Читать книгу Toilers of Babylon: A Novel - Farjeon Benjamin Leopold - Страница 10

"Just come back, Timothy?"

"Yes, sir, just come back."

"You've been away a long time?"

"Seven months, sir."

"Done any good for yourself?"

"Yes, sir."

"Ah, you've got a pocketful of money, then?"

"Not a penny, sir."

"Yet you say you've done well?"

"Yes, sir. I've worked hard, and had plenty to eat, and I'm stronger than ever."

"Ah, that's what you mean by doing well?"

"Yes, sir, and I'm willinger-I mean, more willing than ever."

At this slip of language and its correction Mr. Loveday cocked up his ears, and took a longer look at the lad. Timothy met his gaze ingenuously.

"I think there's an improvement in you, Timothy."

"I hope so, sir."

"Where have you been?"

"In a lot of places, sir, but most of the time in a school."

"Oh, in a school. Doing what? Studying?"

"A little, sir," said Timothy, modestly; "but I wasn't engaged for that."

"For what, then?"

"Garden work, knife-cleaning, boot-cleaning, running of errands, making myself generally useful."

"And picking up scholarship."

"As much of it as ever I could, sir."

"There is certainly an improvement in you, Timothy. You speak more correctly than you did."

Timothy was silent, but his face flushed with pleasure.

"How did you get into the school?"

"By a bit of good-luck, sir-though it wasn't good-luck to another boy who had the place."

"What is one man's meat, Timothy, is another man's poison."

"Is it, sir?"

"So they say, and so it often happens. Go on."

"I was in Essex, sir, looking for a job. It was half-past ten in the morning."

"Carried a watch, eh?"

"No, sir, I was passing a church. But I didn't pass it. I stopped.

"What for?"

"There was a fight going on. Two boys, pegging away at each other like one o'clock. The road was muddy, and they rolled over and over in it, then got up and went at it again. When they'd had enough they ran off different ways, and I lost sight of 'em. I was walking off myself when I noticed something in the mud. It was a letter, and I picked it up and looked at it. I couldn't read the address, it had been dug into the mud so; but in a corner, in very plain writing, I saw the name of Dr. Porter. I went into a baker's shop, and asked if they knew Dr. Porter, and they said he kept a school a little way off. I asked them to show me where it was, as I thought it wouldn't be a bad thing to take the letter to him myself and ask him for a job. They showed me, and I saw Dr. Porter himself; he was in the grounds in front of the schoolhouse, and one of the boys who had been fighting was there too. I gave the doctor the letter, and asked him if it was his, and he said it was. I found out afterwards that it was a very particular letter, and had some money in it. The boy was sent out to post it, and he got fighting and dropped it in the mud. Then the doctor said he supposed I wanted a reward, and I said no, that I wanted a job. Not to make too long a story, sir, he put a lot of questions to me, and seemed pleased with me, and he sent the fighting boy away and took me on in his place to do the rough work."

"How much a week, Timothy?" inquired Mr. Loveday.

"Two shillings a week and my keep."

"You slept there?"

"Yes, sir."

"And out of the two shillings a week for some months you saved nothing? You come back here without a penny?"

"You shall hear, sir. My clothes were pretty bad, the same as I've got on now, and I thought I'd save as much as I could, and buy a new suit. I did buy a new suit the week before last, but I didn't wear 'em for garden work. Well, sir, while I was with the doctor I was very happy. Plenty of work, but plenty to eat. He hadn't many young gentlemen to teach, and I've found out that he wasn't well off. He had a daughter, a beautiful young lady, not as old as I am, and she had a bit of garden that I used to look after for her. I took a lot of pains with her flowers, and she was so pleased that she used to give me lessons. I can write pretty well, sir."

"You can, eh? I'll try you presently. Go on with your story."

"I learnt a bit of grammar, and a bit of history, and a bit of arithmetic. It was a great bit of luck for me, but it ended badly." Timothy paused and sighed, and his face became grave. "I used to stop up late at night to study, and I picked up a lot. Dr. Porter seemed always to have a peck of trouble on him, but he helped me, too, a bit, by lending me books, and Mrs. Porter helped me as well. I was never so happy before. I bought a new suit of clothes, as I've told you, sir. Everything was going on swimmingly till last week." Timothy paused again.

"What happened then, Timothy?"

"I went to bed very late; I'd had a good hard night of it, and I had to get up very early to do something I wanted to Miss Emily's bit of garden."

"Miss Emily is the doctor's daughter?"

"Yes, sir. I don't know how long I'd been asleep, but it was dark when I woke up all of a sudden with a singing in my ears, and a lot of other sounds that I can't describe. Then I heard some one sing out 'Fire!' I'm pretty quick, sir, as a rule, and I got into my old clothes in less than no time, and ran out of the room. Sure enough, the house was on fire. Miss Emily was crying for her mother, and Dr. Porter was running about like a madman. I raced to Mrs. Porter's room, and helped to get her out, and then we stood and watched the fire burning up the house. There wasn't a drop of water except what we could get from the pump, and that came out with a dribble. A fire-engine came up when it was too late. By that time the house was a mass of flames. There wasn't one bit of furniture saved, nor a book. All their clothes were burnt, and everything they had, except what they stood upright in. My new suit of clothes went too, but I didn't think of that; I was too sorry for Miss Emily and her mother and father. We had a dreadful time, and when daylight came the whole house and everything in it was a heap of ashes. Some friends took Dr. Porter and his wife and Miss Emily away, and I hung about, almost dazed out of my senses. I saved one thing, though-this fowl here, and the basket. The next day I saw Dr. Porter. 'My lad,' he said, 'I owe you a week's wages; here's your florin; I'm a ruined man, and you must look out for another situation.' He spoke nothing but the truth, sir; he was ruined; he wasn't insured for a penny. I wouldn't take the florin; I told him about this fowl that I'd saved, and I asked him to let me have that instead. 'Take it and welcome,' he said, 'and your florin too.' But I wouldn't. I wanted badly to see Miss Emily to tell her how sorry I was, and to wish her good-bye, but Dr. Porter had sent her off I don't know where, so I had to come away without seeing her. That's the whole story, sir."

"A sad story, Timothy."

"Yes, sir, you may well say that."

"What are you going to do now?"

"That's what's puzzling me, sir." And Timothy cast a wistful look at the bookseller.

"Take this book in your hand. Open it anywhere. Now read."

Timothy opened the book, and with great fluency read from the top of the page.

"That will do," said Mr. Loveday. "You can write, you say. Sit down there; here's paper, here's a pen. Now write what I say. 'The world is filled with fools and bunglers, and a few clever men. A small proportion of these clever men grow rich, because they are that way inclined; the majority die poor, because they are not entirely sordid-minded. The fools and bunglers grow so in a small measure from inheritance, in a large measure from indolence and a lack of judicious training.' Give it to me."

He examined the paper carefully.

"Ah! Writing tolerably good. Not a bad style; improvement will come by industry. I think you have that, Timothy Chance."

"I think I have, sir."

"Three mistakes in spelling. Bunglers is not spelled b u n g e l. Inheritance is not spelled without an h and with two e's in the last syllable. Judicious is not spelled j e w. For the rest, all right. A bit of arithmetic, eh?"

"Yes, sir."

"Be ready with your pen and paper. I buy a parcel of twenty-eight books at auction for three and sixpence; three I sell for waste-paper, sixteen at twopence each, five at threepence each, two at fourpence, and one for a shilling. What's the result?"

"You lay out three and sixpence, sir," said Timothy, almost instantaneously; he was sharp at most things, but especially sharp at figures; "and you get back five and sevenpence. Two and a penny profit."

"Quite right. Anything else?"

"The three books you sell for waste-paper will bring in something; perhaps they're big ones."

"Perhaps they're little ones. We won't reckon them. Anything else?"

"You bought twenty-eight books, sir; you only gave me twenty-seven to figure out. One short, sir."

"That was stolen, Timothy."

"Where from, sir?"

"From the stall outside."

"It couldn't have been, sir, if you had a sharp boy to attend to it for you."

"Ah! The question is, where to find that particularly sharp boy?"

"He's handy, sir, almost at your elbow." Now, although these words betokened a certain confidence and were spoken with a certain boldness, it is a fact that there was a tremor in Timothy's voice as he uttered them. The conversation between him and Mr. Loveday had been strangely in accordance with his earnest desire to be taken into Mr. Loveday's service. He had been upheld by this hope as he tramped from Essex after the schoolhouse had been burned down, and he had hurried back to London more swiftly than he would have done without it.

Mr. Loveday ruminated; Timothy Chance waited anxiously.

"I'm rather a peculiar fellow, Timothy," said Mr. Loveday, presently; "not at all unpleasant out of business, unless you quarrel with my social crotchets, and you're not old enough to do that yet, Timothy, but very strict in business matters, however trifling. That fowl of yours is beginning to crow, Timothy."

"It's all right, sir," said Timothy, in a tone of wistful expectation, "please finish."

"This strictness of mine in business matters may make me a hard master; I haven't tried my hand in that line much, as I've always attended to my shop myself, but I will not deny that I'm half inclined to engage a lad."

"Make it a whole mind, sir, and engage me."

Timothy's occasionally apt replies tickled and pleased Mr. Loveday; they betokened a kind of cleverness which he appreciated.

"As we stand now," continued Mr. Loveday, "man and boy, not master and servant, we have a mutual respect for each other."

"Thank you, sir."

"It would be a pity to weaken this feeling."

"It might be made stronger, sir."

"There are numberless things to consider. If I say, 'Up at six every morning,' up at six it would have to be."

"And should be, sir."

"If I say, 'Every day's work completely done, every day's accounts satisfactorily made up, before the next day commences,' it would have to be. That fowl of yours is crowing louder, Timothy. No shirking of work by the excuse that it doesn't belong to the duties I engage a lad for. You understand all this?"

"I understand it, sir."

"On the other hand, satisfaction given, the cart would run along smoothly. There might be a little time in the evening for study and reading; there might be sundry pleasant interludes which one can't think of right off. Eh, Timothy?"

"Yes, sir."

"You had it in your mind?"

"I did, sir."

"But," said Mr. Loveday, glancing at the lad, "there is one most important question-the question of respectability."

"There's nothing against me, sir. You may inquire of everybody I've worked for."

"I mean the question of a respectable appearance. Now, Timothy, you will not have the assurance to assert that you present a respectable appearance?"

"Cluck! cluck! cluck?" went the fowl in the basket.

Timothy's eyes wandered dolefully over his ragged garments.

"If my new suit of clothes hadn't been burnt," he murmured-

"But they are burnt. Spilled milk, you know. The long and the short of it is, if you can obtain a decent suit of clothes, I'll give you a trial, Timothy."

"Cluck! cluck! cluck! Cluck! cluck! cluck!" from the basket. A jubilant, noisy, triumphant flourish of trumpets, to force upon the world the knowledge of a great event. Timothy knelt down, put his hand in the basket, and drew forth a new-laid egg.

"The world's mine oyster, which I with knife will ope." But surely that knife never presented itself, as it did at the present moment, in the form of a new laid-egg.