A Great Emergency and Other Tales | Page 6

Weston's face was inscrutable, and I--tracing some
surprise that I should have secured so old and so fine-mannered a boy
for a friend--held up my head, and went on with my narrative, as
fluently as I could, to show that I had parts which justified Weston in
his preference.
Tick, tack! went the clock. Click, clack! went my tongue. I fear that
quite half-an-hour must have passed, when a big boy, with an open face,
blue eyes, and closely curling fair hair, burst in. On seeing us he
exclaimed, "Hulloh!" and then stopped, I suspect in obedience to
Weston's eyes, which met his in a brief but expressive gaze. Then
Weston turned to me.
"Allow me," said he, "to introduce Mr. Thomas Johnson. He bears a

very high character in this school, and it will afford him the keenest
satisfaction to hear an authentic account of such a man as your
esteemed father, whose character should be held up for the imitation of
young gentlemen in every establishment for the education of youth."
I blushed with pride and somewhat with nervousness as Mr. Thomas
Johnson seated himself on the locker on the other side of me and
begged (with less elegance of expression than my first friend) that I
would "go ahead."
I did so. But a very few minutes exhausted the patience of my new
hearer. When he had kicked a loose splinter of wood satisfactorily off
the leg of one of the desks he began to look at the clock, which
quickened my pace from my remoter ancestors to what the colonel of
the regiment in which my father was an ensign had said of him. I
completed my narrative at last with the lawyer's remark, and added,
"and everybody says the same. And that is why my father had '_The
Honourable_' before his name, just as--" &c., &c.
I had no sooner uttered these words than Johnson started from his seat,
and, covering his face with a spotted silk pocket-handkerchief, rushed
precipitately from the school-room. For one brief instant I fancied I
heard him choking with laughter, but when I turned to Weston he got
up too, with a look of deep concern. "Mr. Johnson is taken very unwell,
I fear," said he. "It is a peculiar kind of spasm to which he is subject.
Excuse me!"
He hurried anxiously after his friend, and I was left alone in the
school-room, into which the other boys shortly began to pour.
"Have you been all alone, old fellow?" said Rupert kindly; "I hoped
you had picked up a chum."
"So I have," was my proud reply; "two chums."
"I hope they're decent fellows," said Rupert. (He had a most pestilent
trick of perpetually playing monitor, to the wet-blanketing of all good
fellowship.)

"You know best," said I pertly; "it's Weston and Johnson. We've been
together a long time."
"Weston?" cried Rupert. "I hope to goodness, Charlie, you've not been
playing the fool?"
"You can ask them," said I, and tossing my head I went to my proper
place.
For the rest of school-time I wore a lofty and Rupert an anxious
demeanour. Secure on the level of a higher friendship, I was mean
enough to snub the friendly advances of one or two of the younger
boys.
When we went home at night, I found my mother much more ready
than Rupert to believe that my merits had gained for me the regard of
two of the upper boys. I was exultingly happy. Not a qualm disturbed
the waking dreams in which (after I was in bed) I retold my family tale
at even greater length than before, except that I remembered one or two
incidents, which in the excitement of the hour I had forgotten when in
school.
I was rather sorry, too, that, bound by the strictest of injunctions from
Rupert and my own promise, I had not been able, ever so casually, to
make my new friends aware that among my other advantages was that
of being first cousin to a peer, the very one who lived at the Castle. The
Castle was a show place, and I knew that many of my schoolfellows
were glad enough to take their friends and go themselves to be shown
by the housekeeper the pictures of my ancestors. On this point they
certainly had an advantage over me. I had not seen the pictures. Our
cousin never called on us, and never asked us to the Castle, and of
course we could not go to our father's old home like common
holiday-making townspeople.
I would rather not say very much about the next day. It must seem
almost incredible that I could have failed to see that Weston and
Johnson were making fun of me; and I confess that it