George Manville Fenn (continued 3)

“P’r’aps I’m a fool,” he muttered. “P’r’aps I ain’t. Anyhow, I’ll do it. Look here, youngster, I’m going to trust you, though as you’ve absconded I ought to take you before a magistrate or the inspector, but I won’t, as you’re a friend of my Mary.”

“Thank you, sir,” I said.

“And if you turn out badly, why, woe betide you.”

“Please, sir, I won’t turn out badly if I can help it; but Mr Blakeford said I was good for nothing.”

“Mr Blakeford be blowed! I wouldn’t ask him for a character for a dorg; and as for Mary, she don’t want his character, and he may keep it. I’ll take her without. I wouldn’t speak to any one like this, youngster; but you know that gal’s got a temper, though she’s that good at heart that—that—”

“She’d nurse you so tenderly if you were ill,” I said enthusiastically, “that you wouldn’t wish to be better.”

He held out his hand and gave mine a long and solemn shake.

“Thankye, youngster,” he said, “thankye for that. You and I will be good friends, I see. I will trust your word, hang me if I don’t. Here, come along.”

“Are you—are you going to take me up, sir?” I faltered, with a shiver of apprehension.

“I’m a-going to give you the door-key where I lodges, my lad. I’m on night duty, and shan’t be home till quarter-past six, so you may have my bed and welcome. Now, look here,” he said, “don’t you go and let anybody fool you. I’m going to show you the end of a long street, and you’ll go right to the top, then turn to the right along the road till you come to the fourth turning, and on the right-hand side, number twenty-seven, is where I lodges. Here’s the key. You puts it in the lock, turns it, shuts the door after you, and then goes gently upstairs to the second-pair back.”

“Second-pair back, sir?” I said dubiously.

“Well there, then, to the back room atop of the house, and there you may sleep till I come. Now then, this way out.”

It was a change that I could not have believed in, and I accompanied the constable wonderingly as he led me out of the police-station and through several dark-looking streets, till he stopped short before a long dim vista, where straight before me two lines of gaslights stretched right away till they seemed to end in a bright point.

“Now, then,” he said, “you can’t make any mistake there.”

“No, sir.”

“Off you go then to the top, and then you’ll find yourself in a big road.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Turn to the right, and then count four streets on the right-hand side. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Go down that street about halfway, till you see a gaslight shining on a door with number twenty-seven upon it. Twenty-seven Caroline Street. Now, do you understand? Straight up to the top, and then it’s right, right, right, all the way.”

“I understand, sir.”

“Good luck to you then, be off; here’s my sergeant.”

I should have stopped to thank him, but he hurried me away; and half forgetting my weariness, I went along the street, found at last the road at the end, followed it as directed, and then in the street of little houses found one where the light from the lamp shone as my guide had said.

I paused with the key in my hand, half fearing to use it, but summoning up my courage, I found the door opened easily and closed quietly, when I stood in a narrow passage with the stairs before me, and following them to the top, I hesitated, hardly knowing back from front. A deep heavy breathing from one room, however, convinced me that that could not be the back, so I tried the other door, to find it yield, and there was just light enough from the window to enable me to find the bed, on which I threw myself half dressed, and slept soundly till morning, when I opened my eyes to find Mr Revitts taking off his stiff uniform coat.

“Look here, youngster,” he said, throwing himself upon the bed, “I dessay you’re tired, so don’t you get up. Have another nap, and then call me at ten, and we’ll have some breakfast. How—how—” he said, yawning.

“What did you say, sir?”

“How—Mary look?”

“Very well indeed, sir. She has looked much better lately, and—”

I stopped short, for a long-drawn breath from where Mr Revitts had thrown himself upon the bed told me plainly enough that he was asleep.

I was too wakeful now to follow his example, and raising myself softly upon my elbow, I had a good look at my new friend, to see that he did not look so big and burly without his greatcoat, but all the same he was a stoutly built, fine-looking man, with a bluff, honest expression of countenance.

I stayed there for some minutes, thinking about him, and then about Mary, and Mr Blakeford, and Hetty, and I wondered how the lawyer had got on before the magistrates without me. Then, rising as quietly as I could, I washed and finished dressing myself before sitting down to wait patiently for my host’s awakening.

The first hour passed very tediously, for there was nothing to see from the window but chimney-pots, and though it was early I began to feel that I had not breakfasted, and three hours or so was a long time to wait. The room was clean, but shabbily furnished, and as I glanced round offered little in the way of recreation, till my eyes lit on a set of hanging shelves with a few books thereon, and going on tiptoe across the room, I began to read their backs, considering which I should choose.

There was the “Farmer of Inglewood Forest,” close by the “Old English Baron,” with the “Children of the Abbey,” and “Robinson Crusoe.” Side by side with them was a gilt-edged Prayer-book, upon opening which I found that it was the property of “Mr William Revitts, a present from his effectinat friend Mary Bloxam.” On the opposite leaf was the following verse:—

“When this yu see, remember me, And bare me in yure mind; And don’t forget old Ingerland, And the lass yu lef behind.”

The Bible on the shelf was from the same source. Besides these were several books in shabby covers—Bogatsky’s “Golden Treasury,” the “Pilgrim’s Progress,” and the “Young Man’s Best Companion.”

I stood looking at them for a few minutes, and then reached down poor old “Robinson Crusoe,” bore it to the window, and for the fourth time in my life began its perusal.

In a very short time my past troubles, my precarious future, and my present hunger were all forgotten, and I was far away from the attic in North London, watching the proceedings of Robinson in that wonderful island, having skipped over a good many of the early adventures for the sake of getting as soon as possible into that far-away home of mystery and romance.

The strengthening of his house, the coming of the savages, the intensely interesting occurrences of the story, so enchained me, that I read on and on till I was suddenly startled by the voice of Mr Revitts exclaiming:

“Hallo, you! I say, what’s o’clock?”

Chapter Fourteen.

Breakfast with the Law, and what Followed.

I let the book fall in a shamefaced way as my host took a great, ugly old silver watch from beneath his pillow, looked at it, shook it, looked at it again, and then exclaimed:

“It’s either ’levin o’clock or else she’s been up to her larks. Hush!”

He held up his hand, for just then a clock began to strike, and we both counted eleven.

“Then she was right for once in a way. Why didn’t you call me at ten?”

“I forgot, sir. I was reading,” I faltered; for I felt I had been guilty of a great breach of trust.

“And you haven’t had no breakfast,” he said, dressing himself quickly, and then plunging his face into the basin of water, to splash and blow loudly, before having a most vigorous rub with the towel. “Why, you must be as hungry as a hunter,” he continued, as he halted in what was apparently his morning costume of flannel shirt and trousers. “We’ll very soon have it ready, though. Shove the cloth on, youngster; the cups and saucers are in that cupboard, that’s right, look alive.”

I hastened to do what he wished, and in a few minutes had spread the table after the fashion observed by Mary at Mr Blakeford’s, while Mr Revitts took a couple of rashers of bacon out of a piece of newspaper on the top of the bookshelf, and some bread and a preserve jar containing butter out of a box under the table. Next he poured some coffee out of a canister into the pot, and having inserted his feet into slippers, he prepared to go out of the room.

“Bedroom, with use of the kitchen, for a single gentleman,” he said, winking one eye. “That’s me. Back in five minutes, youngster.”

It must have been ten minutes before he returned, with the coffee-pot in one hand and the two rashers of hot sputtering bacon in the other, when in the most friendly spirit he drew a chair to the table, and saying, “Help yourself, youngster,” placed one rasher upon my plate and took the other upon his own.

“I say, only to think of my mate coming upon you fast asleep in London,” he said, tearing me off a piece of bread. “Why, if he’d been looking for you, he couldn’t ha’ done it. Don’t be afraid o’ the sugar. There ain’t no milk.”

I was very hungry, and I gladly began my breakfast, since it was offered in so sociable a spirit.

“Let’s see. How did you say Mary looked?”

“Very well indeed, sir,” I replied.

“Send me—come, tuck in, my lad, you’re welcome—send me any message?”

“She did not know I was coming, sir.”

“No, of course not. So you’ve come to London to seek your fortune, eh?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Where are you going to look for it first?” he said, grinning.

“I don’t know, sir,” I said, rather despondently.

“More don’t I. Pour me out another cup o’ coffee, my lad, while I cut some more bread and scrape. Only to think o’ my mate meeting you! And so Mary looks well, does she?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And ain’t very comfortable, eh?”

“Oh no, sir! It’s a very uncomfortable place.”

“Ah, I shall have to find her a place after all! She might just as well have said yes last time, instead of going into a tantrum. I say, come; you ain’t half eating. I shall write and tell her I’ve seen you.”

If I was half eating before, I was eating nothing now, for his words suggested discovery, and my being given up to Mr Blakeford: when, seeing my dismay, my host laughed at me.

“There, get on with your toke, youngster. If I tell Mary where you are, you don’t suppose she’ll go and tell old Blakeford?”

“Oh no, sir! she wouldn’t do that,” I said, taking heart again, and resuming my breakfast.

“And I say, youngster, suppose you don’t say sir to me any more. I’m only a policeman, you know. I say, you were a bit scared last night, weren’t you?”

“Yes, sir—yes, I mean, I was very much afraid.”

“Ah, that’s the majesty of the law, that is! Do you know, I’ve only got to go into a crowd, and just give my head a nod, and they disperse directly. The police have wonderful power in London.”

“Have they, sir?”

“Wonderful, my lad. We can do anything we like, so long as it’s men. Hundreds of ’em ’ll give way before a half-dozen of us. It’s only when we’ve got to deal with the women that we get beat; and that ain’t no shame, is it?”

“No, sir,” I said, though I had not the faintest notion why. “You’re quite right,” he said; “it ain’t no shame. What! Have you done?”

“Yes, sir—yes, I mean.”

“Won’t you have that other cup of coffee?”

“No, thank you.”

“Then I will,” he said, suiting the action to the word. “Well, now then, youngster, what are you going to do, eh?”

“I’m going to try and find Mr Rowle’s brother, sir, at a great printing-office,” I said, searching my pockets, and at last finding the address given me. “Perhaps he’ll help me to find a situation.”

“Ah, p’r’aps so. They do have boys in printing-offices. Now, if you were a bit bigger you might have joined the police, and got to be a sergeant some day. It’s a bad job, but it can’t be helped. You must grow.”

“I am growing fast, sir,” I replied.

“Ah, I s’pose so. Well, now lookye here. You go and see Mr Rowle, and hear what he says, and then come back to me.”

“Come back here?” I said, hesitating.

“Unless you’ve got somewhere better to go, my lad. There, don’t you mind coming. You’re an old friend o’ my Mary, and so you’re an old friend o’ mine. So, for a week, or a fortnight, or a month, if you like to bunk down along o’ me till you can get settled, why, you’re welcome; and if a man can say a better word than that, why, tell him how.”

“I—I should be very, very grateful if you would give me a night or two’s lodging, sir,” I said, “and—and I’ve got six shillings yet.”

“Then don’t you spend more than you can help, youngster. Do you know what’s the cheapest dinner you can get?”

“No, sir—no, I mean.”

“Penny loaf and a pen’orth o’ cheese. You come back here and have tea along o’ me. I don’t go on duty till night. There, no shuffling,” he said, grinning. “If you don’t come back I’ll write and tell old Blakeford.”

I could see that he did not mean it, and soon after I left my bundle there, and started off to try if I could find Mr Rowle’s brother at the great printing-office in Short Street, Fetter Lane.

Chapter Fifteen.

“Boys Wanted.”

I went over the address in my own mind to make sure, and also repeated the directions given me by Mr Revitts, so as to make no mistake in going into the City. Then I thought over again Mr Rowle’s remarks about his brother, his name, Jabez, his age, and his being exactly like himself. That would, I thought, make it easy for me to recognise him; and in this spirit I walked on through the busy streets, feeling a good deal confused at being pushed and hustled about so much, while twice I was nearly run over in crossing the roads.

At last, after asking, by Mr Revitts’ advice, my way of different policemen when I was at fault, I found myself soon after two in Short Street, Fetter Lane, facing a pile of buildings from the base of which came the hiss and pant of steam, with the whirr, clang, and roar of machinery; while on the doorpost was a bright zinc plate with the legend “Ruddle and Lister, General Printers;” and above that, written on a card in a large legible hand, and tacked against the woodwork, the words “Boys Wanted.”

This announcement seemed to take away my breath, and I hesitated for a few minutes before I dared approach the place; but I went up at last, and then, seeing a severe-looking man in a glass box reading a newspaper, I shrank back and walked on a little way, forgetting all about Mr Jabez Rowle in my anxiety to try and obtain a situation by whose means I could earn my living.

At last, in a fit of desperation, I went up to the glass case, and the man reading the newspaper let it fall upon his knees and opened a little window.

“Now then, what is it?” he said in a gruff voice.

“If you please, sir, there’s a notice about boys wanted—”

“Down that passage, upstairs, first floor,” said the man gruffly, and banged down the window.

I was a little taken aback, but I pushed a swing-door, and went with a beating heart along the passage, on one side of which were rooms fitted up something like Mr Blakeford’s office, and on the other side a great open floor stacked with reams of paper, and with laths all over the ceiling, upon which boys with curious pieces of wood, something like long wooden crutches, were hanging up sheets of paper to dry, while at broad tables by the windows I could see women busily folding more sheets of paper, as if making books.

It was but a casual glance I had as I passed on, and then went by a room with the door half open and the floor carpeted inside. There was a pleasant, musical voice speaking, and then there was a burst of laughter, all of which seemed out of keeping in that dingy place, full of the throb of machinery, and the odour of oil and steam.

At the end of the passage was the staircase, and going up, I was nearly knocked over by a tall, fat-headed boy, who blundered roughly against me, and then turned round to cry indignantly—

“Now, stoopid, where are yer a-coming to?”

“Can you tell me, please, where I am to ask about boys being wanted?” I said mildly.

“Oh, find out! There ain’t no boys wanted here.”

“Not wanted here!” I faltered, with my hopes terribly dashed, for I had been building castles high in the air.

“No; be off!” he said roughly, when a new character appeared on the scene in the shape of a business-looking man in a white apron, carrying down an iron frame, and having one hand at liberty, he made use of it to give the big lad a cuff on the ear.

“You make haste and fetch up those galleys, Jem Smith;” and the boy went on down three stairs at a time. “What do you want, my man?” he continued, turning to me.

“I saw there were boys wanted, sir, and I was going upstairs.”

“When that young scoundrel told you a lie. There, go on, and in at that swing-door; the overseer’s office is at the end.”

I thanked him, and went on, pausing before a door blackened by dirty hands, and listened for a moment before going in.

The hum of machinery sounded distant here, and all within seemed very still, save a faint clicking noise, till suddenly I heard a loud clap-clapping, as if a flat piece of wood were being banged down and then struck with a mallet; and directly after came a hammering, as if some one was driving a wooden peg.

There were footsteps below, and I dared not hesitate longer; so, pushing the door, it yielded, and I found myself in a great room, where some forty men in aprons and shirt-sleeves were busy at what at the first glance seemed to be desks full of little compartments, from which they were picking something as they stood, but I was too much confused to notice more than that they took not the slightest notice of me, as I stopped short, wondering where the overseer’s room would be.

At one corner I could see an old man at a desk, with a boy standing beside him, both of them shut up in a glass case, as if they were curiosities; in another corner there was a second glass case, in which a fierce-looking man with a shiny bald head and glittering spectacles was gesticulating angrily to one of the men in white aprons, and pointing to a long, narrow slip of paper.

I waited for a moment, and then turned to the man nearest to me.

“Can you tell me, please, which is the overseer’s office?” I said, cap in hand.

“Folio forty-seven—who’s got folio forty-seven?” he said aloud.

“Here!” cried a voice close by.

“Make even.—Get out; don’t bother me.”

I shrank away, confused and perplexed, and a dark, curly-haired man on the other side turned upon me a pair of deeply set stern eyes, as he rattled some little square pieces of lead into something he held in his hand.

“What is it, boy?” he said in a deep, low voice.

“Can you direct me to the overseer’s office, sir?”

“That’s it, boy, where that gentleman in spectacles is talking.”

“Wigging old Morgan,” said another man, laughing.

“Ah!” said the first speaker, “that’s the place, boy;” and he turned his eyes upon a slip of paper in front of his desk.

I said, “Thank you!” and went on along the passage between two rows of the frame desks to where the fierce-looking bald man was still gesticulating, and as I drew near I could hear what he said.

“I’ve spoken till I’m tired of speaking; your slips are as foul as a ditch. Confound you, sir, you’re a perfect disgrace to the whole chapel. Do you think your employers keep readers to do nothing else but correct your confounded mistakes? Read your stick, sir—read your stick!”

“Very sorry,” grumbled the man, “but it was two o’clock this morning, and I was tired as a dog.”

“Don’t talk to me, sir; I don’t care if it was two o’clock, or twelve o’clock, or twenty-four o’clock. I say that slip’s a disgrace to you; and for two pins, sir—for two pins I’d have it framed and stuck up for the men to see. Be off and correct it.—Now, then, what do you want?”

This was to me, and I was terribly awe-stricken at the fierce aspect of the speaker, whose forehead was now of a lively pink.

“If you please, sir, I saw that you wanted boys, and—”

“No; I don’t want boys,” he raved. “I’m sick of the young monkeys; but I’m obliged to have them.”

“I am sorry, sir—” I faltered.

“Oh yes; of course. Here, stop! where are you going?”

“Please, sir, you said you didn’t want any boys.”

“You’re very sharp, ain’t you? Now hold your tongue, and then answer what I ask and no more. What are you—a machine boy or reader?”

“If you please, sir, I—I don’t know—I thought—I want—”

“Confound you; hold your tongue!” he roared. “Where did you work last?”

“At—at Mr Blakeford’s,” I faltered, feeling bound to speak the truth.

“Blakeford’s! Blakeford’s!—I know no Blakeford’s. At machine?”

“No, sir! I wrote all day.”

“Wrote? What, wasn’t it a printing-office?”

“No, sir.”

“How dare you come wasting my time like this, you insolent young scoundrel! Be off! Get out with you! I never knew such insolence in my life.”

I shrank away, trembling, and began to retreat down the avenue, this time with the men’s faces towards me, ready to gaze in my red and guilty countenance, for I felt as if I had been guilty of some insult to the majesty of the printing-office. To my great relief, though, the men were too busy to notice me; but I heard one say to another, “Old Brimstone’s hot this morning.” Then I passed on, and saw the dark man looking at me silently from beneath his overhanging brows; and the next moment, heartsick and choking with the effects of this rebuff, the swing-door was thrown open by the fat-headed boy coming in, and as I passed out, unaccustomed to its spring, the boy contrived that it would strike me full in the back, just as if the overseer had given me a rude push to drive me away.

I descended the stairs with the spirit for the moment crushed out of me; and with my eyes dim with disappointment, I was passing along the passage, when, as I came to the open door of the carpeted room, a man’s voice exclaimed—

“No, no, Miss Carr, you really shall not. We’ll send it on by one of the boys.”

“Oh, nonsense, Mr Lister; I can carry it.”

“Yes, yes; of course you can, but I shall not let you. Here, boy, come here.”

I entered the room nervously, to find myself in presence of a handsome, well-dressed man, another who was stout and elderly, and two young ladies, while upon the table lay a parcel of books, probably the subject of the remark.

“Hallo! what boy are you?” said the younger man. “Oh! one of the new ones, I suppose.”

“No, sir,” I said, with voice trembling and my face working, for I was unnerved by the treatment I had just received and the dashing of my hopes; “I came to be engaged, but—but the gentleman upstairs turned me away.”

“Why?” said the elder man sharply.

“Because I had not been in the printing-office, sir.”

“Oh, of course!” he said, nodding. “Of course. We want lads accustomed to the trade, my man.”

“You should teach him the trade, Mr Ruddle,” said one of the young ladies quickly, and I darted a look of gratitude at her.

“Too busy, Miss Carr,” he said, smiling at her. “We don’t keep a printer’s school.”

“I’ll teach him,” whispered the young man eagerly, though I heard him; “I’ll teach him anything, if you’ll promise not to be so cruel.”

“What a bargain!” she replied, laughing; and she turned away.

“I don’t think we need keep you, my lad,” said the young man bitterly.

“Indeed!” said the other young lady; “why, I thought he was to carry our parcel of books?”

“But he is a strange boy, my dear young ladies,” said the elder man; “I’ll ring for one from the office.”

“No; don’t, pray!” said the lady addressed as Miss Carr quickly. “I don’t think we will carry the parcel. You will carry it for us, will you not?”

“Oh, yes, indeed I will!” I cried eagerly; and I stepped forward, for there was something very winning in the speakers voice.

“Stop a moment, my man,” said the elder gentleman rather sternly, while the younger stood biting his lips; “where do your father and mother live?”

Those words made something rise in my throat, and I looked wildly at him, but could not speak.

He did not see my face, for he had taken up a pen and drawn a memorandum slip towards him.

“Well; why don’t you speak?” he said sharply, and as he raised his eyes I tried, but could not get out a word, only pointed mutely to the shabby band of crape upon my cap.

“Ah!”

There was a deep sigh close by me, and I saw that the young lady addressed as Miss Carr was deadly pale, and for the first time I noticed that she was in deep mourning.

“My dear Miss Carr!” whispered the young man earnestly.

“Don’t speak to me for a minute,” she said in the same tone; and then I saw her face working and lip quivering as she gazed wistfully at me.

“Poor lad!” said the elder man abruptly. Then, “Your friends, my boy, your relatives?”

“I have none, sir,” I said huskily, “only an uncle, and I don’t know for certain where he lives.”

“But you don’t mean that you are alone in the world?” said the young man quickly, and he glanced at the lady as he spoke.

“Yes, sir,” I said quietly, for I had now recovered myself, “I am quite alone, and I want to get a situation to earn my living.”

The elder gentleman turned upon me and seemed to look me through and through.

“Now, look here, young fellow,” he said, “you are either a very unfortunate boy or a designing young impostor.”

“Mr Ruddle!” exclaimed Miss Carr indignantly; and I saw the young man’s eyes glitter as he gazed at her sweet, sad face, twenty times more attractive now than when she was speaking lightly a minute before.

“I don’t want to be harsh, my dear, but here we are obliged to be firm and business-like. Now, boy, answer me; have you been to a good school?”

“No, sir,” I said, speaking sharply now, for his use of the word “impostor” stung me; “I was educated at home.”

“Humph! where do you come from?”

“Rowford, sir.”

“Town on a tall hill?”

“No, sir,” I said in surprise; “Rowford is quite in a hole; but we lived four miles from Rowford, sir, on the Cawleigh road.”

“Then you know Leydon Wood.”

“Oh yes, sir! that’s where papa used to take me to collect specimens.”

“Humph! Don’t say papa, my boy. Boys who go into the world to get their living don’t speak of their papas. John Lister!”

“Wait a minute, Ruddle,” said the younger man, whose back was towards us; and I saw that he was leaning over Miss Carr and holding her hand. “If you wish it,” he whispered softly, “it shall be done.”

“I do wish it,” she said with an earnest look in her large eyes as she gazed kindly at me; and the young man turned round, flushed and excited.

I was shrinking away towards the door, pained and troubled, for I felt that I had no business there, when Mr Lister motioned me to stop, and said something to the elder gentleman.

He in turn screwed up his face, and gave the younger a comical look.

“Your father would not have done so, John Lister,” he said. “What am I to say, Miss Carr?”

For answer the young lady rose and went and laid her hands in one of his.

“If you please, Mr Ruddle,” she said in a low musical voice, “it will be a kindly act.”

“God bless you, my dear,” he said tenderly. “I believe if I were with you long you’d make me as much your slave as you have John Lister.”

“Then you will?”

“Yes, my dear, yes, if it is really as he says.”

She darted an intelligent look at me, and then hastily pulled down her crape veil as Mr Lister followed her to her chair.

“Come here, my lad,” said Mr Ruddle, in quiet business-like tones. “We want boys here, but boys used to the printing trade, for it does not answer our purpose to teach them; we have no time. But as you seem a sharp, respectable boy, and pretty well educated, you might, perhaps, be willing to try.”

“Oh, if you’ll try me, I’ll strive so hard to learn, sir!” I cried excitedly.

“I hope you will, my boy,” he said drily, “but don’t profess too much; and mind this, you are not coming here as a young gentleman, but as a reading-boy—to work.”

“Yes, sir. I want to work,” I said earnestly.

“That’s well. Now, look here. I want to know a little more about you. If, as you say, you came from near Rowford, you can tell me the names of some of the principal people there?”

“Yes, sir; there’s Doctor Heston, and the Reverend James Wyatt, and Mr Elton.”

“Exactly,” he said gruffly; and he opened a large book and turned over a number of pages. “Humph! here it is,” he said to himself, and he seemed to check off the names. “Now, look here, my man. What is the name of the principal solicitor at Rowford?”

“Mr Blakeford, sir,” I said with a shiver, lest he should want to write to him about me.

“Oh, you know him?” he said sharply.

“Yes, sir. He managed papa’s—my father’s—affairs,” I said, correcting myself.

“Then I’m sorry for your poor father’s affairs,” he said, tightening his lips. “That will do, my lad. You can come to work here. Be honest and industrious, and you’ll get on. Never mind about having been a gentleman, but learn to be a true man. Go and wait outside.”

I tried to speak. I wanted to catch his hands in mine. I wanted to fling my arms round Miss Carr, and kiss and bless her for her goodness. I was so weak and sentimental a boy then. But I had to fight it all down, and satisfy myself by casting a grateful glance at her as I went out to wait.

I was no listener, but I heard every word that passed as the ladies rose to go.

“Are you satisfied, my dear?” said Mr Ruddle.

“God bless you?” she said; and I saw her raise her veil and kiss him.

“God bless you, my dear!” he said softly. “So this little affair has regularly settled it all, eh? And you are to be John’s wife. Well, well, well, my dear, I’m glad of it, very glad of it. John, my boy, I would my old partner were alive to see your choice; and as for you, my child, you’ve won a good man, and I hope your sister will be as fortunate.”

“I hope I shall, Mr Ruddle,” said the other lady softly.

“If I were not sixty, and you nineteen, my dear, I’d propose for you myself,” he went on laughingly. “But come, come, I can’t have you giddy girls coming to our works to settle your affairs. There, be off with you, and you dine with us on Tuesday next. The old lady says you are to come early. I’m afraid John Lister here won’t be able to leave the office till twelve o’clock; but we can do without him, eh?”

“Don’t you mind what he says, Miriam,” said Mr Lister. “But stop, here’s the parcel. I’ll send it on.”

“No, no. Please let that youth carry it for us,” said Miss Carr.

“Anything you wish,” he whispered earnestly; and the next moment he was at the door.

“You’ll carry this parcel for these ladies,” he said; “and to-morrow morning be here at ten o’clock, and we’ll find you something to do.”

“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir,” I said eagerly; and taking the parcel, I followed the ladies into Holborn, and then along Oxford Street to a substantial row of houses near Cavendish Square, where the one I looked upon as my friend paused at a large door and held out her hand to me.

“I shall hope to hear from Mr Lister that you have got on well at the office,” she said in her sweet musical voice. “Recollect that you are my protégé, and I hope you will do me credit. I shall not forget to ask about you. You will try, will you not?”

“Oh yes,” I said hoarsely, “so hard—so very hard!”

“I believe you will,” she said, taking the parcel from my hand; “and now good-bye.”

The next moment I was standing alone upon the pavement, feeling as if a cloudiness had come over the day, while, as I looked down into my hand, it was to see there a bright new sovereign.

Chapter Sixteen.

Plans for the Future.

I went straight back to Mr Revitts, and only when nearly there did I remember that I had not thought to ask about Mr Rowle. But I felt it did not matter now, for I had obtained a situation, and he could not be annoyed to find that I was coming to the same establishment.

Mr Revitts was enjoying himself when I reached his room; that is to say, he was sitting in his dingy old red-flannel shirt and his blue uniform trousers, with his sleeves rolled well up above the elbow, reading the police news in a daily paper and smoking a short black pipe, with the wreaths of smoke floating out of the open window.

“Here you are then, my lad,” he said, “just in time. You and I will go out and have a bit o’ something at the cookshop. Did you find your friend?”

“No, sir—no Mr Revitts,” I said, correcting myself, “I forgot to ask for him.”

He let his paper fall in his lap and stared hard at me.

“Now, look here, my lad,” he said, expelling a large cloud of smoke, “I don’t want you to commit yourself, and it’s my dooty to tell you that whatever you say will be—No, no, nonsense. Come, speak out. What are you laughing at? What have you been doing?”

Hereupon I told him my adventure, my eyes sparkling with delight.

“And a whole sovereign into the bargain!” he cried as I finished. “Let’s look at it.”

I handed him the bright new golden coin, and he span it up in the air, caught it dexterously, and bit it. Then he tried it three or four times on the table, as a shopman would a piece of money on a counter, and ended by making believe to thrust it into his pocket.

“It’s a good one,” he said, “and I think I shall stick to it for your board and lodging last night and this morning. What do you say?”

“I think you ought to be paid, sir,” I said eagerly, “for you were very good to me.”

He stared hard at me for a few moments, and then thrust the sovereign back in my hand.

“I’ve seen a good many boys in my time,” he said, “but I’m blessed if ever I run again one like you. Why, you’ve got plenty of pluck, or else you wouldn’t have run away; but of all the simple—well, I won’t say simple, but green—of the green chaps I ever did come across you are about the greenest.”

I flushed up far from that tint at his words, for there was the old complaint again about my greenness.

“Please, Mr Revitts, I’m very sorry I’m so green,” I said, looking at him wistfully; “perhaps it’s because I’ve always lived in the country.”

He stared harder at me.

“Come here,” he said sharply, and going to the window, he placed me between his knees, laid a great hand upon each of my shoulders grasping them firmly, and gazed straight into my eyes. “Look here, youngster,” he said angrily, “is it R or F? Are you trying to humbug me? Because, if so, it won’t do: I’m too old.”

“Humbug you, sir?” I said wonderingly. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“That you don’t,” he said, dropping his fierce way and sinking back smiling. “’Struth, what a boy you are!”

I gazed at him in a troubled way, for I felt hurt.

“I’m very sorry, Mr Revitts,” I said, “and I hope you don’t think I would do anything to deceive you,” for that “R or F” puzzled me.

“Deceive me? Not you, my boy. Why, you couldn’t deceive a sparrer or a hoyster. Why, you’re as transparent as a pane of glass. I can see right through you and out on the other side.”

“I’m afraid I am very stupid, sir,” I said sadly. “I’ll try to learn to be more clever. I don’t know much, only about books, and natural history, and botany, but I’ll try very hard not—not to be so—so—green.”

“Why, bless your young heart, where have you been all your life? You’re either as cunning as—No, you ain’t, you really are as innocent as a lamb.”

“I’ve always been at home with papa and mamma, sir.”

“Sir, be hanged! My name’s William Revitts; and if you and me’s going to be good friends, my boy, you’ll drop that sir-ing and mistering, and call me plain Bill.”

“Should you like it, sir, if I did?” I asked anxiously.

“No, sir, I shouldn’t. Yes, I should. Now then, is it to be friends or enemies?”

“Oh, friends, please,” I said, holding out my hand.

“Then there’s mine, young Antony,” he cried seizing it in his great, fingers. “And mind, I’m Bill, or old Bill, whichever you like.”

“I’m sure—Bill, I should be glad to be the best of friends,” I said, “for I have none.”

“Oh, come now, you said that Polly was very good to you.”

“What, Mary? Oh yes!”

“Well, then, that’s one. But, I say, you know you mustn’t be so precious innocent.”

“Mustn’t I, sir?”

“What!” he cried, bringing his hand down crash on the table.

“Mustn’t I, Bill?”

“That’s better. No: that you mustn’t. I seem to look upon you as quite an old friend since you lived so long with my Polly. But, I say, your education has been horribly neglected. You’re quite a baby to the boys up here at your age.”

“But papa was so anxious that I should learn everything,” I said, as I thought of Mr Ruddle’s words, “and we had lessons every day.”

“Hah! Yes; but you can’t learn everything out o’ books,” he continued, looking at me curiously. “You never went away to school, then?”

“No. I was going in a month or two.”

“Hah! and it was put off. Well, we can’t help it now, only you mustn’t be so jolly easy-going. Everybody here will glory in taking you in.”

“Do you mean cheating me?”

“That’s just what I do mean. Why, some chaps would have nailed that sov like a shot, and you’d never have seen it again. You see, I’m in the police, and we couldn’t stoop to such a thing, but I know lots o’ men as would say as a sov was no use to a boy like you, and think as they ought to take care of it for you.”

“Well, wouldn’t that be right, Mr Revitts?” I said.

“No, it wouldn’t, young greenhorn,” he cried sharply, “because they’d take care of it their way.”

“Greenhorn?” I said eagerly. “Oh, that’s what you mean by my being green! You mean ignorant and unripe in the world’s ways.”

“That’s just what I do mean,” he cried, slapping me on the shoulder. “Brayvo! that’s the result of my first lesson,” he continued admiringly. “Why, I’m blessed if I don’t think that if I had you here six months, and took pains, I could make a man of you.”

“Oh, I wish you would,” I cried excitedly. “I do so want to be a true, good man—one such as papa used to speak of—one who could carve his way to a noble and honourable career, and grow to be loved and venerated and held in high esteem by the world at large. Oh, I would try so hard—I’d work night and day, and feel at last, that I had not tried in vain.”

“He-ar! he-ar! Brayvo, brayvo, youngster! Well done our side! That’s your style!” he cried, clapping his hands and stamping his feet as I stopped short, flushed and excited with the ideas that had come thronging to my brain, and then gazed at him in a shamefaced and bashful manner. “That’s your sort, my boy, I like that. I say, did your father teach you that sorter thing.”

“Yes. Mr Rev.—Yes, Bill.”

“I say, your par, as you called him, wasn’t a fool.”

“My papa,” I said proudly, “I mean my dear father, was the best and kindest of men.”

“That I’ll lay sixpence he was. Why, I was feeling quite out of heart about you, and thinking you such a hinnocent young goose that I shouldn’t know how to help you. Why, lookye here, I’ve been kicking about in the world ever since I was ten, and been in the police six years, and I couldn’t make a speech like that.”

“Couldn’t you, sir—Mr—I mean Bill?”

“No, that I couldn’t. Why, I tell you what. You and I’ll stick together and I don’t know what we mightn’t make of you at last—p’r’aps Lord Mayor o’ London. Or, look here, after a few years we might get you in the police.”

“In the police?” I faltered.

“To be sure, and you being such a scholard and writing such a hand—I know it, you know. Lookye here,” he continued, pulling out a pocket-book, from one of the wallets in which he drew a note I had written for Mary, “I say, you writing such a hand, and being well up in your spelling, you’d rise like a air balloon, and get to be sergeant, and inspector, and perhaps superintendent, and wear a sword! You mark my words, youngster; you’ve got a future before you.”

“Do you think so?”

“I just do. I like you, young Antony, hang me if I don’t; and if you stick to me I’ll teach you all I know.”

“Will you?” I said eagerly.

“Well, all I can. Just hand me that paper o’ tobacco. Thankye. I’ll have just one more pipe, and then we’ll go to dinner.”

He filled and lit his pipe, and went on talking.

“First and foremost, don’t you get trying to smoke.”

“No, I will not,” I said.

“That’s right. It’s all very well for men, a little of it; but I don’t like to see boys at it, as too many tries just now. I often sees ’em on my beat, and I never feel so jolly happy as when I come across one looking white after it about the gills, and so sick he can’t hold his head straight up. But, as I was a-saying, you stick to me and I’ll teach you all I can, and I know two or three things,” he continued, closing one eye and opening it again.

“You must, sir.”

“Yes; there’s some clever chaps I have to deal with sometimes—roughs and thieves and the like; but they have to get up very early in the morning to take me in.”

“Do they, sir—Bill?” I said wonderingly.

“There, now you’re getting innocent again,” he said sharply. “You don’t mean to tell me as you don’t understand that?”

“Oh yes, I do: you mean that they would have to get up very early to master you—say at daybreak.”

“What a young innocent you are,” he cried, laughing; and then seeing my pained look, he slapped me on the shoulder again. “It’s all right, my boy. You can’t help it; and you’ll soon learn all these things. I know a lot, but so do you—a sight o’ things I don’t. Why, I’ll be bound to say you could write a long letter without making a single mistake in the spelling.”

“Yes, I think I could,” I said innocently. “Both papa and mamma took great pains with me over that.”

“Look at that, now!” he said. “Why, I couldn’t write two lines in my pocket-book without putting down something as the sergeant would chaff.”

“Chaff?” I said, “cut-up stuff for horses?”

“Yes: that’s it,” he said, grinning. “Stuff as they cut up. There, you’ll soon know what chaff is, my lad. But, you know, all the same, and speaking quite fair, I do maintain as spelling ain’t square.”

“Not square?”

“I mean fair and square and above-board. Them as invented spelling couldn’t have been very clever, or they’d have made everything spelt as it sounded. Why, it only seems natural to spell doctor’s stuff f-i-z-z-i-k, and here you have to stick in p’s, and h’s, and y’s, and s’s, and c’s, as ain’t wanted at all.”

“It is puzzling, certainly,” I said.

“Puzzling? Puzzling ain’t nothing to it. I can write a fair round hand, and spell fast enough my way. Our sergeant says there isn’t a man on our station as can write such a nice looking report; but when it comes to the spelling—there, I won’t tell you what he said about that!”

“But you could soon improve your spelling.”

“Think so?” he said eagerly. “Oh no, I don’t fancy we could.”

“I am sure you could,” I said. “The best way is to do dictation.”

“Dictation? What, ordering about?”

“Oh no; not that sort of dictation. I mean for me to read to you from a book and you write it down, and then I mark all the misspelt words, and you write them down and learn them.”

“Look at that now!” he exclaimed. “To be sure, that’s the way. Now, you know, I bought a spelling-book, that didn’t seem to do no good; so I bought a pocket dictionary, and that was such a job to go through, so full of breakneck words as no one never heard of before, that I give that up. Why, you ain’t innocent after all. Would you mind trying me?”

“Mind! no,” I cried; “we could use either a slate or paper.”

“So we could, and do it with either a pencil or a pen. I say, come: fair and square, I’ll teach you all I know if you’ll teach me all you know.”

“That’s agreed,” I said.

“Done for you,” he cried, shaking hands. “And now my pipe’s out, and we’ll go and have dinner. Wait till I roll down my sleeves and get on my stock. Why, you and I will be as jolly as can be here. It’s rather a long way to go to your work, but you must get up a bit earlier. Two miles night and morning won’t kill you; and I’ve been thinking what we’ll do. You’ve got your sovereign. We’ll go to a place I know, and buy one o’ them little iron fold-up bedsteads and a mattress and pillow and blanket, and stand it there. It’s breaking into your sov, but then you’ll have the bit o’ furniture, which will be your property, so the money won’t be wasted. What do you say?”

I was delighted, and said so.

“Well, then, lookye here,” he continued, as he took great pains with his hair and whiskers before the glass, and then put on and buttoned up his uniform coat, to stand before me a frank, manly fellow of about thirty, “you’re my company this week, and after that you shall put so much of your salary into the stock to pay for living, and we shall both be free and independent, and what’s left you can shove in the bank.”

“In the bank?”

“Yes, savings-bank. I don’t mind telling you as an old friend I’ve got forty-four pun ten there.”

“Mary has thirty-seven pounds in a savings-bank,” I said.

“Now there’s for you!” he said.

“Yes, she told me so; but perhaps I oughtn’t to have told you.”

“Well,” he said seriously, “I s’pose you oughtn’t, because it was told you in confidence, but I’m glad you did. She never told me.”

“Did you ever tell her how much you had saved?”

“No, that I didn’t, only as I was saving, so it’s all fair. Look here, youngster—I mean Antony,” he said, after standing staring in the glass for a few minutes, “I tell you what it is, you coming up has about brought matters to a head.”

“Has it, Bill?”

“Yes, it hayve, my boy. Do you know, I don’t for the life of me know why we two have been waiting; do you?”

“No,” I said shaking my head.

“No, nor more don’t Mary, I’ll bet a sixpence. We got engaged to one another, and then we said as it wouldn’t be sensible, to get married at once, as we might both see some one we liked better, don’t you see?”

“Yes,” I said, feeling puzzled all the same, “it was very prudent.”

“I could have got married lots o’ times since, but I’ve never seen a girl as I liked so well, and I s’pose Mary hasn’t seen a chap, for she keeps on writing.”

“Oh yes; and she thinks a deal of you. She’s very proud of you.”

“Is she, though?” he said, with a satisfied smile, and giving his head a shake in his stock. “Well, then, I tell you what: I’ll write and ask Mary to say the day, and then meet her at the station. We’ll take a little bigger place, and she’ll come up and make us both comfortable. What do you say to that?”

I clapped my hands, and he stood smiling in an exceedingly simple way, and looking like a very big overgrown boy, for a few moments, before turning himself round to me.

“See that,” he said, in a quiet business-like way. “I was laughing at you for being soft and green just now, and I’m blessed if I don’t feel as if I was ten times worse. Come along, company, it’s ever so late, and my report says hot mutton chop, a cup of tea, and some bread and butter.”

That evening, after a hearty meal, for which Revitts insisted upon paying, there was just time to make the purchases he proposed, which almost melted the whole of my sovereign, and then it was time for him to go on duty.

“They’ve cost a deal,” he said thoughtfully, “but then you’ve still got the money, only in another shape. Now, you get back home and take in the things when they come, and then sit and read a bit, and afterwards go to bed. I wouldn’t go out, if I was you.”

We parted, and I followed out his directions, being shrewd enough to see that he thought me hardly fit to be trusted alone.

The next morning I woke to find it was half-past six, and that Revitts had come home and was preparing for bed. He looked tired out, and was very black and dirty, having been, he said, at a fire; but he was not too much fatigued to give me a friendly bit or two of advice as to getting my breakfast and going down to the office.

“Have a good breakfast before you start, my boy, and get some bread and cheese for your lunch—that’s twopence. When you come back you’ll find the tea-things out, and you can make dinner and tea too.”

In good time I started, leaving Revitts sleeping off his night’s fatigue, and about ten minutes to ten I was at the door of the great printing-office, flushed with exercise and dread, but eager all the same to make a beginning.

I hesitated as to whether I should go in at once or wait till it struck ten, but I thought that perhaps I might be some time before I saw Mr Ruddle, so I walked straight in, and the man reading the paper in his gloss case looked up at me in a very ill-used way as I stopped at his window.

“You again?” he said gruffly. “Well, what is it?”

“If you please, I’ve come to work,” I said.

“Work? Why, it’s ten o’clock. Why weren’t you here at eight?”

“Mr Ruddle said ten o’clock, sir, and I want to see him.”

“Oh!” he said gruffly, as if he were the gatekeeper of an earthly paradise. “Well, I s’pose you must pass in. Go on.”

I went on into the passage, feeling as if the doorkeeper was the most important personage there, and as if the proprietors must make a practice of asking permission to go into their own place.

I went, then, nervously down the passage till I came to the door of the room where I had seen Messrs Ruddle and Lister. It was ajar, and there were loud voices talking, and though I knocked they went on.

“Stern firmness is one thing, Grimstone,” I heard Mr Ruddle saying, “and bullying another.”

“But you don’t consider, sir, that I bully the men, do you?” said another voice which was quite familiar to me.

“You may call it what you like, Grimstone. There, I’m busy now.”

There was a sharp step, and the door was flung wide open and closed, when my friend the overseer, who had been so rough to me on the previous day, came out and pretty nearly knocked me down.

Chapter Seventeen.

My First Literary Efforts. I Make Another Friend.

The overseer and I stood in the dim light gazing at one another for a few moments, during which I seemed to read in his sharp, harsh face an air of resentment at my presence.

“Hallo!” he said, in an angry voice, and evidently rejoicing at having encountered some one upon whom he could vent a little of the anger seething within him. “What, are you here again, you young vagabond? Didn’t I tell you yesterday to go about your business? Be off with you, or I’ll send for a policeman. How dare you! What do you mean?”

“But please, sir,” I remonstrated.

“Will you be off?” he roared; and I felt that I was about to be driven from the place, when the proprietor’s door was sharply opened and Mr Lister appeared.

“Confound it all, Grimstone,” he cried, “what’s the matter now? Look here, sir; I will not have this bullying and noise in the place.”

“Your father never spoke to me like that, Mr John, when he was alive.”

“My father put up with a great deal from you, Grimstone, because you were an old and faithful servant of the firm; but that is no reason why I, his son, should submit to what is sometimes bordering on insolence.”

“Insolence, Mr John?”

“Yes, Grimstone, insolence.”

“What is the matter?” said Mr Ruddle, coming out.

“Mr John says I’m insolent, Mr Ruddle,” said the overseer angrily; “was I ever insolent to you, sir, or his father?”

“Well, if you want the truth, Grimstone, you often were very insolent, only we put up with it for old acquaintance’ sake. But what’s the matter now?”

“I was just speaking to this young vagabond, who persists in hanging about the place, sir, when Mr John came out and attacked me, sir.”

“Don’t call names, Grimstone,” said Mr Lister hotly. “This young vagabond, as you call him, is a fresh boy whom Mr Ruddle has taken on, and whom I desire you to treat kindly.”

“Why didn’t he speak, then,” said the overseer angrily; “how was I to know that he was engaged? In Mr Lister senior’s time the engaging of boys for the office was left to the overseer.”

He stalked off, evidently in high dudgeon, leaving the masters gazing at one another.

“He grows insufferable,” said Mr Lister angrily. “One would think the place belonged to him.”

“Yes, he is rough,” said Mr Ruddle; “but he’s a good overseer, John, and a faithful old servant. He was with us when we first began. Well, my boy, you’ve come then; now go upstairs to the composing-room, and ask Mr Grimstone to give you a job; he’ll be a bit cross, I dare say, but you must not mind that.”

“No; sir; I’ll try not.”

“That’s right,” he said, giving me a friendly nod, and I hurried upstairs and walked right through the composing-room to Mr Grimstone’s glass case.

He saw me coming, but, though I tapped softly at the door several times, he refused to take any notice of me for some minutes, during which I had to stand uncomfortably aware of the fact that I had given terrible offence to this man in authority, by allowing myself to be engaged downstairs after he had bade me go.

He was busy, pen in hand, looking over some long, narrow pieces of paper, and kept on turning them over and over, making his spectacles flash as he changed his position, and directing the top of his very shiny bald head at me, till at last he raised it, gave a start, and turned as if astonished at seeing me there; but it was poor pantomime and badly done.

“Well, what is it?” he said.

“If you please, sir, Mr Lister sent me up to ask you to give me a job.”

“Me give you a job,” he said, in a menacing tone; “why, I thought you would be hanger-on down below, and not come up into the office, where you’d get your nice white hands dirtied. What job can I give you? What can you do? What do you know? Here, Smith, take this boy, and give him a page of pie to dis.”

The big, fat-headed boy came up from a distant part of the room, scowled at me, and led me to one of the desk-like frames, upon which were four large open trays full of compartments of various sizes.

“Here you are!” he said, “lay holt;” and he thrust a little heavy square paper packet into my hands. “It’s burjoyce,”—so it sounded to me; “look alive, and then come for another.”

He went away, leaving me balancing the heavy packet in my hand. It was about the size and thickness of a small book, but what next to do with it, or how I was to do it, I, did not know.

Of course I know now that it was the petty, contemptible revenge of a little-minded man to set me, a totally uninstructed novice, to do that which an old practised compositor will shelve if he can, as an uncongenial task. To “dis a page of burjoyce pie” was, in fact, to distribute—that is, place in its proper compartments, or in the case—every large and small letter, space and point, of a quantity of bourgeois, or ordinary newspaper type, that had been accidentally mixed, or “pied” as it is technically termed. The distribution of an ordinary page or column of type is comparatively easy, for the skilled workman reads it off word by word, and drops the letters dexterously in the compartment assigned; but in “pie” the letters and spaces are all jumbled, and the task is troublesome and slow.

There was I, then, with about as easy a task as if I had been suddenly handed the various parts of a watch, and told to put them together; and I felt helpless and ashamed, not daring to interrupt any of the busy men intent upon their work at the various frames.

An hour must have elapsed before I felt that I dare venture to go towards Mr Grimstone’s glass case, and I was about desperately to tell him that I was ignorant and helpless, and quite unfit to do what he had set me, when the dark, stern-eyed man I had seen on the previous day came round by where I stood.

He gazed at me curiously, and gave me a nod, and was passing on, when I desperately exclaimed:

“If you please, sir—”

“Eh? What, is it, my boy?” he said.

“I was told, sir, to dis this pie,” I said, fearful that I was making some absurd blunder about the word pie.

“Well, why don’t you do it? Get the sponge off the stone and give it a good soaking in a galley.”

“I’m very sorry, sir,” I said, encouraged by his quiet, kind way, “but I don’t know how.”

“Haven’t you been in a printing-office before?”

“No, sir.”

“And never distributed type?”

“No, sir.”

“How absurd! Who set you to do it?”

“Mr Grimstone, sir.”

“But does he know that you have never handled type?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Ass?” he muttered. “Here, come along with me, my man. No; better not, perhaps. Leave that packet alone, my boy. There, lay it down. Stand here and try and learn the case.”

“Learn the case, sir?” I said, with my heart sinking within me at being given another impossible task.

“Yes, it’s very easy; only wants time,” he said kindly; “Here, pick up one of these pieces of type,” he continued, dexterously taking up a little thin bit of black metal, “like this, and turn it in your fingers, and see what letter is stamped on the end, and then put it back in the same compartment of the case.”

“Is that tray the case, sir?”

“Yes, quite right, go on. You can come and ask me anything you don’t know.”

I darted a grateful look at him, and eagerly began my task, though in fear and trembling, lest Mr Grimstone should come and find fault because I had not “dis’d the pie.”

Few people, I think, realise the sufferings of a sensitive boy at school, or at his first launching into life, when set to some task beyond his perception or powers. The dread of being considered stupid; the fear of the task-masters, the strangeness, the uncongenial surroundings, all combine to make up a state of mental torture that produces illness; and yet it is often ridiculed, and the sufferer treated with cruelty for non-performance of that which, simple to the initiated, is to him in his ignorance an utter impossibility.

It was with a sense of relief I cannot describe that I began to lift the metal types one by one, looked at them, and put them back; and I was not long in finding out that, while the capital letters in the upper of the two trays before me ran nearly regularly A, B, C, D, and so on, and beneath them the figures 1, 2, 3, 4, etc, the lower case was a perfect puzzle.

The compartments were not like those above, all small squares, and the same size, but some were very large, and some very small; some were long, and some were square; but I found that they were made upon a regular plan. For instance, there was one very large compartment nearly in the middle at the top of the lower tray, that was evidently six times as big as the small compartments; while below and beside it were many more that were four times as big as the small ones; others being only twice as big.

I naturally examined the large compartment first, and found it full of little thin slips of metal nearly an inch long, at the end of each of which, and beautifully formed, was the letter e. There was no doubt about it, and it was evident that there were more e’s than anything else. Then under it I found the compartment full of h’s, and away to the left, n’s and m’s; t’s, d’s, u’s, o’s, a’s, and r’s were in other large compartments, and it gradually dawned upon my mind that these letters were placed where they would be handiest for use, and that there was the largest number of those that would be most frequently required.

My surmise was quite right, and with this idea as the key, I soon found out that little-used x and z were in very small numbers, in the most out-of-the-way parts of the tray, just as were the double letters ae and oe, etc. One compartment close under my hand, and very full, puzzled me the most, for the pieces of metal therein were short, and had no letters on the end; and at last, after trying in vain to understand their meaning, I determined to ask the dark man next time he passed, and went on trying to master my task with the strange clicking noise made by the men going on all round.

I hardly dared glance about, but in the casual glimpses I stole, I began to understand now that the men about me were picking up, letter by letter, the types, to form words, and arranging them in little curiously shaped tools they held in their hands.

I had been busily learning my letters for about half an hour, when the big, fat-headed boy came up to me.

“Now then!” he said, in a bullying tone that was a very good imitation of the overseer’s, “done that page?”

“No!” I said.

“You ain’t?”

“No; I did not know how.”

“Oh, you’ll catch it, just, when Mr Grimstone knows. You ain’t coming here to do just as you like; and I tell you what it is—”

“Well, what is it, boy?” said a quiet, stern voice, and my heart, gave a joyful thump as I saw the dark man come up.

“Please, he ain’t dis’d this here pie.”

“No; he did not know how. I set him to learn the case.”

“But Mr Grimstone said he was to—”

“Jem Smith, do you know you are a fool?” said the dark man quietly.

“I dessay I am, Mr Hallett, but Mr Grimstone said as this boy was to—”

“And if you don’t go about your business I shall box your ears.”

“No, you—”

He did not finish his sentence, for there was something in the deep-set dark eyes which had such an effect upon him that he sneaked off, and I turned to my protector.

“Would you please tell me why these little things have no letters on their ends, sir?” I said.

“Because they are spaces, my boy. Don’t you remember in reading a book there is a little distance between every word?”

“Yes, sir,” I said eagerly; “and after a full stop there’s a bigger space.”

“To be sure!” he said, smiling, and his pale face looked less stern and severe. “Look: these little things, as you call them, but as we call them, thick spaces, go between every word, and these square ones after a full stop. How are you getting on?”

“I know that’s e, sir.”

“Yes; go on.”

“And that’s h, and that o, and u—m—a—r—i—s—o—n—t,” I said, touching the boxes in turn.

“Good, very good,” he said, “and what is that?”

“That, sir?—d.”

“No, it is p. And that?”

“Oh, that is b.”

“No, it is q. Now you know the meaning of mind your p’s and q’s. You must learn the difference, and try to recollect this; all the letters, you see, are reversed, like a seal.”

“Like the motto on papa’s seal. Yes, I see, sir,” I said eagerly.

“That’s right, my boy,” he said looking at me curiously. “Go on, I am too busy to stay.”

“Now! what’s all this?” said Mr Grimstone, bustling up with Jem Smith.

“Please, sir,” said the latter, “I telled him as he was to—”

“I found the boy unable to do what was set him, Mr Grimstone,” said my protector quietly, “and told him to go on with learning his case. The boy has never been in an office before.”

“That was for me to know, Mr Hallett,” cried the overseer, growing red in the face. “What the devil do you mean by—”

“Interfering, Mr Grimstone? I did it because I was sure you were too good a manager to wish time to be wasted in this large office. And—I must ask you, please when you speak to me, to omit these coarse expressions.”

“Of all the insolence—”

“Insolent or not, sir,” said the dark man sternly, “have the goodness to remember that I always treat you with respect, and I expect the same from you. Excuse me, but a quarrel between us will not improve your position with the men.”

Mr Grimstone looked at him furiously; and turning redder in the face than ever, seemed about to burst into a tirade of angry language, but my protector met his look in a way that quelled him, and turning upon the fat-headed boy, who was looking on open-mouthed, the overseer gave him a sounding box on the ear.

“What are you standing gaping there for, you lazy young scoundrel?” he roared; “go and wash those galleys, and do them well.”

Then, striding off, he went into his glass case, while Jem Smith, in a compartment at the end of an avenue of cases, began to brush some long lengths of type, and whenever I glanced at him, he shook his fist, as he showed his inflamed eyes red with crying and his face blackened by contact with his dirty hands.

My protector, Mr Hallett, had left me at once, and I saw no more of him for some time, as I worked away, sorry at having been the innocent means of getting him into a quarrel. At last, just as I was very intent in puzzling out the difference between p’s and q’s I started, for the great lubberly boy came up close behind me.

“I’ll give you a warming when you goes out to dinner, see if I don’t,” he whispered; but he shuffled off directly, as Mr Hallett came towards me, saw that I was busy, and after giving me a friendly nod, went back, leaving his calm, strangely stern face so impressed upon me, that I kept finding myself thinking of him, his eyes seeming to stare at me from out of every box.

But still I worked on, feeling each moment more and more sure of my way, and at last in a fit of enterprise I set to work and managed to find the letters forming my own name, and laid them side by side.

I felt no little nervous dread as dinner-time approached, for Jem Smith’s warming was in waiting; but as one o’clock struck, Mr Hallett came up to me while the other men were hurrying off, and said kindly:

“Did that boy threaten you?”

“He—he said something, sir,” I replied, hesitating.

“I thought so. He’s gone now, so don’t go out to dinner, my man. I can give you a little of mine. I’ll speak to him before you go to-night.”

Chapter Eighteen.

My Friend Jem Smith Makes Me Ambitious.

I was receiving my first lessons in the fact that there is as much good-will as ill-will in the world—in other words, that there really is, as has been so poetically expressed, a silver lining to every cloud; and I gladly availed myself of Mr Hallett’s kind offer, following him to his frame, as they called the skeleton desks that supported the cases, and there sitting down close by him to partake of some bread and meat which he brought out carefully wrapped in a clean white napkin.

“Don’t be afraid, my boy,” he said, “make a good meal; and I should advise you, for the present, to bring your dinner with you and eat it here. Better than going into the streets.”

He then ate his own dinner quickly, and without taking the slightest notice of me beyond seeing once that I had a sufficiency of the bread and meat, but took out an oblong memorandum-book, and began busily drawing and making some calculation.

As he worked at this, I sat and had a good look at him, and could see that his large, massive head was covered with crisp dark hair that was already slightly sprinkled with grey. From time to time he raised his eyes from his book to look up, as if diving into the distance, or trying to catch some idea that was wandering away from him, and at such moments his deeply set eyes had a curiously intense look about them, while his forehead was deeply marked with thoughtful lines.

I don’t think he was more than thirty, but he looked, so to speak, vigorously old, or, rather, worn like some piece of steel that has been used hard, but has grown sharper and more elastic by that use. He was a tall, well-made man, but thin and spare, giving the idea of one who was ascetic in his habits and devoting himself to some particular end.

He did not speak to me again, and I was not sorry, for there was that in his face and ways that rather repelled than attracted, and I somehow felt that if he, in his quiet, firm way, were angry with me, I should be more alarmed than by the noisy bullying of Mr Grimstone, the overseer.

Two o’clock was signalled by the coming back of the compositors, who resumed their white aprons and rolled up their sleeves, when the sharp clicking noise went on as before. Mr Hallett, at the first entrance of one of his fellow-workmen, had shut his book with a snap, and thrust it into his breast, rolled up the napkin, and then, turning to me with a nod,—

“Two o’clock, my boy,” he said. “Get on with your work.”

As he spoke he resumed his own, and I went back to my case.

I had hardly been there ten seconds, and was diligently making sure which was the compartment containing the letter u, which had a terribly strong resemblance to the letter n, when Mr Grimstone suddenly pounced on me from round the end of the case. I say pounced, for it was so wonderfully like a cat coming upon a mouse. He seemed surprised and disappointed at finding me there, though I did not comprehend his looks then, and after staring hard for a moment or two, he went away.

The hours glided away, and I was so interested in what I was doing, that I hardly noticed the lapse of time, while, long before the afternoon was past, the work the men were engaged upon seemed so attractive that I felt impelled to imitate them by trying to pick up the letters forming various words, and then replacing them in the different boxes.

The first time it was rather difficult, but the second time I got on pretty well, and I was just beginning for the third time, when Mr Hallett came round my way and caught me in the act. I felt very guilty, but he seemed to approve, and walked away, to return directly with a little sliding steel thing, such as the men were using.

“Here’s a stick, my boy; try and place the letters, nick uppermost, in that.”

I took the stick, as he called it, and found that as fast as I placed a letter in, it seemed to do its best to jump out again; then one letter got upon another, or two or three appeared to quarrel and join in a regular squabble, so that their awkwardness and utter refusal to lie quietly side by side at last put me in a profuse perspiration.

I was busily fumbling about when Mr Grimstone, whose voice I had often heard scolding different men, came round, saw what I was doing, and snatched the composing-stick away.

“Tchah! What waste of time! Come along here,” he cried angrily, and I followed him to his glass office, where he sat down upon a worn stool. “Now then,” he said, sharply, “I’ve decided to give you a trial.”

I remember thinking that he was very stupid to assume that he had full authority, when I knew that he had not, but, of course, I was silent.

“And now mind this, sir: I am overseer here, and what I say I will have done, I have done. You hear?”

“Yes, sir,” I said.

“And now we understand one another.”

Saying this, he bounced down from his stool again, and led me to the end of the large room and through a door into a dirty place with a great leaden sink, water, and brushes, and a pot containing some liquid.

Jem Smith was there, having just brought in a long narrow tray containing a column of type.

“Here, Smith, show this boy how to wash a galley; and see that he does it well.”

Jem Smith grinned at me as soon as we were left alone, and I saw plainly enough that he meant to have some compensation for the box on the ear he had received; but I tried hard to contain myself, and meant to submit patiently to anything that might follow.

“Here, ketch hold o’ that galley,” he said sharply, “and look here, young man, don’t you get trying to play the sneak here, and begin getting old Hallett to take your part. He’s only a sneak, and everybody here hates him ’cause he won’t take his beer. You keep away from him, or it’ll be the worse for you. I’ve only got to tell the other boys, and they’ll make it so warm for you as you’ll wish as you’d never come here. Now, then, why don’t you ketch hold o’ that galley?”

“I don’t know what a galley is,” I said sturdily.

“Don’t know what a galley is,” he said, imitating my way of speaking; “you’re a pretty sort of fellow to come and get work at a printing-office. There, ketch holt, stoopid: that’s the galley; put it here, and you needn’t be so precious frightened of getting your fingers black. There’s the brush, dip it, and fetch all that ink off.”

I took the brush, dipped it in the liquor in the pot, and on brushing the surface of the type found that the strong solution easily brought off all the black ink; and I ended as instructed, by thoroughly rinsing the type and placing it to drain.

This done, I had to wash several more galleys, with the result that I was made tolerably black; and to make matters worse, my companion brought in a black roller of some soft material, and dabbed it against my cheek.

I plucked up my spirit and felt ready to strike out, but somehow I kept my anger down, and after washing the roller in turn, I was allowed to dry my hands and clean my face, which Jem Smith persuaded me to do with the strong solution of potash, making it tingle smartly; and, but for the rapid application of pure water, I believe the skin would have been made sore.

This seemed to afford the young ruffian intense delight, and taking up the brush, he dipped it in the potash and tried to brush my hair.

I retreated from him as far as I could, but he got between me and the door, and with the malignant pleasure felt by some boys in persecuting those who are weaker than themselves, he caught me by the collar.

“Just you call out, that’s all,” he said, “and I’ll half kill you. Hold still, you little sneak. You make so much noise as’ll reach outside, and I’ll jump on you.”

We were close beside the lead sink and the pot of solution-lye, as the printers call it; and now a new idea seemed to come into the spiteful young wretch’s mind, for, throwing down the brush, he seized hold of me with both hands, and as we struggled, being much the stronger, he got behind me, thrust his knee violently into my back, and brought me down kneeling before the great earthen pot. And now for the first time I saw what he intended to do, namely, to thrust my face and head into the black caustic solution, and, in spite of my resistance, he got it down lower and lower.

I might have shrieked out for help, and I might have cried for mercy; but, moved partly by his threats, partly by shame, I refrained, and made use of all my strength to escape, but in vain; strive as I would, he forced me down lower and lower, and then by one quick effort placed a hand on the back of my head and thrust it right into the filthy water.

Fortunately for me it was but a momentary affair, and the next instant he allowed me to struggle up and run blindly to the sink, where, perhaps, a little alarmed by his success, he filled a bowl with clean water, leaving the tap running, as I strove to sluice off the blinding, tingling fluid.

I was in the midst of this, and with soaked necktie and collar, kept on bathing my face and hair, when I heard Mr Grimstone’s voice at the door, and hastily thrust my fingers into my ears to clear them.

“What’s he doing?”

“Washing hisself, sir.”

“Washing himself?”

“Yes, sir; he said it was such a nasty dirty job to brush galleys that he must have a good clean.”

“Where’s the towel?” I said blindly, for my eyes smarted so that I dare not open them, and they grew so painful that I hurried once more to the sink and bathed them with clear water before pressing my hair as dry as I could, and then using my handkerchief to wipe my face.

I now opened my eyes, and saw that there was a very dirty jack-towel on a roller behind the door, to which I hastily ran.

“Look here, sir,” said Mr Grimstone, as I hastily rubbed away at my head; “we can’t have these goings-on here. What have you been doing?”

“I think he’s been using the lye, sir,” cried the young hypocrite. “I told him it was only for the type.”

“It isn’t true, sir,” I cried indignantly; when a compositor came up to the door, and Mr Grimstone was called away.

The moment he was gone, Smith darted at me, and thrust his doubled fist hard against my face.

“You say a word agen me,” he said, “and I’ll half kill yer. I’ll smash yer, that I will, so look out.”

He went out of the place, leaving me hot and indignant, rubbing away at my tingling head, which I at length got pretty dry and combed before a scrap of glass stuck by four tacks in a corner; and when I had finished it was in time to see the men just returning from their tea and resuming their work.

Not being told to do anything else, I went back to the case, and continued to learn the boxes, not much the worse for my adventure, only feeling uncomfortably wet about the neck.

At last the clock pointed to eight, and, following the example of the rest, I hurried out of the great office, eager to get back to Mr Revitts before he went on duty, for I wanted to ask him a question.

I got up to the street in Pentonville just as he was coming out of the house, and in answer to his “Halloa! here you are, then,” I caught hold of his arm.

“Bill!” I exclaimed, panting with excitement, “can you teach me how to fight?”

Chapter Nineteen.

William Revitts On Lessons.

Sometime passed before William Revitts replied in full to my question. He had, of course, asked me what I meant, and I had explained to him the treatment I had received, but his duties and mine kept us a great deal apart. One night, however, when he had returned to day-duty, he was seated in his shirt-sleeves talking to me, and said all of a sudden: “Yes, I could teach you how to fight, Antony.”

“And will you?” I said eagerly.

“Give me my ’bacco and pipe off the chimney-piece.”

I handed them to him, and waited patiently while he filled and lighted his pipe, and then all at once, along with a puff of smoke, he exclaimed:

“No, I sha’n’t. Fighting’s all blackguardism, as I know as well as most men. I’ve had the taking up of some of the beauties as go in for it, and beauties they are. I don’t say as if I was you I wouldn’t give that Master Jem Smith an awful crack for himself if he meddled with me again; but I should do it when I was in a passion, and when he’d hurt me. You’ll hit as hard again then, and serve him right. Now let’s have a turn at spelling.”

We did “have a turn at spelling,” and I dictated while Revitts wrote, varying the task with bits of advice to me—absurd enough, some of them, while others were as shrewd and full of common-sense.

By that time I had rapidly begun to fish up odds and ends of experience, such as stood me in good stead, and, in spite of what was really little better than contemptible persecution on the overseer’s part, I was making some little way at the printing-office.

I shall not soon forget the feeling of pride with which on the first Friday night I heard my name called out by a business-like clerk with a book, after he had summoned everyone in the room, and received from him a little paper-bag containing my wages.

“You haven’t been full time, Grace,” he said, entering the sum paid in a book; “but the firm said I was to pay you for the week, as you were a beginner.”

As soon as I thought I was unobserved, I counted out seven shillings, a sum that showed that I was a little favoured, for honestly I believe that I was not worth that amount to my employers.

Hardly had I made sure of my good fortune than I had a visit from Jem Smith, who came up grinning.

“Now, then,” he said, “old Grim’s gone for the night, and you’ve got to come down and pay your footing.”

I stared at him in my ignorance, but, fully under the impression that something unpleasant was meant, I resolutely determined to stay where I was, and I was saved from further persecution by Mr Hallett coming up, which was the signal for Jem Smith to sneak off. I asked Hallett what was meant, and he explained to me that it was a custom for working men on entering a new place to pay for some beer for their fellow-workmen.

“But don’t you pay a penny to the young wolves,” he said, and I determined that I would not.

I was well on in the second week, and during the intervening days I had been set to every dirty and objectionable task Mr Grimstone could invent for me, but I did them patiently and well. I had seen nothing of my employers, and but little of Mr Hallett, who seemed too busy to take much notice of me; but he somehow had a knack of turning up in emergencies, just when I required help and counsel, showing that he kept an eye upon me for my good.

I noticed as I sat beneath a frame eating my dinner in the composing-room that he always employed a good deal of his time in drawing or calculating, and I found, too, that he was no great favourite with his fellow-workmen, who nicknamed him the steam-engine, because he worked so rapidly and did so much. It was very plain, too, that the overseer hated him, giving him the most difficult and unpleasant tasks, but they were always willingly done by Mr Hallett, who was too good a workman to be spared.

I had just completed the washing of some very dirty type one day, and, according to orders, made my way up to Mr Grimstone’s glass case, very dirty and grubby-looking, no doubt, when I stared with surprise on seeing there before me a little cleanly-shaven man who, except in clothes, was the exact counterpart of Mr Rowle.

Somehow or other I had been so occupied, and my mind so intent upon the task given me, that I had thought no more about asking to see him; and now, here he was, Mr Rowle’s twin brother, in angry altercation with the overseer, while Jem Smith stood in the door. The latter had been let off a good many dirty, tasks of late, and I had succeeded to them, but the promotion he had received did not seem to have been attended with success.

“Now look hero, Grimstone,” the little man was saying, “you needn’t bark at me, for I don’t care a pinch of snuff for all your snarls. I asked you to send me up the best boy you had, to read, and you sent me your worst.”

“Mr Rowle, it is false, sir.”

“And I say it is true, and that you did it all out of your crass obstinacy and determination to be as disagreeable as you can to everybody in the place.”

“I sent you up one of my best boys, Mr Rowle.”

“And I say you sent me your very worst—as thick-headed, stupid a dunce as ever entered the place. Look here,” he continued, flourishing a sheet of manuscript in one hand, a long slip of printed paper in the other. “He can’t read that plain piece of writing, and as to the print, why, he’s little better.”

“No such thing, sir,” said Mr Grimstone, fuming.

“Don’t tell me ‘no such thing,’” said the little man fiercely. “Why, the biggest fool in the office would do better. Here, boy,” he cried to me, as I stood there with my hands as black as dirty type could make them; “come here.”

I went up to him.

“He’s no good,” said Mr Grimstone sharply. “He has only just come.”

“Don’t talk to me, sir,” cried Mr Rowle angrily. “You can’t pick out a decent boy, so I must do it myself. Here, boy, read that out aloud.”

I took the piece of paper with trembling hands, doubting my own power to read the lines of crabbed writing, and feeling that even if I could read it I should give dire offence to the overseer by so doing; but I could not help myself, and raising the piece of manuscript written closely on a sheet of ruled foolscap, I saw that it was just such a legal document as I had often copied at Mr Blakeford’s. In fact, something of the old feeling of dread that I used to experience when receiving such a paper from him made a huskiness come in my throat, but clearing my voice, I began:

“‘And the aforesaid deponent also saith that in such a case it would be necessary for the said lessor, his heirs, executors, administrators, and assigns, to make over and deliver, whenever and wheresoever the aforesaid lessee, his heirs, executors, administrators or assigns should desire him so to do—”

“Stop!” said the little man tightening his lips and taking a pinch of snuff. “You did not read that exactly as it’s written there.”

“No, sir,” I said, “‘executors, administrators, and assigns,’ were all contracted.”

“There!” he exclaimed, turning to the overseer triumphantly, “What did I say? Here’s the first boy I meet, fresh from the lye-tub, and he reads it straight off without a blunder, and better than you could have read it yourself. Here, boy, read that.”

He took a letter from his pocket, written in a terribly puzzling hand, and placed it before me.

I took it, hesitated for a moment, and then began:

“‘My dear sir,—I have given the most careful consideration to your proposal, and I am quite willing to—to—to—to—’ If you please, sir, I’m very sorry,” I stammered, “but I can’t make out that word.”

“No, boy, nor I neither. I don’t believe the writer can. There, go and wash those dirty hands,” he continued, snatching the letter from me.

“No: stop!” cried Mr Grimstone wrathfully; “I want that boy here.”

“Then you may take your great clever noodle, Jem Smith,” said the little man.

“Mr Rowle, I will not have my rules and regulations broken in this way, sir.”

“Hang you and your rules,” said the little man. “Have a pinch? No? Then let it alone.”

“I cannot and will not spare that boy,” cried Mr Grimstone, motioning away the snuff-box.

For answer the little man tightened his lips, snapped-to the lid of his snuff-box, hastily took a pinch, snapped his fingers in the overseer’s face, and taking me by the shoulder, marched me before him towards the door, and past Mr Hallett’s frame.

“Here, get your jacket, my lad,” said the little man. “You can wash your hands upstairs.”

Mr Hallett nodded to me and looked, as I thought, pleased as I passed him, and preceding my new taskmaster, I went up to the next floor, where he led me to a glass case, exactly like that occupied by Mr Grimstone and the reader in his room, the sides being similarly decorated with slips of paper hanging from nails.

He showed me where to wash, and, this done, I was soon by his side, reading steadily on to him various pieces of manuscript, while, spectacles on nose, he pored over and made corrections on the margins of the printed slips of paper that were constantly being brought to him by a youth who printed them from the column galleys at a small hand-press.