Читать книгу A Novel Without a Name - William Aubrey Burnage - Страница 4

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(Continued.)

....mind, as the boys, half in fun but terribly in earnest, made their preparations for the trial.

'Jump up, Toby; You're wanted in the Court. Come, the Queen versus Toby Cadman, for Conspiracy and Cowardice, is on for hearing, and the Court mustn't be kept waiting,' said Ned Tait, the newly elected provost in a sepulchural voice.

Toby redoubled the speed and volume of his nasal music, and pretended vigorously to be asleep, past all power of waking.

'If he won't get up, Charley, Mr. President, I mean, let's belt him where he is,' said one of the jury boys. The ominous suggestion had the desired effect, and in the twinkling of an eye, Toby rose from the sheets like a ghost in his cerements. 'I did not do it; I'll swear I didn't!' he gasped, glancing piteously around the group of juvenile, but determined faces.

'Didn't do what? If you've been asleep, you haven't heard what we've got against you!' said the president with a judicial frown.

'Look here, prisoner at the bar,' said the provost, 'If you speak a word while I'm addressing the jury, we hang you first, and try you after, so you'll know to expect.'

The miserable Toby stood staring imploringly from one face to another; but he met with no sympathy anywhere; all eyed him with contempt and disgust. The trial was conducted with a curious mixture of seriousness and merriment, and each actor in the mimic court acquitted himself to his own satisfaction, if not to that of the hapless Toby. After the evidence had been gone carefully through, and each of the orators—who by-the-by, comprised pretty nigh the whole of the jury as well as the advocate and provost—had listened with evident pleasure to his own eloquence, a verdict of guilty was recorded.

'Now, prisoner at the bar, what have you to say that the extreme sentence should not be passed upon you?' asked the grinning president, is a tone so dismally prophetic that Toby began to blubber in abject terror.

'Just make a clean breast of it, Toady, and perhaps we'll let you off this time!' said one of the boys.

Drowning men catch at straws, and Toby, thinking to propitiate his tormentors, told the ludicrous tale of his 'being sweet on little Ruth Scott,' and how, when he found that she cared more for Harry Fenton than for him, he had got up the row in hopes that Harry would get knocked on the head.

'And you run them to fight with pistols, because you knew that Frank was a good shot; and Harry wasn't, and most likely would be killed!' exclaimed Ned Tait, in horror. 'Hanging's too good for a wretch like you!'

'We mustn't hang him anyhow, so my sentence is one hundred lashes upon the bare skin, to be given in equal share by each of us,' said the president, with judicial dignity.

Toby made a rush for the door, but was quickly caught, and thrown down upon one of the beds.

'Gag him, or he'll bellow, and bring the whole house upon us,' cried one; and, taking the hint, the provost snatched up one of Toby's own dirty socks, and stuffed it into his mouth. His self-appointed judges then, under Charley Graham's direction, tied him down with their braces, and commenced the flagellation to which he had been sentenced. Charley Graham wore a leather belt instead of braces, and being 'senior officer of the Court,' as the other boys called him, gave the first instalment of the hundred, which he laid on with a will. The quivering culprit winced and groaned, but to no purpose. His floggers were inexorable, and never ceased till each had performed his share of the task, and Toby had received his full hundred, with a few over by way of interest.

'Come, Tom,' said Ned Tait to the boy whose duty it was to put the finishing stroke upon the miserable Toby, 'Come, Tom, knock off now; the poor devil's had more than a fair hundred!'

'I hope the dose 'll operate well, Ned. It'll take more than a hundred, though, to purge the villainy out of him, I'm thinking!' said Tom Ray, the son of a druggist in the Strand, who was intended for his father's profession. 'As my old man says:—"There's nothing like bleeding in these extreme cases."'

'My word, Charley, the cat has scratched him awful! I expect he'll feel in the morning very much as if he'd sat down for an hour upon a red hot gridiron!' said Percy Clay, grinning. The jest did not provoke the laugh that the speaker had anticipated. Now that the tragic farce was played out, the boys began to pity the moaning rascal at their feet, and to wish they had not interfered.

'By George, Charley, we'll get into a jolly row to-morrow, when the old doctor gets wind of our hiding Toby!' said Dick Colridge, suddenly beginning to think of consequences. Charley Graham acquiesced in Dick's foreboding of future trouble, and stooping down by the penitent victim of their boyish sense of justice, whispered impressively, 'Now, Toby, just you listen—We've perhaps done wrong in hiding you, but it served you right, you know; but if we say a word about that duel affair you'd get hung as sure as you're a cow-hearted cub. So you see the best thing you can do is to take your flogging in good part, and be thankful!'

Toby moaned and said nothing, for the simple reason that to speak with a sock in his mouth was a feat that, under the circumstances, he was not equal to. Charley Graham's attention being called to the fact by one of the boys, he removed the obstruction, and the unfortunate wight, between sobs and tears, protested that he was perfectly satisfied of the justice of the proceeding's, and promised with energy to say nothing of the evening's amusement, if the boys would only save him from the gallows by saying nothing about the duel.

The boys, one and all, promised eagerly to keep the secret, and then slunk off to their beds, ashamed of the farce they had just concluded, and wishing they had left Toby instead to the stings of his own conscience, if any.

In half an hour their repentant eyes were all closed by the gentle hand of sleep, and many of them were soon accompanying the young culprit's doleful moans by a chorus of snoring.

Never before had a night appeared so interminable to Master Toby Cadman; he could not sleep for the pain, occasioned by the severity of his punishment. He could get no ease by lying on either side, and to lie on his back was simply impossible; and all through the long hours of that never-to-be-forgotten night he tossed about sleepless and utterly disconsolate. A night at such a time would seem an age; but even an age does pass away; and at last the cocks began to speculate upon the rising of the sun, and the thick darkness of night slowly dissolved before the opening day. By the time that it was light enough to see, Toby rose from his sleepless bed, and with much difficulty got into his nether garments. Dressed at length, he proceeded to put on his boots, for which purpose he sat down upon a chair by his bed side, but he had barely touched the cold hard seat, when his head came in violent contact with the low ceiling, and he gave up that idea in despair. At last, after long and patient practice in standing on one leg, he contrived to shoe himself; and, giving a glance of vindictive hatred to Charley Graham as he lay still sleeping, he turned to the door, muttering as he did so: 'It was you that said to flog me, and I'll be even with you yet, or my name isn't Toby. Ah! I know what I'll do!'

Slowly and painfully he crawled down stairs and out into the garden, all white with the snow, that had fallen through the night. Whatever it was that had struck him as a good revenge, a silly black and white kitten appearing at the kitchen window altered his plan, and he at once turned aside to catch it. Pussy, however, had some misgivings as to Toby's intentions. It was such an unusual thing for him to notice her unless with the toe of his boot. Cats are said to be good judges of character. Be that as it may, this particular cat, young and inexperienced though she was, seemed to doubt the sincerity of Toby's 'Puss, puss, come pussy! I won't hurt you, pussy!' and declined most unequivocally to trust him. Presently, however, she was captured, and carried off in triumph. 'Look here, puss, you're Charley Graham's cat, so it's no use purring to me. I can't thrash him, so I'm going to take it out of you!'

Toby's indefinite threat appealed to alarm puss, for she began to struggle frantically; but she was too tightly held to break free, and after a few minutes fruitless scramble relapsed into the passive torpor of terror, evidently giving herself up as a lost cat. Right in front of the gate leading into the play-ground stood a pear tree, whose arms were now bare. Toby looked at it for a moment, and muttering, 'Yes. That'll do!' took out of one of his trousers' pockets a collection of boyish paraphernalia, among which appeared an old top string long out of use. Without, speaking a word he set about his terribly significant preparations. The string was carefully measured, and found to be just long enough, after sufficient allowance was made for fastening to the branch, and for tying round the kitten's neck, to reach near enough to the ground to allow a few inches between the feet of the intended victim and the snow. No sooner were the arrangements completed than the doomed kitten, who had tremblingly watched the fatal preparations for her latter end, was shunted off the stage of life, and hung dangling down most uncomfortably, without rest for the sole of her foot. The inhuman young rascal watched the dying convulsions of the unhappy cat with philosophical interest, and speculated, as calmly as his own unpleasant position would admit, upon the unfathomable mystery of life and death. For nearly twenty minutes the protracted death-struggle of the cat afforded him subject for experimental observation, and then the earthly career of the unfortunate victim of his dastardly revenge was over, and the miscreant slunk back to his bedroom.

The sun rose gilding the distant hills when Dr. Shelwood's boys assembled at the breakfast table. As was the usual custom, the lads stood round the table waiting as patiently for grace to be said, as a herd of small swine in and around their trough, awaiting their morning meal. At last the ordeal was over, and the signal to "fall to" given.

'What's the reason of Master Cadman not sitting?' enquired the old doctor, in a severe voice.

All the 'second class' eyes were in an instant vigorously employed in examining the patterns of the plates and spoons—at least all but those belonging to the luckless Toby, and they were staring helplessly out of the window, which, to his intense annoyance, offered a full view of the body of the murdered cat.

'What is the reason of Master Cadman not sitting?' the doctor asked again, in voice so wrathful that every 'second class' eye, save Toby's, was raised to his, in expectant terror.

'Say it's a boil!' whispered Dick Colridge, his next hand neighbour.

'Please, sir, it's a boil!' faltered Toby in confusion.

'Dear me, Edward, I must give that poor boy a dose of brimstone and treacle!' said the kind-hearted Mrs. Shelwood, to the hapless Toby's infinite disgust, who abhorred 'brimstone and treacle' even worse than a hiding.

'Come here, my lad! Let me see your tongue!' said the motherly lady, and the unfortunate urchin reluctantly approached, and opened his mouth for inspection. The unruly member was duly examined, and pronounced to be out of order; and the unpalatable dose administered. Mrs. Shelwood was a great believer in 'gentle aperients,' and always kept a supply by her, in the form of 'brimstone and treacle,' which compound was a source of perpetual terror to several of the boys who she fancied had delicate constitutions, among whom was Toby. Some little confusion was caused by the lady departing from her usual custom and giving the dose in the room, as the victim's wry faces were almost more than his unsympathetic, but highly amused and decidedly ungenerous school-fellows, could witness without laughter. But an unmistakable 'Silence!' from the head of the table, speedily restored order; and Toby returned to his chair, about as miserable as a combination of misadventures could make him. But the tale of his troubles was not yet full. The gardener appeared on the threshold of the door; and rather than have to face him under existing circumstances, Toby felt that he could gladly have devoured the whole jar of the distasteful mixture.

'Well, Rodgers?' said the doctor, looking at the leg of mutton he was carving—being a red-letter day the ordinary breakfast course was slightly improved upon. 'Well, Rodgers, what now?'

'Can you spare a minute, sir? There's something I want to show you in the garden,' replied Rodgers who scorned the idea of making a fuss even in a case of life and death.

'Certainly! Certainly!' said Dr. Shelwood. 'I will be with you in a moment.' He knew the old gardener too well to believe that a trifling matter would occasion him to intrude at meal times.

Every pair of eyes was directed enquiringly upon Rodgers, as he stood in the doorway leaning, hat in hand, against the post, and eyeing the youngsters at the table with a look that seemed to Toby Cadman like the gaze of a lynx. Dr. Shelwood wrapped a woollen comforter about his neck, for the morning was bitterly cold, and followed the gardener to the scene of the discovery. In about five minutes he returned, looking very grave and stern.

'What is the matter, Edward?' asked Mrs. Shelwood, eagerly, that lady having a fair legacy of Eve's inquisitiveness.

'Nothing, my love; we'll talk about it after breakfast.'

The boys, who had eagerly listened for Dr. Shelwood's explanation, were disappointed at the vagueness of his answer, but very philosophically, returned to the suspended attack upon the good things before them—all but the melancholy Toby, and a variety of subjects conspired to spoil his appetite.

Scarcely a word was spoken during the remainder of the meal, and directly grace was said the order was given to follow the doctor into the garden. If wishes could have been of any avail to undo the past, one among the juvenile throng at the heels of the doctor would have speedily brought back to life the dismal memorial of his boyish cruelty, which was found suspended from a branch of the pear tree. As the boys caught sight of the melancholy object, and realised the tragic end of their little favorite, a loud wail of sorrow, which soon changed into a cry of rage and execration, rose loud and shrill upon the morning air.

'Silence!'

You could have heard a pin drop, so thorough was the discipline the boys were in.

'The boy who can throw any light upon this sad spectacle, step forward!'

There was no response to the invitation, each boy being engaged in scanning the features of the others.

'I expect somebody did it!' whispered Toby to the nearest boy, feeling it necessary to say something, and not knowing what to say.

'I'd like to hang him too, whoever he is?' exclaimed the boy addressed, and the word made Toby's blood run cold; he had himself, he thought, so narrowly escaped hanging, that the suggestion was to him too terribly significant.

Dr. Shelwood waited a minute or two for a reply to his words, and receiving none, lifted the deceased cat in his arms, and examined the fatal noose.

'See, Rodgers, this is a top-string, and must have belonged to one of the bigger boys;' (Toby's knees knocked together). 'Take it off the cat's neck, and show it round.'

'The owner can have it on application!' said the gardener drily, as he unfastened the cord. It is needless to say, the owner did not avail himself of the kind permission.

The tell-tale string was handed round, and—boys are so lynx-eyed and observant that nothing escapes them—the owner was soon found. Each one had denied all knowledge of the article, until it was handed to the boy Toby had just addressed, when he, after a few seconds attentive examination, exclaimed, 'Yes, I expect somebody did do it, and you're that somebody, you——'

Whatever the expletive was to have been, the youngster recollected himself in time to pause before uttering it, and Dr. Shelwood interrupted him, by inquiring if the culprit had been discovered.

'Please sir, that's Toby's top-string?'

Toby suddenly collected his scattered wits, and proved himself equal to the occasion, 'My top-string? Let me see it? I lost a top-string more than a month ago?'

The top-string was handed to Toby in silence, 'I can't say for certain, sir; but I think its mine! Anyway it's just like the one I lost,' said the boy, with apparent candor.

'Hem! You don't know who found it, do you?' asked the master, doubtfully.

'No, sir.'

Dr. Shelwood scratched his head for a moment. He was completely puzzled. The crime of hanging the cat was too grave to be overlooked if committed by one of his pupils; yet there appeared to be no possibility of detecting the offender, for the only clue, the top-string, was of no apparent service.

'When did any of you see this top-string with Toby Cadman last?'

None had seen it for a long time, as tops were out; and, giving up the search for a time, Dr. Shelwood ordered the boys back to the schoolroom. In returning, Charley Graham contrived to walk by Toby's side, and whispered, as they were entering the door, 'Toby, I know who hung my kitten, and why he did it; but I forgive him.'

Toby walked away back with his head down, and wishing heartily he hadn't met the luckless cat. 'It's all her own fault;' he soliloquised. 'If she hadn't been there, I wouldn't have touched her.'