master.

It was not till after this bustle had been going on for a good while that I was taken out of the drawer and put back into the pocket in which I had spent so many anxious hours the day before. But here I was destined not to remain long, as will be seen.

Breakfast was a sad meal to that little family. Even the gay, high- spirited boy was sobered in anticipation of the coming parting, and as to his parents, they dared not open their lips for fear of breaking down.

Then there was a rumbling of wheels in the street, and a banging about of boxes at the hall door; then a last long embrace between mother and son. She no longer resisted her grief, and he for the time forgot everything but her he was leaving; then father and son stepped into the cab and drove away.

I felt the father's heart beating quicker and his chest heaving deeper as we proceeded. Presently his hand stole to the pocket where I lay hid, and he said--

"Charlie, boy, I've said all I have to say to you. You will remember our talk last night, I am sure, and I shall remember it too. I have no greater wish than to see my boy brave and honest and true to himself. Remember always I am your father, and never hesitate to tell me whenever you are in trouble, or danger, or--and I hope this won't often be--in disgrace. See here," said he, drawing me forth, "this is a watch which your mother and I have got for you. Think of us when you use it; and mind this, Charlie, make the best use of time, or time will become your enemy."

The poor man faltered out these words with a half-broken heart, as he handed me to his son.

The boy's eyes brightened and his face became radiant at the sight of his unexpected treasure. What boy does not covet a watch of his own at some time or other?

"Oh, father!" he cried, "how good and kind of you! What a beauty!"

The father smiled to see his son's delight, and helped to fasten the chain to his button-hole.

"You and mother are bricks!" exclaimed Charlie, feasting his eyes upon me, and half wild with delight. "How _did_ you know I was longing to have one?"

"Were you?" inquired the father.

"Of course I was, and you knew it. What a swell I shall be! And it will always be sure to remind me of home."

While this talk was going on I had leisure to examine my new owner. Picture to yourselves a curly-haired, bright-eyed boy of thirteen with honest, open face, good features, and winning smile. He is big for his age, and strongly built. At present his form is arrayed in a brand-new suit of grey; his collar is new and his tie is new, his boots are new and his socks are new; everything is new about him, down to the very guard of his hat, and he himself is the newest and purest of all. Was ever such a radiant young hero turned loose into the world?

And now, over and above his other glories, he had me to crown all. The graceful curve of my chain on his waistcoat gave that garment quite a distinguished appearance, and the consciousness of a silver watch in his pocket made him hold his head even higher than usual.

"He is a beauty!" again he broke out, "exactly the kind I like most. I'll take ever such a lot of care of him." And so saying, he began to swing me at the end of the chain, till I suddenly came sharply into collision with the door of the cab.

"Hullo," exclaimed my young master, "that won't do. I'll put him away now. It _was_ good of you, father."

With that we reached the railway station, and in the bustle that ensued I was for the time forgotten.

Charlie's trunks were duly labelled for Randlebury, and then came the hardest moment of all, when father and son must part.

"I wonder if you'll be altered, Charlie, when I see you again."

"Not for the worse I hope, anyhow," replied the boy, laughing.

"Tickets, please!" demanded the guard.

"There goes the bell," said Charlie, pulling me out of his pocket. "They're very punctual. Hullo, we're off! Good-bye, father."

"Good-bye, boy, and God bless you."

And there was a close grasp of the hand, a last smile, a hasty wave from the window; and then we were off.

How many grown-up men are there who cannot recall at some time or other this crisis in their lives, this first good-bye from the home of their childhood, this stepping forth into the world with all that is familiar and dear at their backs, and all that is strange and unknown and wonderful stretching away like a vast landscape before them? How many are there who would not give much to be back once more at that threshold of their career; and to have the chance of living over again the life they began there with such bright hopes and such careless confidence? Ah, if some of them could have seen whither that flower-strewn path was to lead them, would they not rather have chosen even to die on the threshold, than take so much as the first step forth from the innocent home of childhood!

But I am wandering from my story. For half an hour after that last good-bye Charlie leaned back in the corner of his carriage and gave himself up to his loneliness, and I could feel his chest heaving to keep down the tears that would every now and then rise unbidden to his eyes.

But what boy of thirteen can be in the dumps for long? Especially if he has a new watch in his pocket. Charlie was himself again before we had well got clear of London, and his reviving spirits gradually recalled to his memory his father's parting gift, which had for a while been half forgotten amid other cares.

Now again I was produced, I was turned over and over, was listened to, was peeped into, was flourished about, was taken off my chain, and put on again with the supremest satisfaction. At every station we came to, out I came from his pocket, to be compared with the railway time. By the clock at Batfield I was a minute slow--a discrepancy which was no sooner discovered than I felt my glass face opened, and a fat finger and thumb putting forward my hand to the required time. At Norbely I was two minutes fast by the clock, and then (oh, horrors!) I found myself put back in the same rough-and-ready way. At Maltby I was full half a minute behind the great clock, and on I went again. At the next station the clock and I both gave the same time to a second, and then what must he do but begin to regulate me! After a minute calculation he made the astounding discovery that I had lost a minute and a quarter in four hours, and that in order to compensate for this shortcoming it would be necessary for him to move my regulator forward the two hundred and fortieth part of an inch. This feat he set himself to accomplish with the point of his scarf-pin while the train was jolting forward at the rate of thirty miles an hour!

I began to grow nervous. If this was a sample of what I was to expect, I had indeed need be the healthy, hardy watch I was represented to be by my maker.

And yet I could not be angry with my brave, honest little tormentor.

It was a sight to see him during that long journey, in all the glory of a new suit, with a high hat on his head for the first time, and a watch in his pocket. _In_ his pocket, did I say? I was hardly ever so lucky. Every five minutes he whipped me out to see how the time was going. If he polished me up once with his handkerchief, he did it twenty times, and each time with such vigour that I was nearly red-hot under the operation. And no sooner was he tired of polishing me, than he took to paying his hat the same attention, till that wretched article of decoration must have trembled for its nap. Then he would take to whistling and singing (what boy can help doing one or the other in a train?) and as I heard all his little artless songs and gay chirping, I thought it the pleasantest music one could possibly listen to. And, not to let his hands be less busy than his throat, he would bring out the wonderful six-bladed knife his uncle had given him, and exploring all its wonders, and opening all its blades at the same time, together with the corkscrew, the gimlet, the pincers, and the button-hook, at different angles, would terrify the lives out of his fellow-passengers by twirling the awful bristling weapon in his fingers within a foot or so of their faces.

"Mind, dear," said an old lady on the seat opposite, "you'll cut your fingers off, I'm certain."

"Oh, no, I won't," exclaimed he, taking out his handkerchief, and beginning to polish the blades one after another.

The old lady trembled as she watched him, and sighed with relief when the operation was over.

Presently, having nothing particular to do, he stared at her. "Would you like to know the time, ma'am?" he inquired.

"If you please," replied the good old soul.

"Well, it's just seventeen minutes and nineteen seconds past three by my watch. Would you like to see for yourself, ma'am?"

And, pleased to have a confidant of his possessions, he loosed my chain, and flourished me bodily before the eyes of his new friend.

She took me kindly, and said, "What a fine watch you've got, dear?"

"Yes," replied he, with lofty condescension; "like to see his works?"

"You should be careful, you know," she said, "watches so easily get out of order."

"Oh, I won't hurt it," said he, proceeding to take off my coat and waistcoat. "There! there are his works. Don't breathe hard, or you'll damp them."

So the old lady held her breath and peeped in, much to my young master's gratification.

"And so you're going to school, my man?" said she presently.

"Yes; who told you! Did my father tell you?"

"No, I guessed."

"Did you though? Can you guess what the name of the school is?"

"No, I can't do that."

"Have a try."

"Well, then, I guess Randlebury, because my boy is there, and it's the only one I can think of."

The boy stared at her. "How ever did you know that?"

"What!" she exclaimed, "you don't mean to tell me you _are_ going to Randlebury?"

"I am, though."

"Well, I never," cried the good old soul, "who would have believed it! Think of your going to the same school as my Tom."

"Is Tom your boy's name?"

"Yes."

"Is he a nice boy?"

Such a question to ask any one's mother!

The old lady burst into tears instead of answering--a proceeding which greatly alarmed and disconcerted my master.

"Don't cry," he said excitedly. "Look here! I didn't mean--oh, don't! Look here, shall I tell you the time? It's--it's sixteen minutes to four--I didn't mean, you know. Of course he's a nice boy--oh, don't cry!"

And he got into such a state that the old lady dried her eyes at once.

"Never mind me, dear," said she, "it wasn't you made me cry: it was thinking of my Tom. You'll be a good friend to him, won't you, dear?"

"Perhaps he won't like me."

"Now I'm sure he will," exclaimed the lady warmly; so warmly that I quite loved her for my little master's sake. Both were silent for some time, and then Charlie asked,--

"I say, has he got a watch?"

"No."

"Oh, never mind," said he, in a tone of evident relief, "I can tell him the time, you know, whenever he wants to know."

"To be sure you can."

Then Charlie took to polishing me and the chain up again, an occupation which lasted until we arrived at Gunborough Junction, where passengers changed for Randlebury.

"Good-bye, dear," said the old lady, as Charlie proceeded to get together his things.

"Good-bye," said he. "Would you like to know the time before I go? It's eight past five. Good-bye."

"May I give you a kiss?" said she.

Charlie blushed, but offered his cheek hurriedly.

"And you promise to be a good friend to Tom," said she, kissing him, "won't you?"

"All right," said the boy, jumping out on to the platform, and running to see after his luggage.

In a moment however he returned to the window and put his head in.

"I say," said he, "what's his name--Tom what?"

"Drift," said the old lady, "Tom Drift!"

"Oh!" replied my master, "all right, good-bye;" and next minute the train went on, and he was left standing surrounded by his luggage in the middle of the platform, like a lighthouse in the middle of an island.

Chapter Three.

How My Master And I Reach Randlebury In State, And Of A Great Calamity.

My master and I had nearly an hour to wait on the platform at Gunborough before the Randlebury train came up. Part of this interval Charlie, for fear he might forget to do it at night, devoted to winding me up; an experiment which nearly closed my career for ever, for he first began to turn the key the wrong way; then, when he had discovered his mistake, he started in the other direction with a sudden dash, and finally overwound me to such an extent that I expected every second to hear my heart break with the strain.

Then he sat on his boxes, whistling to himself and drumming his heels on the platform. The train came up at last, and in he jumped, finding himself and a grave elderly gentleman in joint possession of the carriage.

Charlie was too busy staring out of the window, whistling, and brushing the dust off his new hat, to take much notice of his companion until the train was fairly started; then, observing the gentleman look at his watch, the boy at once recognised a bond of sympathy and pulled out me.

"I wonder if I'm the same as you?" he said eagerly.

"I hope you are not," said the gentleman, "for I'm a quarter of an hour fast."

"Are you though?" said the boy, in astonishment.

"Why don't you put it right? I would."

"It's a bad thing to put a watch back, my boy; besides, I rather like keeping mine a little fast."

"Do you? I say, do you think my watch is a good one?" said Charlie, thrusting me into the hands of his astonished travelling companion.

"I can't say, my boy. I know nothing about watches. It looks a nice one."

"Yes, father gave it me. I say, are you going to Randlebury?"

"Yes."

"Do you know the school? I'm going there."

"Oh, yes; I know the school. And you are going there, are you?" inquired the gentleman, with interest.

"Yes, I'm a new boy, you know."

"And how do you like going to school?"

"Oh, all right; only I don't know what it'll be like. Eat I say, I don't suppose there's many of the boys my age have got watches, do you?"

The gentleman laughed. "I dare say not," he said. Charlie was silent for a time, and then asked,--

"I say, what sort of fellow's the head master; do you know?"

"I've seen him now and then," said the gentleman.

"Is he awfully stuck-up and strict?" asked the boy anxiously.

"I really don't know," said the gentleman, biting his lips; "I hope not."

"So do I. I wish my father was the head master," said Charlie, the tears for a moment starting to his eyes at the bare thought of such happiness.

The gentleman looked at him very kindly, and said,--

"Cheer up, my little man; perhaps it won't be so bad after all."

Charlie smiled again as he said,--

"Oh, yes, I've got to be brave, you know, because I promised father. But I say, if you ever come to the school, ask for me--my name's Charlie Newcome--will you? because I don't know any of the fellows; and besides," added he, brightening at the idea, "we can see if our watches are going the same, you know."

The gentleman promised, and soon after this the train arrived at Randlebury. The boy bid his companion farewell, and went off as before to look after his belongings.

As he was standing surrounded by his baggage, a man in the dress of a coachman came up to him and said,--

"Are you the young party from London for the school?"

"Yes," replied the boy.

"It's all right," said the man; "give us hold of these things, and jump inside my trap."

"How far is it?" he asked of the man.

"Better of three miles."

"Is it, though? I say, can't you put the things inside, and then I can ride on the box?"

"All square," said the man; "hop up, my young bantam."

The young bantam did hop up, and they were soon on their way to the school.

I need hardly say it was not long before Charlie and the driver were on confidential terms. The boy duly produced first me and then his six- bladed knife to the admiring eyes of his new companion, insisting on his taking both into his hands, and demanding his candid opinion on their merits.

Presently a wholly new idea seemed to strike him.

"I say, driver, what's your name?"

"Jim, if you want to know," replied that public servant.

"Well, Jim, I wish you'd just get inside and look after the luggage, and let me drive; will you?"

The man opened his eyes and his mouth at the proposition, and then bursting out laughing.

"Hark at him!" he exclaimed; "did you ever hear the like? Me get inside and let a young shaver like him drive me--ho! ho!"

"Come along, Jim; I know the way; and it _would_ be a lark. Come on, _dear_ Jim."

And the boy got quite affectionate in his eagerness.

"Dear Jim," who was one of those easy-going men who don't take much persuading when they're approached the right way, at length consented to hand over the reins to Charlie; and after waiting some time to see for himself that the boy could really manage, after a fashion, to drive the horse, he further gratified him by descending from the box, and leaving him in sole possession of the coveted position.

"Get inside, Jim," cried the boy, with beaming face.

Jim, his face all one grin, obeyed, saying, as he did so,--

"Well, if you ain't a queer one! That's the house there, on the top of that hill. Mind how you go, now."

"All right; you get inside. And I say, Jim," added the boy, leaning down from his perch, "make yourself comfortable, you know, and don't bother about me. I want to drive all by myself, and you aren't to help me a bit, mind."

So the driver got inside, and seating himself among the luggage, proceeded to make himself "comfortable," as instructed.

Meanwhile my master, as proud as an emperor, lashed his steed into a canter, and rattled off in the direction of the school.

"That'll astonish some of them caps and gowns, I reckon," I heard cabby say to himself. "You see, if he don't drive us right up to the front door, as comfortable as if we was the sheriff of the county."

You may imagine what was the astonishment of the grave and reverend authorities at Randlebury School when they perceived, coming up the carriage drive, a cab with a boy of thirteen perched on the box, tugging at the reins, hallooing to the horse, and making his whip crack like so many fireworks; while inside, comfortably lounging amid a pile of luggage, reclined cabby at his ease, grinning from ear to ear.

The young Jehu, perfectly innocent of the sensation he was making, pursued his triumphant career at full speed up to the very hall door, pulling up his steed with such a sudden jerk as almost to bring him into a sitting position, while the piled-up luggage inside fell all about the cab with the shock, to the imminent risk of cabby's life.

"Well, if that ain't one way of doing it, I don't know what is!" exclaimed that astonished charioteer, emerging from his precarious quarters. "Down you jump, young un."

Charlie descended, all jubilant with triumph, and pulling out me, exclaimed, "We did that three miles in half an hour--not bad, was it?"

In his excitement he had not observed that the door of the house had opened, and that these words, instead of being addressed to the cabby, had been spoken to a stately female who stood in the portal before him.

Now however he caught sight of her, and not knowing exactly what was the proper thing to do under the circumstances, stared at her.

"What do you say, young man?" inquired she, in a solemn voice.

"Oh," said the boy, "I didn't know it was you. I was telling Jim we had come from the station in half an hour. You know we started at 6.2 by my watch, and it's just 6.33 now. Would you like to see for yourself, marm?" added he, preparing to unfasten the chain.

"I know what the time is, young man," replied she sternly; "and pray, who is Jim?" she asked, looking down in solemn perplexity at this queer boy.

"Oh, he's the driver is Jim, and he got inside, you know, and I've driven nearly all the way up by myself; haven't I, Jim?"

"Come inside, sir," said the matron hurriedly, "and don't stand talking to vulgar cabmen and calling them by their Christian names. Your name is Charles Newcome, I suppose? Come this way."

Charlie followed her in, his enthusiasm rather damped at this somewhat frigid greeting, and sorry in his heart he had not been allowed an opportunity of bidding farewell to his friend the driver.

And now I could hear the little fellow's heart begin to beat quicker as he found himself at length for the first time in his life inside a public school. The rows of caps in the corridors, the distant hum of voices through half-opened doors, the occasional shout from the playground, and the fleeting vision of a master in cap and gown, all had for him the deepest and most mysterious interest. As he sat waiting in the matron's room while that worthy lady went to superintend the bringing in of his luggage, his mind became full of wonderings and misgivings. I who lay so near the seat of his emotions could tell what was going on in his breast. He wondered if the pair of socks lying on the table with a hole in each heel, which appeared to be waiting their turn for mending, belonged to the son of the old lady he had met in the train. He wondered if the footsteps in the passage belonged to the head master, and whether that awful being was being fetched to punish him for his crime of driving the cab. He wondered who the boy was who put his head in at the door and drew it back again. With what reverential eyes he followed that hero's retreating form, and how he hung on his whistling.

When would _he_, he wondered, be sufficiently hardy to whistle within those awful walls? Then he wondered if he was the only new boy, and if so, whether every one would stare at him and laugh at his new coat. He wished he'd got his old one on, then he wouldn't have felt so brand-new. And then--and then...

But here, tired-out with his long journey and the excitement of the day, a drowsy fit came over him, and without another thought he dropped off to sleep, where he sat. In this attitude the housekeeper found him when she returned.

She could not help feeling rather more than a common interest in this curly-haired, tired-out little fellow, as he sat there in his new clothes, huddled up, with his little hat slipping from his head, and his hand clasping his precious six-bladed knife. Accustomed as she was to boys and their rude ways, this matron had a good deal of softness left in her heart, and I dare say she thought as she watched Charlie that afternoon that if she had ever had a son of her own she would have liked a boy something like the little fellow before her. She went softly up to him, took his hat from its perilous situation, and, lifting him in her strong arms so gently as not to wake him, laid him on her own sofa, and left him there to enjoy his well-merited sleep, while she busied herself about making tea.

It was at this moment that a calamity befell me, which, in my inexperience of the ways and natures of watches, I imagined to be nothing short of fatal. The excitement through which I had passed, and the rough-and-ready usage to which I had been subjected during the day, seemed all of a sudden to overpower me. In some unaccountable way I found my hands caught together in a manner I had never known them to be before; no effort of mine could disengage them, and the exertion thus required, added to the fatigues of the day, produced a sort of paralysis of my whole system without quite losing consciousness. I could feel my circulation become slower and finally stop; my nerves and energies became suspended, and my hands grew numb and powerless. Even my heart ceased to beat, and the little cry of alarm which I gave just before my powers left me failed to bring me any help. I was ill, very ill indeed; to me it seemed as if my last moment had come, and I could not bear the thought of thus early being taken from my young master, whom already I had learned to love as my best, though my roughest friend.

How long I lay thus, speechless and helpless, I cannot say. Once I was just conscious of a slight jerk from my chain as he peeped in and whispered,--

"What are you so quiet about down there?"

Of course I could not answer.

"Do you hear? What are you so quiet about?"

It only added to my misery to know that there was a fellow-being so close at hand, and yet that I was powerless to make him aware of my condition. My silence offended him, for he turned away, muttering to himself,--

"Sulky humbug! I declare some people haven't so much as the manners of a kitchen clock."

After that I was left to myself, in agony and suspense, to wait the moment of my dissolution.

A long time passed before my master stirred, and when he did the housekeeper's tea was cold. She bustled about to make him some more, and was so kind in buttering his toast and hunting for some jam, that the drooping spirits of the tired-out boy revived wonderfully. Indeed, as the meal proceeded he became on friendly and confidential terms even with so awful a personage as Mrs Packer.

"Would you like to see my knife, ma'am?" he asked.

"Bless me, what a knife it is," cried the lady. "You'll go doing yourself some harm with it."

"That's what the other old lady in the train said," replied Charlie, unconscious of wounding the feelings of his hostess, who fondly imagined she was not more than middle-aged; "but then, you know, she thought it was a fine knife, and I think so too, don't you? I say, marm, do you know Tom Drift?"

The change of subject was so sudden that Mrs Packer stared at the boy, half wondering whether he was not talking in his sleep.

"What about him?" she inquired.

"Oh, only the old lady was his mother, and I promised her--at least she said--do you know Tom Drift, ma'am?"

"To be sure; he's one of the boys here."

"Yes--I say, ma'am, might I see Tom Drift, do you think? I've got something to say to him."

Mrs Packer, wholly at a loss to understand her youthful guest, but at the same time disposed to be indulgent to his little whims, said Tom would be at lessons now, and she didn't think he would be able to come.

"Wouldn't it do in the morning?"

"Oh no," said Charlie, with the gravest face. "I must see him to-night, please, if you don't mind."

The housekeeper concluded that Charlie had some important message from the mother to her son, and therefore rang for a servant, whom she despatched with a message to Master Drift that some one wanted to see him.

In a very little time that hero made his appearance; and as he was the first Randlebury boy Charlie had set eyes on, he appeared for a moment a very awful and a very sublime personage in that little new boy's eyes. But Charlie was too intent on his mission to allow himself to be quite overawed.

"Here's a new boy, Master Drift, wants to speak to you."

"What do you want, young un--eh?"

"Oh, it's all right, Tom Drift; only I saw your mother, you know, in the train, and she said you were a nice boy, and she sent her love, and I told her I'd let you know the time whenever you wanted, because you ain't got a watch, you know, and I have. I say, would you like to know the time now, Tom Drift?"

All this was rattled out with such eager volubility, that Tom Drift, hero as he was, was fairly taken aback, and looked quite sheepish, as the beaming boy proceeded to pull me out of his pocket.

"Well, it's just--hullo!"

He saw in an instant something was wrong.

"Why, it says only half-past six--that must be wrong!"

"It's eight o'clock by the hall clock," said Mrs Packer; "it's just now struck."

Charlie looked at me, opened me, held me to his ear, and then exclaimed,--

"Oh! my watch has stopped! My watch has stopped! What shall I do?" and the poor boy, overwhelmed with his misfortune, held me out appealingly, and scarcely restrained the tears which started to his eyes.

Chapter Four.

How I Was Cured Of My Ailments, And How My Master Began Life At Randlebury.

All this while Tom Drift had said nothing, but had stood regarding first my master, and then me, with mingled amusement, pity, and astonishment. At last, when poor Charlie fairly thrust me into his hands, that he might see with his own eyes the calamity which had befallen the watch that had been destined to minister such consolation to his time- inquiring mind, he took me gingerly, and stared at me as if I had been a toad or a dead rat.

"Can't you make it go, Tom Drift? Please do."

"How can I make him go? I don't know what's the row."

"Do you think it would be a good thing to wind it up?" asked Charlie.

"Don't know; you might try."

Charlie did wind me up; but that was not what I wanted. Already I had had that done while waiting at Gunborough Junction.

"What do you say to shaking him?" asked Tom Drift presently. Most people spoke of me as "it," but Tom Drift always called me "him."

"I hardly like," said Charlie; "_you_ try."

Tom took me and solemnly shook me; it was no use. I still remained speechless and helpless.

"Suppose we shove his wheels on?" next suggested that sage philosopher.

Charlie demurred a little at this; it seemed almost too bold a remedy, even for him; however he yielded to Tom's superior judgment.

The heir of the house of Drift accordingly took a pin from the lining of his jacket, and, taking off my coat and waistcoat, proceeded first to prod one of my wheels and then another, but in vain. They just moved for an instant but then halted again, as stiff end lifeless as ever.

For a moment the profound Tom seemed baffled, and then at last a brilliant idea occurred to him.

"I tell you what, I expect he's got damp, or cold, or something. We'd better warm him!"

And the two boys knelt before the fire with me between them, turning me at the end of my chain so as to get the warmth on all sides, like a leg of mutton on a spit.

Of course that had no effect. What was to be done? No winding up, no shaking, no irritation of my wheels with a pin, no warming of me at the fire, could avail anything. They were ready to give me up. Suddenly, however, Tom, who had been examining my face minutely, burst into a loud laugh.

"What a young donkey you are!" he cried. "Don't you see his hands are caught? That's what's the matter. The minute-hand's got bent, and can't get over the hour hand. You're a nice chap to have a watch!"

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 pass 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 gratitude. 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 passages, dashing 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 astonishing 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, assembled 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 passages, and he knew not where else to go.

As he stood watching in despair the last remnant of his fellow- worshippers passing 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 muff?--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 embarrassed.

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, blushing 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 passed 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, reassured 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 fags.

"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.

"This is my den; and mind when you clean the window you don't crack that pane more than it is; and when you brush my things, you know, see the shelf isn't dirty, because I sometimes keep my worms there--do you hear? And now come along to bed; they put out lights at half-past nine."

The mention of the time recalled me instinctively to Charlie's thoughts. He could not resist the temptation, suggested half by anxiety and half by vanity, of taking me out and looking at me.

"Hullo! What, have you got a watch?"

"Yes," said Charlie meekly, not exactly knowing whether his companion would be admiring or indignant with him.

"More than I have," was all Joe's rejoinder.

Charlie's generosity was at once touched.

"Oh, never mind, we can go shares sometimes, if you like, you know," said he, not without an effort.

"I don't want your watch," was Master Halliday's somewhat ungracious reply. "Let's have a look at it, will you?"

He took me, and examined me; and evidently would not have objected to be the possessor of a watch himself, though he tried to make it appear it was a matter of indifference to him.

"Why don't you get your father to give you one?" asked Charlie innocently.

"Because I haven't got a father."

"Not got a father! Oh, I am sorry!" and the starting tears in the little fellow's eyes testified only too truly to his sincerity. "Look here," he added, "do take the watch, please; perhaps you would like it, and my father would give me another."

Joe Halliday gazed at his young fag in amazement.

"Why, you are a queer chap," he said. "I wouldn't take your watch for anything; but I tell you what, I'll ask you the time whenever I want to know."

"Will you really?" cried the delighted Charlie. "How jolly!"

"And look here," continued Halliday, "take my advice, and don't go offering your watch to everybody who hasn't got a father, or some of them might take you at your word, and then you'd look foolish. Come along now."

And he led the boy into the dormitory, where there were about twenty beds, most of them already occupied by boys, and the rest waiting for occupants, who were rapidly undressing in different parts of the room.

"Look sharp and tumble in," said Joe, pointing out the bed Charlie was to have. "There's only five minutes more."

Charlie, with all the naturalness of innocence, knelt, as he was always used to do, and said his prayers, adding a special petition for his dear absent parents, and another for the poor boy who hadn't got a father.

He was wholly unaware of the curiosity he had excited by his entrance into the dormitory, still less did he imagine the sensation which his simple act of devotion was creating. Twenty pairs of eyes stared at the unwonted spectacle of a boy saying his prayers, and many were the whispered comments which passed from lip to lip. No one however (had any been so inclined) stirred either to disturb or molest him--an immunity secured to him as much perhaps by the fact of his being under the protection of so redoubtable a champion as Halliday as by any special feeling of sympathy for his act.

The good example was not, however, wholly lost, for that same night, after the lights were out, and when silence reigned in the room, more than one boy covered his head with his sheet and tried to recall one of the early prayers of his childhood.

As for Charlie, with me and the knife under his pillow, he slept the sleep of the just, and dreamt of home; and I can answer for it his weary head never turned once the livelong night.

Chapter Five.

How My Master Entered And Quitted The Head Master'S Study Twice In One Morning.

Charlie's first care in the morning was, as I need hardly say, to pull me out from under his pillow, and consult me as to the time. None of his companions were astir, so that, not having anything particular to do, he lay still, and abandoned himself to the luxury of an idle half- hour in bed.

His spirits were so greatly revived by his night's rest that he forgot both the novelty and the loneliness of his position, and fell to polishing first his knife and then me as merrily as if he were at home. What a difference a sound sleep often makes in the aspect of our affairs! Twelve hours ago he had felt as if he could never be sufficiently bold as to whistle within the walls of Randlebury, and now the first sight and sound which greeted Halliday's returning senses, as he sat up and rubbed his eyes, was his young _protege_ whistling to himself like a lark, and brightening me up with all his might with the corner of his blanket till I glowed again at nearly a red heat.

"Who's that kicking up that row whistling?" growled a voice from the far end of the room; "because I'd like to shy a boot at his head."

At this Charlie subsided, not desiring to gratify his unknown auditor in his benevolent desire, and very soon after jumped up and dressed himself.

"Look here, youngster," said Joe, "you'd better do my study now, as you mayn't have time after breakfast to-day. You know which room it is--the sixth on your right when you get downstairs. Cut along, look sharp, you've a good half-hour."

Charlie made his way down to the lion's den, meeting on his way several other discontented fags, bound on similar errands. He set himself to clean the window, tidy the cupboard, and generally put things square, and had succeeded fairly well in this endeavour by the time his patron made his appearance.

"What's the time?" inquired that lord of creation, running his eye rapidly round the room at the same time, to notice how his fag had done his duty.

"It's five minutes to eight," replied Charlie, after consulting me, and highly delighted to be thus appealed to.

"Come along to breakfast, then. You'll have to sit at a different table from me; but mind and wait for me afterwards, for I've got to take you to the doctor."

So Charlie was conducted down to the hall to breakfast, and provided with a humble seat at the foot of the lowest table, while Joe Halliday made his way with all the dignity that became his years to a distinguished place at the highest.

My master found himself among a set of noisy little boys, who amused themselves during the greater part of the meal by interchanging volleys of bread pellets, which much oftener missed their marks than reached them, in consequence of which he himself came in for the brunt of the cannonade. Once he ventured to return one of the random shots which had found its way to his fingers. Fortune favoured his aim, and his shaft hit the boy it was intended for full in the eye.

"Who did that?" cried the wounded hero sharply.

"I did," replied Charlie, quite proud of his achievement.

"All right, I'll punch your head for it when we get outside."

This was by no means what Charlie had expected. He had imagined the wound would be received in the same spirit of jest in which it was aimed.

"It was only in fun," he explained; "did it hurt you?"

"Of course it did," exclaimed the injured youth, who till Charlie's arrival had been the junior pupil of the school, and was now delighted to find some one below himself in the scale of seniority. "Of course it did, and you'll catch it."

All the other boys laughed, and Charlie, who could not find it in him to be overawed by even so majestic a hero as little Master Johnny Walker, made the best of his position.

"Look here," he said, "I'll give you three shots at my mouth, and if you--"

"There's too much talking at table six!" exclaimed an awful voice, and instantly every voice was hushed, including Charlie's, who blushed to the roots of his hair, and felt as if he had been singled out before the whole school as a rioter. He gulped down his breakfast without further argument with Master Walker, and was relieved, when the meal was over, to find that that doughty warrior appeared to have altered his mind about punching his youthful head.

After some time he saw Halliday beckoning to him from the other side of the room.

"Now you've got to go to the doctor," said he; "come along."

This was the first time my master had fully realised the solemn nature of the approaching interview, and I felt his heart flutter as he inquired,--

"I say, what will he say to me?"

"Oh, all sorts of things; you'd better mind what you're up to, I can tell you," was the reassuring reply.

"Do you think I shall get in a row for driving the cab yesterday?" faltered Charlie.

"Shouldn't wonder," was the reply.

"Oh, dear! And do you think he saw me hit Johnny Walker in the eye at breakfast?"

"What, were you the boy who was kicking up all that row? My eye! you're in for it! Here you are; I'll knock for you."

And giving the poor trembling boy not so much as an instant in which to collect his flurried ideas, Joe gave a rap at the door, which was answered at once by a sharp "Come in!" from within.

"Now then," said Halliday, "in you go."

Charlie's knees shook under him, and he hung back from that awful door in mute terror.

"Come in!" again cried the voice.

"Do you hear, you young muff?" exclaimed Halliday. "Won't you catch it! Go in, will you?"

And opening the door himself he fairly pushed my poor master into the head master's study.

Fancy the agony of the poor boy, fully believing himself a doomed miscreant, entering for the first time the awful presence of the head master of Randlebury School.

He stood there with downcast eyes, not daring to speak, and rooted to the spot.

"Why, what's the matter, my boy?"

At the words Charlie started like one electrified. He had surely heard that voice before somewhere! He looked up, and what was his astonishment to find in his dreaded principal no other than the gentleman with whom he had yesterday spent such a friendly hour in the train between Gunborough and Randlebury!

And his face was as kind as ever, and his voice encouraging, as he repeated,--

"What's the matter, my man? has the watch stopped."

"Oh, sir," said Charlie, running up to him, "I am glad it's you, and I'm so sorry I drove the cab, and hit Walker in the eye. I'll never do it again!"

"Tut, tut," said the head master; "if you never do any worse than that, you won't go far wrong. I didn't tell you who I was yesterday, because I wanted you to manage for yourself, and fight your own battle on first arriving. Now tell me how you have got on."

And Charlie faithfully recounted to him everything, including my sudden indisposition, and my cure by Tom Drift.

Dr Weldon (for that was his name) listened to his story, and then said,--

"Well, you've made a pretty good beginning. Now try to remember this: your father has sent you here for two reasons; one is that your head may be furnished, and the other is that your character may be trained. I and your teachers can undertake the first; but it depends chiefly on you how the second succeeds. You will constantly be having to choose for yourself between what is right and what is wrong, and between what is true and what is false. Take the advice of one who has passed through all the temptations you are likely to meet here--rely always on a wisdom that is better than your own, and when once you see which way duty calls, follow that way as if your life depended on it. Do this, and you'll turn out a far better man than the man who is talking to you. Whenever you are in trouble come to me, I shall always be glad to see you. I promised you, you know, I would ask for you occasionally, didn't I? And now let's see what you've got in your head."

And then followed a brief examination, conducted in a way which put Charlie quite at his ease, and so enabled him to acquit himself with a fair amount of credit and win from his master a commendation, which he prized not a little, for it was that his father's efforts had not been wasted on him.

"You will be put in the second-form," said the doctor, "and if you work hard, I see no reason why you should not get up into the third next midsummer. Now, good-bye. I hope you won't find the head master of Randlebury is as `stiff and stuck-up a fellow' as you dreaded, and I trust I shall find you as honest and brave a fellow as I hoped you would turn out the first time I saw you. Good-bye."

Charlie rose to leave with overflowing heart. He even forgot in the midst of his pleasant emotion to inquire, as he had fully intended to do, after the doctor's watch, and if it was still a quarter of an hour fast.

As he left the room he could not help contrasting with thankfulness his present state of mind with that in which he had entered it an hour ago. He laughed at himself for all his foolish fears then, and as for the future, that seemed now ever so much easier and brighter.

Outside the door he found Tom Drift passing along the corridor in a state of great excitement.

"The very chap, I declare," cried he. "I say, lend us your watch, young un, will you?"

"What for?" asked Charlie.

"Only a time race. Tom Shadbolt says he can run a mile in 4.40. I say he can't do it under 4.50, and we've got a bet of half-a-crown a side upon it. So lend us your watch to time him by."

Charlie hesitated, and a pang passed through his breast. He knew that one of the things which he had promised his father was that he would have nothing to do with betting or gambling in any form, and how could he obey in this respect if he now lent me for the purpose for which I was required? And yet he owed Tom Drift no common gratitude for the good service he had done in setting me right yesterday, and surely if any one had a right to borrow me it was he. The struggle was a sore one, but soon decided.

"I can't lend it you, Tom Drift."

"Why ever not?" asked Tom sharply.

"I'm very sorry; if it had been anything else--but I promised father I would not gamble."

"Young ass! who wants you to gamble? I only want you to lend us your watch."

"_You_ are gambling, though," said Charlie timidly.

"And what's that got to do with you, you young idiot," exclaimed Drift, fairly losing his temper, "if I am?"

"I'm very sorry," said Charlie, "especially as you put it all right. If it was anything else; but I can't for this."

"Look here," said Drift in a fury, "we've had fooling enough. Hand me the watch this moment, or I'll take it and smash it, and you into the bargain!"

"Oh, Tom Drift, don't do that. I would so gladly for anything else, but I promised father--"

"Once more, will you, or will you not?"

"I can't."

"Then take that!" and next moment Charlie received a blow full on the chest, which sent him staggering back against the wall.

Oh, how he wished that moment he had never owned me!

Tom came upon him with an angry oath, and seized him by the throat.

"Will you give it up?"

"No," replied Charlie.

He was fairly roused now; no boy--certainly no boy of his sort--can stand quietly by and receive undeserved blows. Tom tightened his grip on the boy's throat, and strove to snatch me from his pocket.

Quick as thought Charlie threw his arms round him, and, though the smaller boy of the two, extricated himself from the clutch of the bully, and sent him in turn staggering back. Livid with rage, Tom rushed at him; but Charlie eluded him, and left him to overbalance himself and fall sprawling on the paved floor. At this instant the doctor's door opened, and the head master stood gazing on the scene.

Poor Charlie! five minutes ago so full of bright hopes and brave resolutions, and now, under the eyes of the very man who had inspired in him those hopes and resolutions, engaged in a common fight with a schoolfellow!

"What is all this?" asked the doctor sternly. "Come in here, you two."

Charlie, with sinking heart, entered again that solemn room, and Drift followed, sulky, and with a black bruise on his forehead.

Charlie left his antagonist to tell his story after his own fashion, and was too dispirited either to contradict him or seek to justify himself. He felt ashamed of himself, and in his self-humiliation saw neither defence nor extenuation for his conduct.

Drift was dismissed with a few sharp words of reproof and warning. Charlie remained longer.

What the doctor said to him, and what he said to the doctor, I need not here repeat. Suffice it to say, the former was able to form a fairer estimate of my master's conduct than he himself was. He did not blame him; he even told him that no boy could expect to get through his school days without some blows, and advised him to see they were always on the right side. He talked to him long and seriously about home, and so comforted him in prospect of future difficulties and temptations, that when he left that study the second time, it was as a wiser, though perhaps a sadder boy than before.

Chapter Six.

How My Master Had Both His Friends And His Enemies At Randlebury.

The events of Charlie's first day at Randlebury had at least taught him one salutary lesson, and that was, to moderate his enthusiasm with regard to me, and consequently for the next few weeks I had a quiet time of it. True enough, my master would occasionally produce me in confidence to a select and admiring audience, and would ever and again proffer the use of me to his protector, Joe Halliday, but he gave up flourishing me in the face of every passer-by, and took to buttoning his jacket over the chain, I found my health all the better for this gentler usage, and showed my gratitude by keeping perfect time from one week's end to the other.

It is hardly necessary for me to say that Charlie was not long in making friends at Randlebury. Indeed some of his acquaintance looked upon this exceeding friendliness in the boy's disposition as one of his weak points.

"I do believe," said Walcot, who was only four from the head of the school, to his friend, Joe Halliday, one day, about a month after my master's arrival at Randlebury--"I do believe that young fag of yours would chum up to the poker and tongs if there were no fellows here."

"Shouldn't wonder," said Joe. "He's a sociable young beggar, and keeps my den uncommon tidy. Why, only the other day, when I was in no end of a vicious temper about being rowed about my Greek accents, you know, and when I should have been really grateful to the young scamp if he'd given me an excuse for kicking him, what should he do but lay wait for me in my den with a letter from his father, which he insisted on reading aloud to me. What do you think it was about?"

"I couldn't guess," said Walcot.

"Well, you must know he's lately chummed up very thick with my young brother Jim in the second, and--would you believe it?--he took it into his head to sit down and write to his governor to ask him if he would give Jim and me each a watch like the one he's got himself. What do you think of that?"

"Did he, though?" exclaimed Walcot, laughing. "I say, old boy, you'll make your fortune out of that youngster; and what did his father say?"

"Oh, he was most polite, of course; his boy's friends were his friends, and all that, and he finished up by saying he hoped we should both come and spend Christmas there."

"Ha! ha! and did he send the watches?"

"No; I suppose he wants to spy out the land first."

"Well," said Walcot, "the boy's all right with you, but he'll go making a fool of himself some day if he makes up to everybody he meets."

My master, in fact, was already a popular boy with his fellows. He had a select band of admirers among the youth of the Second-Form, who cackled round him like hens round a bantam. Together they groaned over their Latin exercises and wrestled with their decimals; together they heard the dreaded summons to the master's desk; and side by side, I am sorry to say, they held out their open palms to receive his cane. If a slate bearing on its surface an outline effigy of the gentleman who presided over the lessons of the class was brought to light, and the names of its perpetrators demanded, Charlie's hand would be seen among a forest of other upraised, ink-stained hands, and he would confess with contrition to having contributed the left eye of the unlucky portrait. And if, amid the solemn silence which attended a moral discourse from the master on the evils of gluttony, a sudden cataract of nuts, apples, turnips, and jam sandwiches on to the floor should drown the good man's voice, Charlie would be one of the ill-starred wights who owned to a partnership in the bag of good things which had thus miserably burst, and would proceed with shame first to crawl and grope on the dusty floor to collect his contraband possessions, and then solemnly to deposit the same jam, turnips, and all, on the desk of the offended dominie as a confiscated forfeit.

By these and many other like experiences Charlie identified himself with his comrades, and established many and memorable bonds of sympathy. He took the allegiance of his followers and the penalties of his masters in equal good part. He was not the boy to glory in his scrapes, but he was the boy to get into them, and once in, no fear of punishment could make a tell-tale, a cheat, or a coward of him.

With the elder boys he was also a favourite, for what big boy does not take pride in patronising a plucky, frank youngster? Patronising with Charlie did not mean humiliation. It is true he would quake at times in the majestic company of the heroes of the Sixth Form, but without hanging his head or toadying. It is one thing to reverence a fellow- being, and another to kneel and lick his boots.

Altogether Charlie had what is called "fallen on his feet" at Randlebury. By the end of two months he was as much at home there as if he had strutted its halls for two years. His whistle was as shrill as any in the lobbies, and Mrs Packer stuck her fingers in her ears when he burst into her parlour to demand a clean collar. He had already signalised himself too on the cricket field, having scored one run (by a leg-bye) in the never-to-be-forgotten match of First Form, First Eleven, against Second-Form, Second Eleven; and he had annihilated the redoubtable Alfred Redhead in the hundred yards hopping match, accomplishing that distance in the wonderfully short time of forty-five seconds!

But the dearest of all his friends was Jim Halliday, his lord and master's young brother. To Jim, Charlie opened his own soul, and me, and the knife; with Jim he laid his schemes for the future, and arranged, when he was Governor-General of India and Jim was Prime Minister, he would swop a couple of elephants for one of Ash and Tackle's best twenty-foot fishing-rods, with a book of flies complete. With Jim, Charlie talked about home and his father, and the coming holidays, till his face shone with the brightness of the prospect. Nor was the faithful Jim less communicative. He told Charlie all about his sisters down at Dullfield, where his father had once been clergyman, and gave it as his opinion that Jenny was the one Charlie had better marry; and to Charlie he imparted, as an awful secret not to be so much as whispered to any one, that he (Jim) was going to array his imposing figure for the first time in a tail-coat at Christmas.

With two friends on such a footing of confidence, is it a wonder they clave one to the other in mute admiration and affection? Many a sumptuous supper, provided at the imminent peril of embargo by the authorities on the one hand, and capture by hungry pirates on the other, did they smuggle into port and enjoy in company; on many a half-holiday did they fish for hours in the same pool, or climb the same tree for the same nest; what book of Jim's was there (schoolbooks excepted) that Charlie had not dog's-eared; and was not Charlie's little library annotated in every page by Jim's elegant thumbs? In short, these two were as one. David and Jonathan were nothing to them.

But in the midst of all his comfort and happiness one continually recurring thought troubled Charlie, that was about Tom Drift. He had promised the mother to be a friend to her son, and although he owned to himself he neither liked nor admired Tom, he could not be easy with this broken promise on his mind.

One day, about a month after the quarrel outside the head master's study, my master, after a hard inward struggle, conceived the desperate resolve of going himself to the lion in his den and seeking a reconciliation.

He walked quickly to Tom's study, for fear his resolution might fail him, and knocked as boldly as he could at the door.

"Come in!" cried Tom inside.

Charlie entered, and found his late antagonist sprawling on two chairs, reading a yellow-backed novel.

At the sight of Charlie he scowled, and looked anything but conciliatory.

"What do you want?" he said angrily.

"Oh, Tom Drift!" cried Charlie, plunging at once into his subject, "I do wish you'd be friends; I am so sorry I hurt you."

This last was an ill-judged reference; Tom was vicious enough about that bruise on his forehead not to need any reminder of the injuries he had sustained in that memorable scuffle.

"Get off with you, you little beast!" he cried. "What do you mean by coming here?"

"I know I've no business, Tom Drift; but I do so want to be friends, because--because I promised your mother, you know."

"What do I care what you promised my mother? I don't want you. Come, off you go, or I'll show you the way."

Charlie turned to go, yet still lingered. A desperate struggle was taking place, I could feel, within him, and then he stammered out, "I say, Tom Drift, if you'll only be friends I'll _give_ you my watch."

Poor boy! Who knows what that offer cost him? it was indeed the dearest bribe he had to give.

Tom laughed sneeringly. "Who wants your watch, young ass?--a miserable, second-hand, tin ticker; I'd be ashamed to be seen with it. Come, once more, get out of here or I'll kick you out!"

Charlie obeyed, miserable and disappointed.

He could stand being spoken roughly to, he could bear his disappointment, but to hear his father's precious gift spoken of as a "miserable, second-hand tin ticker," was more than he could endure, and he made his way back to his room conscious of having lost more than he had gained by this thankless effort at reconciliation.

"What are you in the sulks about?" inquired Halliday that evening, as Charlie was putting away his lord and master's jam in the cupboard.

"I don't want to be sulky," Charlie said, "but I wish I could make it up with Tom Drift."

"With who?" exclaimed Joe, who, as we have before observed, was subject to occasional lapses of grammar.

"Tom Drift, you know; we had a row the first day."

"I know," replied Joe; "about that everlasting watch of yours, wasn't it?"

"Yes," said Charlie, "I didn't like to lend it him, because--"

"I know all about that," said Halliday. "You were squeamish about something or other he wanted it for. Well, the watch belonged to you, I suppose, and you aren't obliged to lend it to anybody. What on earth do you want to go worrying about the thing any more for?"

"I'm not; only I wanted to be friends with Tom Drift."

"What for?" demanded Joe.

"Oh, because--because I promised his mother I would be," pleaded Charlie.

"All I can say is, you had no business to promise any one to be friends with a fellow you never saw."

"But she said he was a nice fellow; and besides he made my watch go when it had stopped," added Charlie, as a great argument.

"Why, Charlie, you are a greater little noodle than I took you for. Every one who calls that precious watch a good name is your master, and you're his slave."

"Not so bad as that, Joe," said Charlie; "but I say, isn't Tom Drift a nice boy, then?"

"Isn't he? that's all," replied the other. "I'm not going to abuse him behind his back, but take my advice, young un. You are better off as Tom's enemy than his friend, and don't you try to make up to him any more."

"Why not?" asked Charlie in bewilderment.

"Never you mind," was all Joe's reply; "and now hand me down my Liddell and Scott and make yourself scarce."

Charlie, sorely puzzled, did as he was bid.

He certainly was not in love with Tom Drift; but it was not easy for him to give up, without an effort, his promise to be his friend.

Tom, however, was by no means in need of friends. Not many weeks after the day when Charlie had left his study, disappointed and miserable, he might have been seen entertaining company of quite a different sort.

[My readers, let me here observe, must not be too curious to understand how it is I am able to speak of so many things which must have taken place beyond the range of my observation. They will find the reason all in good time.]

The supper party over which Tom presided consisted of four boys, including himself. One was Shadbolt, on whose account, it will be remembered, Tom had desired to borrow Charlie's watch. Shadbolt was an unwholesome-looking fellow of fifteen, with coarse features and eyes that could not look you straight in the face if they had tried. He was accompanied by his chum Margetson, who certainly had the advantage of his friend in looks, as well as in intellect. The quartet was completed by Gus Burke, one of the smallest and most vicious boys at Randlebury. He was the son of a country squire, who had the unenviable reputation of being one of the hardest drinkers and fastest riders in his county; and the boy had already shown himself only too apt a pupil in the lessons in the midst of which his childhood had been passed. He had at his tongue's tip all the slang of the stables and all the blackguardisms of the betting-ring; and boy--almost child--as he was, he affected the swagger and habits of a "fast man," like a true son of his father.

At Randlebury he had wrought incredible mischief. Tom Drift was not the only soft-minded vain boy whom he had infected by his pernicious example. Like all reckless swaggerers, he had his band of admirers, who marked every action and drank in every word that fell from their hero's lips.

It was just with such boys as Drift that his influence was most telling; for Tom was a boy not without aptitude to note and emulate a powerful example, whether it were good or bad, while his vanity rendered him as pliant as wax to the hand of the flatterer.

Such was the party which assembled surreptitiously in Tom's study that evening and partook of the smuggled supper.

Tom had had hard work to provide for his guests, and had succeeded only at the risk of grave penalties if detected.

"I say, Tom, old horse, this is a prime spread!" said Gus; "where did you get it?"

"Oh!" said Tom, "I had a new hat coming from Tiler's, so I got old Tripes (the butcher) to make a neat brown-paper parcel of the kidneys, and got them up in my gossamer. The old donkey might have done the thing better though, for the juice squeezed through, and the inside of my hat looks as if I had lately been scalped."

"Hard lines! But never mind, perhaps they'll put it down to the crack you got on your forehead."

Tom flushed scarlet; any reference to his inglorious scuffle with Charlie Newcome was odious to him, as Gus and the others knew well enough. He said nothing, however, only scowled angrily.

"What!" said Gus, "does it hurt you still then? Never mind, it was a good shot, and I wouldn't be ashamed of having floored you myself."

"He didn't floor me; I fell!" cried Tom indignantly.

"Did you? Rather a way fellows have when they get knocked down!"

"I was not knocked down, Gus, I tell you; and you'd better shut up!"

"All right, old horse! you mustn't mind a bit of chaff. I'm sure you've taken it all very well."

"Yes," said Margetson, "everybody thinks you must take after your mother; you're such a sweet-tempered chap."

"What do you know about my mother?" snarled Tom.

"Only what your young friend tells everybody about her."

"What business has he to go talking all over the school about my affairs?" exclaimed Tom furiously. "What's my mother to do with him?"

"A great deal, it seems," replied Margetson, "for he promised her, on the strength of her assertion that you were a nice boy, to be your friend, and now he's awfully hurt you won't let him."

"I thought it was Tom who was awfully hurt," put in Gus, by way of parenthesis.

"I tell you what it is, you fellows," said Tom, "it may be all very funny for you, but I've had quite enough of it. Ever since that young canting humbug came here I've led the life of a dog. If, instead of making a fool of me, you'd tell me how I can pay him out, I should be better pleased."

"All very fine," said Margetson; "why don't you pay your own bills?"

"If you want some one to punch his head," said Shadbolt the ugly, "I don't mind trying; my life is insured."

"Suppose we make him stupid," suggested Gus, "with milk punch, and shove him inside the doctor's study."

"Couldn't you get hold of his watch and boil it?" said Margetson, who had heard of the experiments practised on me in Mrs Packer's parlour.

"If I got hold of it I'd smash it into fifty pieces!" growled Tom between his teeth.

"Look here, you fellows, I've got a glorious plan!" exclaimed Gus suddenly.

"What is it?" they all cried.

But Gus's plan requires a new chapter.

Chapter Seven.

How A Pleasant Treat In Store Was Prepared For My Master.

Gus proceeded then to divulge his plan for giving Tom Drift his revenge on my master.

"Let's take him to Gurley races on Saturday," said he. "You know it's a holiday, and if we can only get him with us, well astonish his sanctimonious young soul. What do you say?"

"You'll never get him to come," said Margetson.

"Won't we? Well see about that," replied Gus, "he needn't know where he's going."

"But even so," said Drift, "you won't get him; he's not in love with me, and I don't fancy any of you are much in his line."

"Oh, you'll have to manage that part, Tom. You know how the young idiot's pining to make it up with you, for your dear old mother's sake!"

"Now you needn't start that nonsense again," put in Tom sulkily.

"All right; but don't you see, if you were to take a forgiving fit and make up to him, and talk about the old lady and his watch, and all that, he'd be out of his wits with joy? and then if you asked him to come for a day's fishing on Saturday, we could meet you somewhere on the road, and then he'd have to come whether he liked or not; and won't we astonish him!"

Tom mused a little.

"It's not a bad idea," said he presently, "if it would only work. But I can't make up to the young puppy as you think. Ten to one I should stop short in the middle and kick him."

"That would spoil all the fun. Try it on, any way, it'll be a nice little excitement to have young Innocent with us. And now, Tom, where are blacks and reds; I'm just in the humour for a rubber, aren't you?"

The host produced from a locked desk a dirty and much-worn pack of cards, and the party sat down to play.

They played for penny points, and as Gus and Margetson were partners, it is hardly necessary to say that Drift and his ill-looking friend lost every game.

Before this amiable and congenial quartet separated, Gus had referred again to the scheme of getting Charlie to Gurley races, and got Drift to promise he would secure his victim next day.

Next day, accordingly, as Charlie was in the midst of a desperate game of fives with his friend Jim, a small boy came to him and said that Tom Drift wanted him.

"What for?" demanded Charlie, who, since his talk with the elder Halliday, had felt somewhat "shy" about Tom.

"I don't know," said the boy.

"Your turn, Charlie," called out Jim from the end of the court.

Charlie took his turn while he was revolving on his answer to this mysterious summons.

"What does that child want?" inquired Jim, with all the loftiness of a second-form boy speaking of a first.

"He says Tom Drift wants me."

"Whew!" whistled Jim, who of course knew the whole mystery of the affair between his chum and Tom; "tell him to go to Jericho! Look out for yourself!"

And so saying, he took his turn with the ball.

"That wouldn't do," said Charlie; "I don't want to rile him."

"_I'd_ like to have a chance," retorted the implacable Jim. "Well, then, tell him you can't come. Here, young un, tell Tom Drift Charlie can't come. Do you hear? Cut your sticks!"

But Charlie called the messenger back. "I _could_, go if I wanted, Jim. Better tell him I'd rather not come. Say that, youngster--I'd rather not."

So off the youngster ran, and Charlie and Jim finished their game. Of coarse, the youthful messenger gave Tom a full, true, and particular account of this conversation in all its details, which rendered that young gentleman rather less eager than ever for his enterprise. However, he had the fear of Gus before his eyes, and strolled out into the playground on the chance of coming across Charlie.

And he did come across him, arm-in-arm with the faithful Jim. Tom worked his face into the ghastly similitude of a friendly smile as he approached, and said, in as genial a voice as he could pretend, "I'm glad I met you, Newcome, because I want to speak to you, if you don't mind taking a turn round the playground."

Charlie, of course, was astonished; he had expected at the very least to be kicked over the wall when he saw Tom approach, and he was utterly at a loss to understand this not unfriendly greeting. Innocent boy! it never occurred to him the demonstration could be anything but real. Jim would have been a tougher subject to deal with. Indeed, as he let go Charlie's arm, and saw him walk off with Tom, he muttered to himself, not caring particularly whether the latter heard him or not.

"Gammon! that's what it is."

Charlie had not long to wait before his companion began the conversation.

"I suppose you wonder why I want you, Newcome?" said he. "The fact is, I've been thinking I wasn't altogether right in being down on you the other day about lending me that watch, especially as you were a new boy; and I'm sorry if I hurt you."

Charlie sprung towards him and caught his arm.

"Oh, Tom Drift, don't say that, please! It was my fault--all my fault, and I have been so sorry ever since. And you will be friends now, won't you? I do so want to be, because I promised your mother--"

Tom gave a quick gesture of impatience, which, if Charlie had understood, he would have known how near receiving a kick he was at that moment.

Tom, however, restrained himself, and said,--

"Oh, yes, for her sake I'd like to be friends, of course, and I hope you'll forget all about that wretched quarrel."

"Indeed I will," cried Charlie; "and don't let us say any more about it. I am ever so much happier now, and it was so good of you to come to me and make it up."

"Well," said Tom loftily, "you know it's no use for two fellows to be at loggerheads when it can be helped, and I dare say we shall get on all the better now. How are you going on in the second?"

Whereupon Charlie launched into a lengthy and animated account of his experiences, to which Tom pretended to listen, but scarcely heard a word.

"So you are fond of fishing?" he said, casually, after the boy had mentioned something on that subject.

"Ain't I, though?" cried Charlie, now quite happy, and his old self again. "I say, Tom Drift, would you like to see the new lance-wood top I've got to my rod? It's a stunner, I can tell you. I'll lend it you, you know, any time you like."

"Have you caught much since you were here!" asked Tom, anxious to get this hateful business over.

"No. You know the brook here isn't a good one for fish, and I don't know anywhere else near."

"Well, I'll tell you what," said Tom, as if the idea had then for the first time occurred to him. "Suppose we go off for a regular good day on Saturday? It's a holiday, you know, and we could go and try up the Sharle, near Gurley. There's lots of trout there, and we are certain to have a good day."

"How jolly!" exclaimed Charlie. "It would be grand. But I say, Tom Drift, are you sure you wouldn't mind coming? It wouldn't be a bother to you, would it?"

"Not a bit. I like a good day's fishing. But, I say, young un, you'd better not say anything about it to any one, or we shall have a swarm of fellows come too, and that will spoil all the sport."

"All right," said Charlie. "I say what a day we shall have! I'll bring my watch and knife, you know, and some grub, and we can picnic there, eh?"

"That'll be splendid. Well, I must go in now, so good-bye, Newcome, and shake hands."

What a grip was that! on one side all trust and fervour, and on the other all fraud and malice!

Tom Drift was not yet utterly bad. Would that he had allowed his conscience to speak and his better self prevail! Half a dozen times in the course of his walk from the playground to the school he repented of the wicked part he was playing in the scheme to injure Charlie. But half a dozen times the thought of Gus and his taunts, and the recollection of his own bruised forehead came to drive out all passing sentiments of pity or remorse.

Charlie rejoined his chum with a beaming face.

"Well," asked Jim, "what has he been saying to humbug you this time?"

"Nothing very particular; and I won't let you call him a humbug. I say, Jim, old boy, he's made it up at last, and we're friends, Tom Drift and I! Hurrah! I was never so glad, isn't it jolly?"

Jim by no means shared his friend's enthusiasm. Like his elder brother, he instinctively disliked Tom Drift, without exactly being able to give a reason.

His reserve, however, had no effect on Charlie's high spirits. At last the wish of his heart had been gained! No longer did he walk with the burden of a broken promise weighting his neck; no longer did the consciousness of having an enemy oppress him.

"Simpleton!" many of my readers will exclaim. Perhaps he was; but even if you laugh at him, I think you will hardly despise him for his simple- mindedness, for who would not rather be such a one than the tempter, Tom Drift?

All that week he was jubilant. Boys looked round in astonishment at the shrillness of his whistle and the ring of his laughter. His corner of the class room was a simple Babel, and the number of apples he bestowed in charity was prodigious.

Something, every one could see, had happened to make him happier than ever. Few knew what that something was, and fewer still knew what it meant.

"What are you up to to-morrow?" asked the elder Halliday of his fag on the Friday evening.

"Fishing," briskly replied the boy.

"You're for ever fishing," said Joe. "I suppose that young brother of mine is going with you?"

"No; Jim's going to play in the match against the Badgers."

The "Badgers," let me explain, was the name of a scratch cricket eleven made up of boys in the first, second and third forms.

"Are you going alone, then?"

Charlie felt uncomfortable as he answered,--

"No."

"Whom are you going with?" pursued the inquiring Joe.

"A fellow in the fifth who asked me to come."

"What's his name?"

Charlie had no help for it now.

"Tom Drift," he faltered.

"Tom Drift! I thought you and he were at loggerheads."

"Oh, don't you know we've made it up? He was awfully kind about it, and said he was sorry, when it was really my fault, and we shook hands, and to-morrow we are going to fish in a place he knows where there's no end of trout."

"Where's that?"

"He didn't want me to tell, for fear everybody should come and spoil the sport; but I suppose I can tell you, though; it's up the Sharle, near Gurley."

"Humph! I've fished there before now. Not such a wonderful lot of fish, either."

"I suppose you won't be there to-morrow?" asked Charlie nervously, afraid of losing the confidence of Tom Drift by attracting strangers to his waters.

"Not if I know it," replied Joe. "I say, youngster, I thought you had given up the notion of making up to that fellow?"

"I didn't make up to him, only I can't be sorry to be friends with him--"

"Well, I hope you won't be sorry now you've done it. Take care what you're about, that's all."

Charlie was again perplexed to understand why Halliday seemed to have such a dislike to poor Tom.

Just as he was going off to bed Joe stopped him and asked,--

"By the way, shall you be using your watch to-morrow?"

"Well, I promised I'd take it, to see how the time went; but I dare say we could do without it, and I would like to lend it to you, Halliday."

"Not a bit of it," replied the other. "I can do without it as well as you. I am going to walk over to Whitstone Woods and back."

"Hullo, that's a long trot," said Charlie. "It must be nearly thirty miles."

"Something like that," said Joe. "Walcot and I are going to make a day of it."

"Which way do you go?"

"Through Gurley, and then over Rushton Common and past Slingcomb."

"Never! I wish I could do thirty miles at a stretch."

"So you will some day. Good-night."

And Charlie went to bed, to dream of the lance-wood top of his rod and the trout in the Sharle.

In the meanwhile the conspirators had had another meeting in Drift's den.

"Well, have you hooked him?" asked Gus.

"Yes; it's all right. He took it all in like a lamb."

"And all the school," said Margetson, "is talking of the great reconciliation, and the gratification which that event will undoubtedly afford to your venerable mother."

"Shut up, will you, Margetson? I've had quite enough of that chaff."

"But I do assure you, Tom--"

"That'll do," said Tom, snappishly; and Margetson did not go the length of saying what it was he was so ready to assure him of.

"Well," said Gus, "we'll meet you and the young cub at the cross roads by Sharle Bridge. The races don't begin till twelve, so we shall have lots of time. I mean to see if we can't get a trap at Gurley, and do the thing in style. What do you say? We could get one for about ten bob."

"All serene," said Margetson. "I'll fork out my share."

"You'll pay for me, Tom," said Shadbolt, "won't you?"

"I'll see," said Tom.

"All right, that's settled; and you are seeing about grub, Tom, aren't you? Don't forget the etceteras. What time have you told young mooney- face?"

"Nine. He's sure to be in time."

"Well, we'll start a little before, you know, and meet you quite by accident, and the young beggar won't smell a rat till we are safe in Gurley."

"And if he turns cantankerous?"

"Then we can put Shaddy to look after him."

"Who's going to win the Gulley Plate, Gus?"

And then the party fell to canvassing the entries for the morrow's races, and making their bets, in which, of course, Tom stood almost bound to lose, whichever horse won.

Long ere they had parted company Charlie was sound asleep and dreaming, with me under his pillow.

Chapter Eight.

How My Master DID Not Catch The Fish He Expected.

About ten years before the time of my story it had happened that in a famous battle fought between her Majesty's troops and those of a hostile and savage king, the colours of the 300th Regiment were noticed to be in imminent peril of capture. The ensign who carried them was wounded, and already a score of the enemy were rushing forward to seize the prize and carry it off in triumph to their king. Suddenly, however, there dashed up to the spot a young cornet of dragoons, who, seeing the peril of his fellow-officer and the colours he carried, dragged him, flag and all, up nearly into his own saddle, and started off with his precious burden towards a place of shelter from the fire and spears of the savages. Before, however, he had gone twenty yards the poor ensign tumbled to the ground, shot through the heart, yielding with his dying hands his colours to the dragoon. That plucky young soldier, wrapping the torn and stained flag round his body, set his teeth, stooped forward in his saddle, and, digging his spurs into his horse, galloped for his life. He had a terrific gauntlet to run, and grandly he ran it. The friendly trench was in sight, the cheers of his comrades fell like music on his ears, a vision of glory and honour flashed through his mind, and then suddenly he reeled forward in his seat--a malignant shot had found him out at last, and, with the colours round him, he dropped from his horse into his comrades' arms a dead man.

This hero was an old Randlebury boy; and ever since that day, on every anniversary of his glorious death, Randlebury kept, and still keeps, holiday.

All this Charlie was informed of by his faithful chum, Jim Halliday, as the former was dressing himself on the morning of the eventful holiday in question.

What possessed him to get up at six, when he was not to start till nine, I cannot say. He even routed me from under his pillow at five, so fidgety was he, and as soon as ever I pointed to six he bounced out of bed as if he was shot.

"What are you up to, getting up at this time?" growled Jim, who, much to the mutual delight of the boys, slept in the same room with Charlie.

"Oh, you know; I don't want to be behindhand," replied Charlie.

"Behindhand! Why, do you know it's only just six?"

"I know that, and I mean to make the most of my holiday. I say, Jim, what do they want to give us a holiday for, do you know?"

"They don't want to at all; they've got to."

"Got to? What do you mean?" inquired Charlie, dragging on his boots.

And then Jim, with many yawns and growls, told him the story; and, without waiting for his comments thereon, rolled over and went off to sleep again.

Charlie spent his early hour in polishing up things generally. When he had polished up his rod with the lance-wood top, he polished up his green can and his hooks. Then he warmed me up with a piece of wash- leather, and then his many-fanged knife.

By the time these little jobs were accomplished, and Joe's study put in order, the breakfast bell sounded, and he went down with a mouth sore with whistling.

He caught sight of Tom Drift at another table, and nodded and waved his green can to him; he informed every boy within hearing distance that it was certain to be a fine day, whatever it looked like now; and he made the wildest and most indiscriminate promises to entertain his whole acquaintance at no end of a trout supper on the spoils of that day's sport. Twenty times during breakfast did he pull me out and look impatiently at my minute-hand slowly making its way from eight to nine; and as soon as ever the meal was over he rushed upstairs like mad for his rod and bag, and then tore down again four steps at a time, nearly knocking the head master over at the bottom.

"Gently, my man," said that gentleman, recognising in this cannon-ball of a young fellow his little travelling companion. "Why, what's the matter?"

"I beg your pardon, doctor," said Charlie; "did I hurt you?"

"Not a bit. So you are going to fish to-day?"

"Yes, sir," said the beaming Charlie. "I say, sir, do you think it'll be a fine day?"

"I hope so--good-bye. I suppose this can will be full when you come back?"

"Good-bye, sir," said Charlie, secretly resolving that if fortune favoured him he would present the two finest of his trout to the doctor.

He found Drift ready for him when he reached that young gentleman's study.

Besides his rod, Tom had a somewhat cumbersome bag, which, as it carried most of the provisions for the whole party, he was not a little surly about being burdened with.

Charlie, of course, thought it was his and Tom's dinner.

"Is that the grub?" he cried. "Why, Tom Drift, you have been laying in a spread! What a brick you are! Look here, I'd carry it--isn't it a weight, though! If we get all this inside us two we shan't starve!"

And so they started, Charlie lugging along the bag and whistling like a lark.

"Looks cloudy," said Tom, who felt he must say something or other.

"Never mind, all the better for the trout, you know. I say, I wish I had my fly on the water this minute."

As Tom was silent, Charlie kept up the conversation by himself.

"I say, Tom Drift," said he, "if your mother could only see us two chaps going off for a day's fishing she--"

"Look here, draw it mild about my mother, young un. She can take care of herself well enough."

Charlie blushed to the roots of his hair at this rebuke, and for some time the flow of his conversation was arrested.

It was a good four miles from Randlebury to Sharle Bridge; and long ere they reached it Charlie's arm ached with the ponderous bag he was carrying. He did not, however, like to say anything, still less to ask Tom to take a turn at carrying it; so he plodded on, changing hands every few minutes, and buoying himself up with the prospect of the river and the trout.

Presently they came within sight of the signpost which marks the junction of the Gurley and Sharle Bridge roads.

"Here we are at last!" cried Charlie, panting and puffing. "I say, Tom Drift, I don't believe I could have carried this bag any farther if I'd tried."

"It'll be lighter when we go home. Hullo! who are these three?" for at this moment Gus, Margetson, and Shadbolt made their appearance.

"They look like Randlebury fellows by their caps. Oh, I know who one of them is," added Charlie-- "Margetson, in the fourth; don't you know him?"

"Rather!" replied Tom; "and the other two are Shaddy and Gus. Who'd have thought of meeting _them_!" and he gave a whistle, which succeeded in attracting the attention of the worthy trio.

Of course their surprise at meeting Tom and his companion was no less great--in fact, they had to inquire who the youngster was.

"Where are you off to?" demanded Gus.

"We're going to try our luck up the Sharle," said Tom.

"You'll be sold if you do," said Gus. "We were down looking at it, and a pretty state it's in. Old Skinner at the Tannery took it into his head to leave his gates up last night, and his muck has got into the river and poisoned every fish in it--hasn't it, Shad?"

"Rather!" replied Shad. "I was glad enough to get my nose away from the place."

"Here's a go, Charlie!" said Tom, turning to his young companion.

During this short conversation Charlie had passed through all the anguish of a bitter disappointment. It is no light thing to have the hope of days snuffed out all in a moment, and he was ready to cry with vexation. However it couldn't be helped, and he had learned before now how to take a disappointment like a man. So when Tom appealed to him he put a good face on it, and said,--

"Awful hard lines. Never mind, let's go back and see the match with the Badgers, Tom."

"Why don't you come with us?" asked Gus. "We are going to Gurley; have you ever been to Gurley, young un?"

"No," said Charlie.

"Come along, then, we'll show it you. It's a prime town, isn't it, Margetson?"

"Don't ask me," said Margetson; "I'd sooner see about Gurley than catch a seven-pounder, any day."

"And besides," said Tom, "isn't there some good fishing above the lock! Come along, Charlie; we shall not be baulked of our day's sport after all."

Charlie joined the party, although he did not conceive any great admiration for Tom's three friends. His anxiety not to offend his now reconciled enemy, and the possibility of fishing after all, overruled him; and still dragging the bag, he trudged along with the others towards Gurley.

As they approached the town he could not help noticing the number of holiday-makers and vehicles that passed them. There were drags full of gaily-dressed ladies; and gentlemen who wore veils; and there were light jaunty dog-carts with spruce young white-hatted gentlemen perched in them; there were vans in which corks were popping like musketry fires and parties on foot like themselves, hurrying forward with loud laughter and coarse music.

"Surely," thought he, "there's something on at Gurley."

Presently a waggonette, driven by a very loud youth in a check suit, and with an enormous cigar in his mouth, pulled up in passing, and its driver addressed Gus.

"So you've found _your_ way here, have you, my young bantam? Catch _you_ being out of a good thing. Are you going on the grand stand?"

"Don't know," said Gus grandly. "We may pick up a trap in the town."

"Ho, ho! going to do it flash, are you? Well, there's one of you could do with a little spice," added he, glancing at Charlie. "I suppose my trap's not grand enough for you."

"Can you give us a lift, then, Bill?" asked Gus, charmed at the idea.

"Yes, to be sure; I've no company to-day. There's just room. Hop in. I may as well turn an honest penny as not. Here, you young sinner, jump up beside me on the box." And before Charlie knew where he was or whither he was going he found himself on the box of the waggonette beside the flash youth, and his four friends behind him inside.

"Who's your friend, Gus?" he heard Margetson ask.

"Son of Belsham, who keeps the `Green Tiger' at Randlebury. We're in luck, I can tell you, you fellows."

As Charlie gradually recovered from his bewilderment he felt himself extremely uncomfortable and ill at ease. From what had been said he had gathered that the object of the boys in going to Gurley was something more than to see the town; and he by no means liked Gus's new friend, or approved of his easy familiarity with a low publican's son. It was not long before his dawning suspicions were fully confirmed.

"So you're going to see the races?" asked Mr Belsham.

"No, I'm not," replied Charlie, as curtly as he could, for he had no desire to encourage the conversation of this objectionable person.

"Ain't you? And what are you going to do, then, my young lamb?" And in the course of this brief sentence Mr Belsham succeeded in interjecting at least three oaths.

"I shan't speak to you if you swear," said Charlie; "it's wrong to swear."

"No! is it? Who says that?"

"My father says so," blurted out Charlie, fully satisfied that no better reason could be demanded.

Belsham laughed, and turning to the four inside, said,--

"I say, young gentlemen, this young pippin tells me he's got a father who says it's wrong to swear. What do you think of that?"

"His father must be an amusing man," replied Gus.

"Wait till we get on to the course," said Margetson; "he'll hear something to astonish him there, young prig!"

"I'm not going to the races!" cried my master, starting from his seat, and now fully alive to the fraud of which he had been made the victim. "How could you do this, Tom Drift! Let me down, will you!" and he struggled so desperately with Belsham that that gentleman was obliged to let go the reins in order to hold him.

Of course it was no use his resisting. Amid the shouts and jeers of his schoolfellows he was held on to the box. In vain he pleaded, besought, struggled, threatened; there he was compelled to stay, all through Gurley and out to the racecourse. Here he found himself in the midst of a yelling, blaspheming, drunken multitude, from the sight of whose faces and the sound of whose words his soul revolted so vehemently that it lent new vigour to his exhausted frame, and urged him to one last desperate struggle to free himself and escape from his tormentors.

"Look here," said Belsham to Gus; "if you suppose I'm going to have all my fun spoiled by looking after this cub of yours while you're enjoying yourselves there inside, you're mistaken; here, look after him yourselves."

So saying, he dragged Charlie from his seat and swung him down into the waggonette with such force that he lay there half stunned and incapable of further resistance, and so for the time being saved his persecutors a good deal of trouble.

And indeed had it been otherwise it is hardly likely they would have just then been able to pay him much attention, for at that moment the horses were all drawn up at the starting-post, waiting for the signal to go.

That was a feverish moment for Tom Drift. He had bet all his money on one horse, and if that horse did not win, he would lose every penny of it.

As usual, he had repented a hundred times of that day's business, and the last brutal outrage on poor Charlie had called up even in his seared breast a fleeting feeling of indescribable shame. It was, alas! only fleeting.

Next moment he forgot all but the horses. There they stood in a long restless line. A shout! and they were off. In the first wild scramble he could catch a sight of the colours on which his hopes depended near the front. On they came like the wind. A man near shouted the name of Tom's horse--"It's winning," and Tom's head swam at the sound. On still nearer, and now they have passed. In the retreating, straggling crowd he can see his horse still, but it seems to be going back instead of forward. Like a torrent the others overhaul and pass it. Then a louder shout than usual proclaims the race over, and the favourite beaten, and Tom staggers down to his seat sick and half stupid.

"Never mind, old man," he heard Gus say, "luck's against you this time; you'll have your turn some day. Take some of this, man, and never say die."

And Tom, reckless in his misery, took the proffered bottle, and drank deeply.

It was late in the afternoon before Belsham thought of turning his horse's head homeward, and by that time Charlie, on the floor of the waggonette, was slowly beginning to recover consciousness.

Chapter Nine.

HOW MY MASTER AND I HAD QUITE AS MUCH EXCITEMENT IN ONE AFTERNOON AS WAS GOOD FOR US.

Just as they were turning to go, a sudden shout and rush of people arrested them. The crowd on the course had been immense, and of the roughest and lowest description: sharpers, thieves, and roughs were there by the hundred, attracted from the neighbouring villages by the opportunity of plunder and riot which Gurley races always afforded. As soon as the serious business of the racing was over, this low mob naturally sought excitement of their own making, and increasing in disorder and intemperance as the day wore on, had become beyond control just about the time when Mr Belsham, junior, took it into his muddled head to make a start in the direction of home. The shout which kept him where he was, was occasioned by that spectacle dear to the eyes of all blackguards, a fight. Round the two blood and dust-stained combatants, the mob surged and yelled. Every moment it grew denser and wilder; and every moment it swayed nearer and nearer to the spot where the Randlebury boys stood in their waggonette; and before they could move or get clear, they found themselves in the very centre of the mob. Shouts, shrieks, and wild laughter rose on every side of them; some of the crowd scrambled up onto their wheels to get a glimpse of the pugilists; some abused and swore at them for getting in the way; some tried to invade their waggonette, and struck at them when they resisted.

In the midst of all, Belsham's horse took fright. There was a wild plunge, a shriek from the crowd in front, and next moment the five boys were thrown down among the crowd, while the horse, with the shattered and overturned vehicle behind him, forced for himself a ghastly lane through the mob.

Of Gus and his three friends, Charlie, whom the shock roused to sudden consciousness, could see nothing. He tried to rise, but the crowd pressed too wildly to give him the chance. For some moments he lay among a host of crowding, struggling feet, expecting every moment to be stunned, if not killed. But by a wonderful providence he escaped the peril. The crowd gave a sudden swing in a new direction, and he was left unhurt, though stupefied and almost unable to stir.

Presently he was conscious of a man standing in front of him.

"Oh, help me!" gasped my poor master.

The man seized him roughly by the arm and raised him to his feet.

"That's worth a tip," he growled; "come, hand over."

Charlie put his hand in his pocket and drew out a shilling.

The man scowled.

"Do you suppose I'll take a dirty shilling? Come, young swell, empty out them pockets. Look sharp, I've no time to waste on the like of you."

Tremblingly Charlie obeyed, and gave the man all the little stock of money he possessed.

But he was not yet to escape. From under his jacket the greedy eye of the thief had caught a glimpse of a chain. With a rough hand he tore open the coat. "What, a ticker? Here's luck; out with it, come."

"Oh," cried Charlie, "take anything but that! Take my chain and my knife, but not my watch?"

Hardly and brutally laughed the man as he snatched me out of the poor boy's hand, and administering a parting cuff on the head of his victim, turned to walk off with me in the recesses of one of his filthy pockets.

Scarcely, however, had he turned, when three men appeared in front of him, coming in the direction of Charlie. The boy saw them, and imagine his joy when in one of the party he recognised his old acquaintance, the cabman Jim! With a sudden bound and cry of delight he rushed towards him, shouting and pointing to the robber. "Oh, Jim, he's taken my watch; get my watch back, Jim."

Jim took in the state of affairs in an instant, and calling on his two companions to follow him, rushed upon and secured the thief before the latter was even aware of their intention. It was vain for one man to resist three. He was forced to disgorge first me, then the knife, and then the money. Charlie indeed pleaded that they should leave him the money, or some of it, but this proposal Jim scouted, and in his zeal relieved the robber of a good deal more than he had stolen from Charlie. Then with kicks and blows they drove the wretch away as fast as his legs could carry him.

This done, Jim the cabman had an opportunity of renewing his acquaintance with my master.

"Well," said he, "who'd have thought of seeing _you_ here? And what a nice mess you're in. You look as if--"

"Oh, don't," cried Charlie, holding him by the arm; "it's bad enough as it is, without you thinking ill of me."

And then he told him as well as he could how he had been decoyed to these vile races; how he had been kept there by main force; how he had been made senseless by their rough treatment, and how, but for Jim's timely help, he would now have been robbed and helpless.

Jim listened in astonishment, not unmingled with many an ejaculation of indignation at the poor boy's persecutors.

"And where are they now?" he asked, when Charlie had done.

"I don't know. We were all thrown out, you know, among the crowd. I only hope they've not been killed."

"Well, if I was you," said the downright cabman, "I wouldn't break my heart over them. I know _I'd_ like to have a chance of a quiet talk with the young swells; _I'd_ give them something to take home with them, I would."

Charlie said nothing, but gratefully put himself under the protection of his deliverer, who, making a considerable round to avoid the crush, led him safely to Gurley.

"There's no trap to be got for love or money, so you'll just have to walk if you want to get back to Randlebury to-night."

Anything to get away from that odious crowd. If the distance had been twice as far, Charlie would have undertaken it.

It was long enough, however, before they got away from the crowd. The road from Gurley to Sharle Bridge was alive for a mile and more with vehicles, drunken men and women, beggars and pickpockets. On either side of the road were jugglers, and thimble-riggers, and card-sharpers, who each attracted their crowd of simpletons. Many were the fights and riots that attended these eager assemblages. As they passed one booth, the headquarters of a blustering card-sharper, a sudden disturbance arose which threatened to block the entire road. The man had offered a sovereign to any one of his audience who could tell which of three cards he held uppermost in his hand. One voice called out a number. The man shuffled his cards, and by some slip on his part the guess of the speculator turned out correct. Instantly that youth demanded his sovereign, which the man refused, vowing and calling others to witness that another number had been guessed.

"I'll bring the police," cried the voice, and instantly there was a movement in the group as of some one endeavouring to force his way out.

"Knock him over!" some one cried; "he's only one of them donkey schoolboys. What business have they here at all?" And at the signal two or three of the juggler's accomplices made a dash at the retreating youth and seized him.

"Souse him in the river!" cried somebody else.

"Sit on him!" shouted a third.

In the midst of these contradictory advices the roughs lifted their struggling victim from his feet, and proceeded to carry him in the direction of the bridge.

In the momentary glimpse which Charlie got of the wretched object of this persecution, he recognised, to his horror and astonishment, Tom Drift, livid with terror, frantic with rage, and yelling with pain.

"Jim," cried Charlie, "that's Tom Drift! Oh! can't we help him? Will you try, Jim! Poor Tom!"

"Is he one of them four as brought you here?" asked Jim, not offering to move.

"Yes; but never mind that; they will drown him; see how furious they are! Will you help him, Jim?"

"Not a bit of me," replied the stubborn Jim, who was well content to see the tables turned on one who had so brutally ill-treated his young companion.

"Then I must try myself;" and so saying, the boy of thirteen rushed in among the crowd, and wildly tried to make his way to where his schoolfellow was being dragged by his persecutors.

Of course Jim had nothing for it but to back him up, and in a moment he was beside my young master.

"Let the boy be!" he shouted to those who carried Drift, in a voice so loud that for a moment the rabble stood quiet to hear.

In the midst of this silence Charlie shouted,--

"Hold on, Tom Drift, we'll help you if we can."

Instantly the crowd took up the name.

"Tom Drift! Yah! Souse Tom Drift! Roll Tom Drift in the mud! Yah! Tom Drift!"

And sure enough Tom Drift would have suffered the penalty prepared for him, despite Charlie's attempt at rescue, had not help come at that moment from a most unexpected quarter.

It will be remembered that Joe Halliday and his friend Walcot had planned a long walk on this holiday to Whitstone Woods, some ten miles beyond Gurley.

This plan they had duly carried out, and were now making the best of their way back to Randlebury along the crowded highway, when the sudden cry of a schoolfellow's name startled them.

"Tom Drift! Yah! Beggarly schoolboy!"

"I say, Joe, that's one of our fellows! What's happening?"

Joe accosted a passer-by.

"What's going on?" he inquired.

"They're only going to souse a young chap in the river."

"What for?"

"I don't know; 'cause he don't think the same as old Shuffle, the three- card chap."

"We must do something, Joe," said Walcot.

"I wish it were any other chap; but come on, we're in for it now," said Joe.

And with that these two broad-shouldered, tall fellows dashed into the thick of the fray.

Tom's bearers were now at the bridge, which was a low one, and were turning down towards the water's edge, when a new cry arrested them.

"Now, Randlebury! Put it on, Randlebury! Who backs up Randlebury?"

It was the old familiar cry of the football field, and at the sound of the well-known voices, Charlie's heart leapt for joy.

"I do!" he shouted, with all his might. "Here you are, Randlebury!"

And Jim's gruff voice took up the cry too.

A panic set in among the blackguards. To them it seemed that the school was come in force to rescue their comrade, for on either side the cry rose, and fighting towards them they could, see at any rate two stalwart figures, who, they concluded, were but the leaders of following force. One of the men was hardy enough to turn at bay at the moment Walcot had cleared his way at last up to the front. Big bully though he was, he was no match for the well-conditioned, active athlete who faced him, and Walcot punished him in a manner that made him glad enough to take to his heels as fast as he could.

This exploit turned the day. Dropping Tom--how and where they did not stay to consider--they followed their retreating companion with all the speed they were capable of, and left the enemy without another blow masters of the situation.

But if, as a victory, this charge of the Randlebury boys had been successful, as a rescue it had failed; for Tom Drift, being literally dropped from the shoulders of his executioners, had fallen first on to the parapet of the bridge, and then with a heavy shock into the stony stream beneath. When Walcot, Joe, Charlie, and Jim among them, went to pull him out, he was senseless. At first they thought him merely stunned by the fall (the stream was only a few inches deep), but presently when they began to lift him, they found that his right arm, on which he had fallen, was broken.

Bandaging the limb as well as they could, and bathing his forehead with water, they succeeded in restoring Tom to consciousness, and then, between them, carried him as gently as possible to the nearest house, when they managed, with some difficulty, to get a vehicle to convey them the rest of their journey. It was a sad, silent journey. To Tom, the pain caused by every jolt was excruciating. They did their best to ease him, holding him lying across their knees, while Jim drove along the level footpath; but by the time the school was reached the sufferer was again insensible, and so he remained till the surgeon had set his arm.

Thus ended the eventful holiday.

Before Charlie went to bed, the doctor sent for him to his study, and there required to know the true history of that day's doings. And Charlie told him all. I need hardly say that, according to his version, the case against the four culprits was far lighter than had their impeachment been in other hands. He took to himself whatever blame he could, and dwelt as little as possible on the plot that had been laid to get him to Gurley, and on the means which had been used to keep him when once there. He finished up with a very warm and pathetic appeal for Tom Drift.

"Don't, please, expel Tom Drift," he said, in all the boldness of generosity; "he was led on by the others, sir, and he's punished badly enough as it is. Oh! sir, if you'd seen his mother cry, when she only spoke of him, you couldn't do it."

"You must leave that to me," said the doctor sternly, "I hope I shall do nothing that is unjust or unkind. And now go to bed, and thank God for the care He has taken of you to-day."

And Charlie went.

Tom Drift was not expelled. For weeks he lay ill, and during that time no nurse was more devoted, and no companion more constant, than Charlie Newcome. A friendship sprang up between the two, strangely in contrast with the old footing on which they had stood. No longer was Tom the vain, hectoring patron, but the docile penitent, over whose spirit Charlie's character began from that time to exercise an influence which, if in the time to come it could always have worked as it did now, would have gone far to save Tom Drift from many a bitter fall and experience.

When Tom, a week before the Christmas holidays, left the sick-room and took his place once more in his class, Gus, Margetson, and Shadbolt were no longer inmates of Randlebury School.

Chapter Ten.

How I Changed Hands And Quitted Randlebury.

And now, dear reader, we must take a leap together of three years. For remember, I am not setting myself to record the life of any one person, or the events which happened at any one place. I am writing my own life--or those parts of it which are most memorable--and therefore it behoves me not to dwell unduly on times and scenes in which I was not personally interested.

I had a very close connection with the events that rendered Charlie's first term at school so exciting, but after that, for three years, I pursued the even tenor of my way, performing some twenty-six thousand two hundred and eighty revolutions, unmarked by any incident, either in my own life or that of my master worthy of notice.

By the end of those three years, however, things were greatly changed at Randlebury. Charlie, not far from his sixteenth birthday, was now a tall, broad-shouldered fellow, lording it in the Upper Fifth, and the hero of the cricket field of which he himself had once been a cadet. In face he was not greatly altered. Still the old curly head and bright eyes. He _was_ noticed occasionally to stroke his chin abstractedly; and some envious detractors went so far as to rumour that, in the lowest recesses of his trunk he had a razor, wherewith on divers occasions, in dread secret, he operated with slashing effect. Be this as it might, Charlie was growing up. He had a fag of his own, who alternately quaked and rejoiced beneath his eye; he wore a fearful and wonderful stick-up collar on Sundays, and, above all, he treated me with a careless indifference which contrasted wonderfully with his former enthusiasm, and betokened only too significantly the advance of years on his young head.

True, he wound me up regularly; but he often left me half the day under his pillow; and though once in a fit of artistic zeal he set himself to hew out a C.N. in startling characters on my back, with the point of a bodkin, he never polished me now as he was once wont to do.

All this was painful to me, especially the operation with the bodkin, but I still rejoiced to call him master, and to know that though years had changed his looks, and sobered his childish exuberance, the same true heart still beat close to mine, and remained still as warm and guileless as when little Charlie Newcome, with me in his pocket, first put his foot forth into the world.

There were two besides myself who could bear witness at the end of these three years that time had not changed the boy's heart. These two, I need hardly say, were Tom Drift and Jim Halliday.

To Tom, Charlie had become increasingly a friend of the true kind. Ever since the day at Gurley races, the influence of the younger boy had grown and overshadowed the elder, confirming his unstable resolutions, animating his sluggish mind with worthy ambitions, and giving to his pliant character a tone coloured by his own honesty and uprightness. Just as a pilot will safely steer the ship amid shoals and rocks out into the deeper waters, so Charlie, by his quiet influence, had given Tom's life a new direction towards honour and usefulness.

Once, and once only, during those three years had he shown a disposition to hark back on his old discreditable ways, and that was the result of a casual meeting with Gus one summer during the holidays, with whom, he afterwards confessed to Charlie, he was induced to forget for a time his better resolutions in the snares of a billiard-room. But the backsliding was repented of almost as soon as committed, and, to Charlie's anxious eyes, appeared to leave behind no bad result.

Jim was the same downright outspoken boy as ever. He had yielded, surlily at first, to the admission of Tom Drift into the confidence and friendship of himself and his chum, but by degrees, moved by Charlie's example, he had become more hearty, and now these three boys were the firmest friends in Randlebury.

One day, as Charlie was sitting in his study attempting, with many groans, to make sense out of a very obscure passage in Cicero, his fag entered and said,--

"Newcome, there's a parcel for you down at Trotter's."

"Why didn't you bring it up, you young muff?" inquired his lord.

"Because it's got to be signed for, and he wouldn't let me do that for you."

"Like your cheek to think of such a thing. What's it like?"

"Oh, it's in a little box. I say, Newcome, shall we go and get it?"

"I can't go at present; it'll wait, I suppose," said Charlie, with the air of a man who was daily in the habit of receiving little boxes by the carrier.

But for all that he could not wholly conceal his curiosity.

"What size box?" he asked presently.

"About the size of a good big pill-box."

"All that? I dare say I can fetch that up by myself," said Charlie.

Size of a large pill-box! It could not be anything so very important after all. So he turned again to his Cicero, and sent the fag about his business.

Presently, however, that youth returned with a letter for Charlie. It ran thus:

"Dear Young Scamp,

"People always say bachelor uncles are fools, and I think they are right. I've sent you a proof of my folly in a little box, which ought to reach you about the same time as this letter. You've done nothing to deserve a present from me, and a box on the ears would be much better bestowed. Never mind. Take care of this little gift for me, in memory of the jolly Christmas you and I last spent together, and when you are not kicking up a row with your cronies at Randlebury or have nothing better to do, think of your affectionate

"Uncle Ralph."

Much to the fag's astonishment, Charlie, having perused this letter, slammed up Cicero, and seizing the cap from off his (the fag's) head, as being most ready to hand, dashed out of school in the direction of the village.

"Trot!" he exclaimed, as he reached the establishment of that familiar merchant, "hand up that little box, you old villain! Do you hear?"

The long-suffering Trotter, to whom this address was comparatively polite in its phraseology, was not long in producing the parcel, in acknowledgment of which Charlie gave his sign manual in lordly characters upon the receipt; and then, burning with impatience, yet trying hard to appear unconcerned, walked swiftly back to the school.

The fag was hanging about his study, scarcely less curious than himself.

"Hook it!" cried his master, putting the parcel down on the table and taking out his penknife to cut the string.

Still the inquisitive fag lingered. Whereupon Charlie, taking him kindly yet firmly by the collar of his coat, conveyed him to the open window, whence he gently dropped him a distance of six feet to the earth.

Privacy being thus secured, he turned again to his parcel and opened it. Imagine his delight and my agony when there came to light a splendid gold watch and chain! I turned faint with jealousy, and when a second glance showed me that the interloper was no other than the identical gold repeater whom I had known and dreaded in my infancy, I was ready to break my mainspring with vexation. To me the surprise had brought nothing but foreboding and despair, and already I felt myself discarded for my rival; but to Charlie it brought a rapture of delight which expressed itself in a whoop which could be heard half over the school.

"What on earth's the row?" said a head looking in at the door; "caught cold, or what?"

"Come here, Jim, this moment; look at this!"

And Jim came and looked, and as he looked his eyes sparkled with admiration.

"My eye, Charlie, what a beauty!" said he, taking up the treasure in his hand. His thumb happened to touch the spring on the handle, and instantly there came a low melodious note from inside the repeater--One, two, three, and then a double tinkle twice repeated.

"That's striking," observed Jim, who was occasionally guilty of a pun. "Why, it's a repeater!"

"So it is! Did you ever know such a brick as that uncle of mine?"

"It's a pity your people can't think of anything else but watches for presents. Why, what a donkey you made of yourself about that silver turnip when you first had it! Don't you remember? What's to become of it, by the by?"

"How do I know? I say, Jim, this one wasn't got for nothing." And then the boys together investigated the wonders of the new watch, peeping at its works and making it strike, till I was quite sick of hearing it. But then I was jealous. There was no more Cicero for Charlie that day. He was almost as ridiculous, though not so rough, with his new treasure as he had been with me. He turned me out of my pocket to make room for it; and then half a dozen times a minute pulled it out and gloated over it. At night he put us both under his pillow, little dreaming of the sorrow and disappointment that filled my breast.

Where were all the old days now? Who would admire or value _me_, a poor, commonplace silver drudge, now that this grand, showy rival had come and taken my place? In my anger and excitement my heart beat fast and loud, so loud that presently I heard a voice beside me saying,--

"Gently, there, if you please; no one can hear himself speak with that noise."

"I've more right to be here than you," I growled.

"That is as our mutual master decides; but surely I have heard your voice before! Let me look at you."

And he edged himself up, so as to get a peep at my shabby face.

"To be sure--my young friend the three-guinea silver watch? How do you do, my little man?"

This patronage was intolerable, and I had no words to reply.

"Ah! you find it difficult to converse. You must indeed be almost worn out after the work you have had. I am indeed astonished to see you alive at all. I am sure, in my master's name, I may be allowed to thank you for your praiseworthy exertions in his service. We are both much obliged to you, and hope we shall show ourselves not unmindful of your--"

"Brute!" was all I could shriek, so mad was I, Whether my rival would have pursued his discourse I cannot say, but at that instant a hand came fumbling under the pillow. It passed me by, and sought the repeater, and next moment the tinkling chimes sounded half-past eleven.

It was as much as I could endure to be thus slighted and triumphed over.

"Contemptible creature!" I exclaimed; "you may think you've a fine voice, but, like a simpering schoolgirl, you can't sing till you're pressed!" I had him there, surely!

"Better that than having no voice at all, like some people, or using it when no one wants to hear it, like others." I suppose he thought he had me there, the puppy!

He went on chiming at intervals during the night, and of course my master had very little rest in consequence.

The next day Charlie and Jim had a solemn confabulation as to the disposal of me.

"It's no use wasting it, you know," said Jim. "Pity you haven't got a young brother to pass it on to."

"Suppose you take it," said the generous Charlie.

"No, old man, I don't want it. I'm not so mad about tickers as you. But, I tell you what, Charlie, you might like Tom to have it. He's leaving, you know, and it would be a nice reminder of Randlebury."

"Just what I thought directly the new one came," exclaimed Charlie, "only then I remembered we had a row about this very watch three years ago, and I'm afraid he wouldn't like it."

"Try. Old Tom would be quite set up with a watch."

Charlie proceeded that same day in quest of Tom, whom he found packing up his books and chemicals in a large trunk.

To him my master exhibited his new treasure, greatly to Drift's delight.

"Why, Charlie," he said, "I don't know much about watches, but I'm certain that's worth twenty pounds."

"No!" exclaimed Charlie; "you don't mean that."

"Yes, I do; but, for all that, I'll back your old turnip to keep as good time as it."

"It's always gone well, the old one. I'm glad you like it, Tom."

"I always liked it, you know."

"Why?"

"Well, I've known it as long as I've known you, and if it hadn't been for it things might have been different."

"Yes," said Charlie, "it was the cause of all the row three years ago."

"And if it hadn't been for that row I should have gone to the bad long ago. That was a lucky row for me, Charlie, thanks to you."

"Don't say that, old man, because it's a cram."

"I say, Tom," added Charlie nervously, coming to his point, "will you do me a favour?"

"Anything in the world. What is it?"

"Take my old watch, Tom. It's not worth much, you know, but it may be useful, and it will help to remind you of old days. Will you, Tom?"

Tom's lips quivered as he took me from Charlie's outstretched hand.

"Old boy," said he, "I'd sooner have this than anything else in the world. Somehow I feel I can't go wrong as long as I have it."

Charlie was beyond measure delighted to find his present accepted with so little difficulty.

"Oh, Tom," he said, "I am glad to think you'll have it, and I know you'll think of me when you use it."

"Won't I?" said Tom. "I say, Charlie, I wish you were coming to London with me."

"So do I. Never mind, we'll often write, and you'll promise to let me know how you are getting on, won't you?"

"Yes."

"And you'll call and see my father pretty often, won't you?"

"Yes."

"And you'll keep yourself free for a week's jaunt at Easter?"

"Yes."

They had much more talk that evening, which lasted till late. What they talked about it is not for me to repeat, and if it were it would probably not interest my reader. He would perhaps be disappointed to find that a considerable part of it related to a new suit of Tom's, just arrived from the tailor's, and that another part had reference to Tom's intention to prevail on his landlady in London to allow him to support a bull-dog puppy on her premises. These subjects, deeply interesting to the two friends, would not improve with repetition; and neither would the rest of their talk, which was chiefly a going over of old times, and a laying of many a wondrous scheme for the future. Suffice it to say, on this last evening the two boys unbosomed themselves to one another, and if Tom Drift went off to bed in a sober and serious frame of mind, it was because he and Charlie both had thought and felt a great deal more than they had spoken during the interview. The packing went on at the same time as the talk, and then the two friends separated, only to meet once more on the morrow for a hurried farewell.

"Let's have a last look at him," said Charlie, as Tom was getting into the cab to go.

Tom took me out and handed me to him. Long and tenderly my dear young master looked at me, then, patting me gently with his hand as if I were a child, he said,--

"Good-bye, and be good to Tom Drift; do you hear?"

If a tick could express anything, my reply at that moment must have satisfied him his parting wish would not be forgotten. Then returning me to my new master, he said,--

"Good-bye, old boy; joy go with you. We'll hear of you at the head of your profession before Jim and I have left school."

"Not quite so soon," replied Tom, laughing.

Then came a last good-bye, and the cab drove off. As it turned the corner of the drive Tom leaned out of the window and held me out in his hand.

Long shall I remember that parting glimpse. He was standing on the steps with Jim waving his hands. The sun shone full on him, lighting up his bright face and curly head. I thought as I looked, "Where could one find his equal?"--_Sans peur et sans reproche_--"matchless for gentleness, honesty, and courage," and felt, as the vision faded from me, that I should never see another like him. And I never did.

Little, however, did I dream in what strange way I was next to meet Charlie Newcome.

Chapter Eleven.

How Tom Drift Made One Start In London, And Prepared To Make Another.

The two months that followed my departure from Randlebury were melancholy and tedious.

It was hard for me, after the boisterous surroundings of a public school, to settle down to the heavy monotony of a dull lodging in a back street of London; and it was harder still, after being the pride and favourite of a boy like Charlie Newcome, to find myself the property of Tom Drift.

Not that Tom used me badly at first. He wound me up regularly, and for the sake of his absent friend honoured me with a considerable share of his affection.

Indeed, for the first week or so he was quite gushing, scarcely letting me out of his sight, and sometimes even dropping a tear over me. And I, remembering Charlie's last words, "Be good to Tom Drift," felt glad to be able to remind my new master of old times, and keep fresh the hopes and resolutions with which Charlie had done so much to inspire him. But Tom Drift, I could not help feeling, was not a safe man.

There was something lacking in him, and that something was ballast. No one, perhaps, ever had a greater theoretical desire to be all that was right and good, but that was not in itself enough.

In quiet, easy times, and with a guiding friend to help him, Tom Drift did well enough; but left to himself amid currents and storms he could hardly fail to come to grief, as we shall presently see.

For the first two months he stuck hard to his work he was regular at lectures, and attentive when there; he spent his spare time well in study bearing upon the profession for which he was preparing; he wrote and heard once a week from Charlie; he kept clear of the more rackety of his fellow-students; he spent his Sundays at Mr Newcome's house, and he took plenty of healthy exercise both for body and mind.

With many examples about him of industry and success he determined to make the most of his time as a student, and spoke of the life and sphere of a country doctor, for which he was training, with the enthusiasm of one whose heart is in his work.

"The more I think of it," he once wrote to his mother, who was residing abroad for her health, "the more I take to it. A good doctor is the best-liked man in his parish. Everybody comes to him in their trouble. He gets into the best society, and yet makes himself loved by the poorest. In four or five years at least I ought to get through my course here, and then there is nothing to prevent my settling down at once. By that time I hope you'll be well enough to come and keep house for me, for all country doctors, you know, are bachelors," and so on.

All this was very well, and, as one of Tom's friends, I rejoiced to see him thus setting himself in earnest to the duties of his calling. But I rejoiced with trembling. Although he kept clear, for the most part, of his fellow-students, choosing his friends charily and shyly, I could yet see that he had no objection to contemplate from a distance the humours and festivities of his more high-spirited companions. He was not one of those impulsive fellows who shut their eyes and take a header into the midst of a new good-fellowship, only to discover too late their error, and repent their rashness at leisure.

No, Tom had his eyes open. He saw the evil as well as the good, and, alas for him, having seen it, he looked still!

The students of Saint Elizabeth's Hospital were not on the whole a bad set. On Tom's arrival in London, however, he had the firm impression in his mind that all medical students were bad characters, and this foolish notion did him much harm. If two or three of them were to go off for a spree, his imagination would at once picture them in scenes and places such as no respectable man would like to frequent, whereas, if the truth were known, these misjudged young men had committed no greater crime than that of taking a boat up the river, or a drive in a dog-cart. If a group of them should be seen by him laughing and talking, he instinctively concluded their topic must be ribaldry, whereas they would perhaps be only joking at the expense of some eccentric professor, or else chaffing one of their own number. And so it happened that Tom failed in time to distinguish between the really bad and such as he only imagined to be bad; and from his habit of looking on at them and their doings from a studied distance, their presence began gradually and insensibly to exercise a very considerable influence over his mind.

"After all," he would sometimes say to himself, "these fellows get on. They pass their exams, they pay their bills, they gain the confidence of their professors, and at the same time they manage to enjoy themselves. Perhaps I am a fool to take so much pains about the first three of these things, and to deny myself the fourth. Perhaps, after all, these fellows are not so bad as I have fancied, or perhaps I am prudish."

And then the silly fellow, having once inclined to admit there was something to be said for medical students, and having before considered all bad alike, became tolerant all round, more particularly of the really bad set, who appeared to him to enjoy themselves the most.

As his companions became more attractive to him, his work became less interesting.

"Why should I grind and plod here," he said, "while every one else is enjoying himself? If young Charlie were here, I'm pretty sure _he'd_ be in for some of their sprees, and laugh at me for wearing my eyes out as I'm doing."

And then he leaned back in his chair and took to wondering what the six fellows who started that afternoon for Richmond were doing. Smashing the windows of the "Star an