Читать книгу A Novel Without a Name - William Aubrey Burnage - Страница 8

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'Letter for Henry!' cried Polly Seymour, running in from the garden, the morning after the storm.

'Call the boys to breakfast, Polly. They are out in the back garden,' said the old lady, not hearing her little niece's words; but observing the missive in Polly's hand, she took it, saying, 'Immediate; I hope there is nothing the matter at home; Call him Polly!'

In a second or two the boys were at the table; and Harry's urgent missive opened.

'Elmgrove.

'Dear Harry, come home at once; papa fell from the Duke, when riding into Dunmow yesterday afternoon. He is not much hurt; so don't alarm yourself, Harry; but he wants you home to chat with, as he feels lonely in doors all day. Excuse haste,

Your darling sister, Fanny.

P.S. Did you hear the dreadful news? Mabel's mamma was drowned at Dover yesterday. Isn't it awful?'

F. F.

'What's that?' cried Miss Letitia, snatching the letter, sans ceremony, from Harry's grasp. 'Drowned yesterday! That isn't possible! for Mabel said her mother came over from Paris on Wednesday, you remember.'

They all recollected their little visitor saying so; and Harry gave it unhesitatingly as his opinion that his sister had got hold of the wrong end of some story.

'Did you look at the Dispatch this morning, aunt?' asked Frank, rising from the table, and looking about for the paper.

'No, Frank; nor yesterday's either. I was too busy! Here's to-day's unopened.'

Frank took the paper, and, tearing it open, searched anxiously through the shipping news while his aunt and sister and Harry watched and waited in eager silence.

'Total loss of the Albatross yacht, one lady drowned,' he read aloud.

'Is that the only shipwreck, Frank?' asked his sister, eagerly.

'Yes, Polly, I'm happy to say!' he replied slowly, running his eyes down the column again, lest he should have missed any.

'Oh then it's a mistake! Mrs. Wilton came over on Wednesday in the regular packet.'

'It's too true Polly, that confounded report!' returned Frank slowly. 'Here, aunt, read this.'

Miss Letitia took the paper, and after carefully dusting and adjusting her spectacles, read the melancholy notice in silence. 'Yes, Frank, it is too true! And there can be no mistake, for it distinctly says that the lady drowned was the wife of Herbert Wilton, Esq., of Fenwick Park.'

'Poor Mabel,' sobbed Polly, the warm tears falling thick upon her neat, little, white apron.

After a few minutes spent in listening to Miss Letitia reading the particulars of the sad occurrence, and in discussing its probability, Frank asked by what train his friend intended to start.

'The next, if I can catch it!' replied Harry, with decision.

It did not take Harry long to finish his breakfast and get ready, and he was waiting upon the platform, carpet-bag in hand, a full half-hour before the time for the train to start. Frank was with him; and the melancholy death of Mrs. Wilton was the sad theme that occupied their thoughts, as they paced up and down the platform waiting for the train; but conversation was a failure. Frank was beginning to hate Harry, as only a jealous and morose disposition can hate, and felt more inclined to throw his friend under wheels of the passing trains than patiently to hear her name upon his lips. And Harry was too much concerned about Mabel's loss, and his own father's accident to do more than keep up a fitful and dragging conversation.

'It's no use, old fellow,' he said, rousing himself from a fit of "absence" to answer a question as to how long he had known Mabel Wilton! 'I'm in no humour for talking. My father's mishap may be more serious than Fanny likes to own; and Mabel too, she must be in a great way about her mother's death; so I—— But you ask me how long have I known little Mabel? The first I can clearly recollect of her, was on her sixth birthday. Her father and mother were in London, and she was staying on a visit with us the while. My mother had a childrens' party in honor of Mabel's birthday, and I can remember, young as I was, thinking her the prettiest girl at the party. It was queer, wasn't it, for a youngster of eleven or twelve, to think about good looks, but I did, and have never seen anyone since, I think half her equal. No, Frank, you are my best friend, so I'll tell you a secret that nobody else knows. I would rather marry Mabel, if she hadn't a penny, than the best and loveliest girl in the whole earth, even if she was as rich as all the Jews in the world put together; and, I tell you more, Frank, I will marry her too, if we both live.'

'If!' Frank muttered to himself gloomily, and then turning to his ingenuous friend, said with a sneer, 'Marrying is a bargain it takes two to make. What, if she 'declined with thanks,' as the newspapers say?'

Harry cast an enquiring glance at this friend. 'Declined with thanks? Mabel says she would wait her whole life for me. No, no! There's no fear of her, she is as true as the sun. Although, we're only children, we promised to wait for each other, and be faithful always.'

'Like the babes in the woods!'

The tone of evident ill-humour that this was spoken in, startled and pained Harry, and he looked at his friend in surprise.

'Why, Frank, you're, as pale as chalk; I'm half afraid you haven't quite got over the chill you had in the park yesterday! You really look quite ill.'

The mention of his narrow escape from drowning in the Serpentine the morning before, filled Frank's sensitive breast with shame and remorse. 'There's nothing the matter with me, Harry; only I'm a brute! Forgive my rude words. Here comes your train! Good-bye, old fellow; I hope you'll be back again at school after the vacation; it would be dull without you. Good-bye!'

Harry had, boy-like, forgotten his ticket, and he had to dash off to get it as the long train glided up, and had barely time to take his seat when the whistle answered the bell, and the train rolled off.

'Remember me to all at home! Good-bye!' Frank said, as he shook hands through the window; and in another minute the guard van shot past him; and he turned away to walk home. 'I'm an unnatural wretch,' he soliloquised bitterly. 'He saved my life only yesterday morning; and here I am almost wishing the train'll run off the line, and he be picked up dead among the general smash. I'm afraid I was right last night when I said I would recollect nothing but that I had sworn to win her. Oh, how delightful it would be to know that she loved me! Ah, well, she might some day, who knows? I'll go back now, and dig up some more of those dry, old Greek roots. A barrister must learn Greek; and I will be a barrister yet!'

Frank had walked on dreaming and resolving for nearly half-way to Woodbine Cottage when he suddenly encountered Toby Cadman carrying a game-cock under his arm.

'Why, Toby, where the dickens are you off to with that cock?' he asked in surprise. 'I declare you look as scared as if you had been caught in the act!'

'What act?' enquired Toby, uneasily.

'Cock-fighting! You didn't think I meant robbing a hen roost!' said Frank laughing at Toby's evident alarm. 'Oh, by-the-by, Toby, how did you sleep the night before last?'

'Sound as a top,' replied Toby sturdily.

'As a whipped top?' asked Frank significantly.

Toby assumed an expression of innocent stupidity, and said he didn't know. He'd gone off to sleep directly, and never woke until the other boys called him in the morning.

'Well, good-by, Toby; I'm off back again. Harry's——'

Before the sentence was finished Toby was down an area; and a sleepy policeman passed by. As soon as he turned the corner, Toby re-appeared.

'Didn't see this beast of a cock jump out of my arms. He's just as quick as lightning.'

'Were you afraid of that bluecoat, Toby? I haven't a very good opinion of you after that duel affair; but I don't like to think any boy belonging to the old school would have to jump down an area out of the way of a policeman.'

Toby's defence, if any, was cut short by the sudden rising from the area of an apparition in the form of a lank and lean old woman.

'You bold, good-for-nothing vagabond of a street arab, what do you want jumping down a poor lone widow's area to steal her coals, what cost me two shillings a hundred, yesterday was a week ago. It's not the first time I've had to go to bed supperless through you and the other little blackguards stealing my few bits of coal, which is a positive shame to you if you had so much as a ha'poth of feeling.'

'My game-cock got away, and I had to catch it again, hadn't I?' replied Toby in an aggrieved tone. The excuse, instead of mollifying her, let loose her tongue; and a crowd speedily collecting, the boys were glad to hail a passing cab, and drive away amidst the groans and derisions of a crowd of larrikins, who hooted and hissed the 'young swells, who'd robbed a poor old woman of her coals.'

'I get out here; good-bye!' said Toby, soon after they had got out of sight and sound of the boisterous defenders of the old woman's coals. 'Pull the check-string; I can't free my hand.'

'What are you doing with that cock, Toby?' asked Frank, pulling the string as he spoke.

'Nursing him!'

'You are taking him to fight in a cock-pit. Look here, Toby, if I see you at it, I'll tell the old doctor; so you'd better not let me catch you. I think I've seen that cock before too!'

'No, I'll swear you haven't! I bought him just now from a tramp.'

'Perhaps! But it looks very much like Dr. Shelwood's.'

'I'm taking it home to give to my father; he is a regular poultry-fancier!' replied Toby, not appearing to notice the insinuation.

'Well, good-bye Toby; and don't forget the court-martial!' said Frank, stepping out; and a Kensington omnibus passing he hailed the driver, and mounted to the box beside him.

'My word they'll pay for it, if ever they hide me again!' growled Toby, as he turned into a lane, which led to a low public-house at some distance from the street. There were several rough-looking men congregated about the door, eagerly discussing the respective merits of a couple of game-cocks confined in a cage.

'Look, Bob, I'll lay you a tanner Tom Smith's young red 'un 'll lick Martin Giles' old blue 'un,' said a dirty-looking old rascal, pipe in mouth.

'You're a fool if you do, Jack. Martin's old warrior's a sticker.'

'Holloa, here's young Master Cadman. That's a rare 'un he's got this time.' Bob Flinders exclaimed with admiration, as Toby marched up to them exhibiting his prize in triumph.

'Don't see a pugilistic masculine fowl like that every day,' he said, holding the bird at arm's-length, and turning it round for general inspection. 'That's what I may call a magnificent specimen of the combatant chanticleer species.'

'Come, shut up young'un. We don't want none of your school lingo here,' growled old Bob Styles.

'Let him be a bit, Bob. He's only been and swallered a dic. It's a wonder it didn't choke him.'

'Come now, what'll you give me for this one? I want half-a-crown for him,' said the boy, turning his attention to business.

'Where did you shake him, young'un?' asked one of the men.

'What's that to do with you?' replied Toby, sulkily. 'Here he is for half-a-crown. Who'll buy him?'

'He's mine!' said a wiry little bird-fancier with a nose like a parrot's. 'Here's the rhino. Cash down, small profits and quick returns. That's my motto!'

'I'll give you a crown. He's worth that,' said another, putting his hand deep into his trousers pocket for the coin. 'Here, it is all in one piece.'

Toby took the coveted cash, handed over the fowl, and departed, well pleased with his morning's work; and the purchaser carried his bargain to the back to test its pluck by a bout with a pugnacious little bantam, who would be sure to 'draw it out,' if it would 'shape' at all. The rest of the men followed to see the sport; and Toby hurried to a shop in the front street to buy a pair of steel spurs, for a young game-cock of his own he was 'bringing out.'