A Great Emergency and Other Tales | Page 8

never
seen, it is well not to abuse the privilege, and now and then to allow
them an "innings" at describing their remarkable parents, brothers,
sisters, and remoter relatives.
I realized all this fully as I stood, with burning cheeks and downcast
eyes, at the very elbow of my tormentor. But I am glad to know that I
would not have run away even if I could. My resolution grew
stubborner with every peal of laughter to bear whatever might come
with pluck and good temper. I had been a fool, but I would show that I
was not a coward.
I was very glad that Rupert's influenza kept him at home for a few days.
I told him briefly that I had been bullied, but that it was my own fault,
and I would rather say no more about it. I begged him to promise that
he would not take up my quarrel in any way, but leave me to fight it out
for myself, which he did. When he came back I think he regretted his
promise. Happily he never heard all the ballad, but the odd verses
which the boys sang about the place put him into a fury. It was a long
time before he forgave me, and I doubt if he ever quite forgave Weston.
I held out as well as I could. I made no complaint, and kept my temper.
I must say that Henrietta behaved uncommonly well to me at this time.
"After all, you know, Charlie," she said, "you've not done anything
really wrong or dishonourable." This was true, and it comforted me.
Except Henrietta, I really had not a friend; for Rupert was angry with
me, and the holding up at school only made me feel worse at home.
At last the joke began to die out, and I was getting on very well, but for
one boy, a heavy-looking fellow with a pasty face, who was always
creeping after me, and asking me to tell him about my father. "Johnson
Minor," we called him. He was a younger brother of Thomas Johnson,
the champion of the code of honour.
He was older than I, but he was below me in class, and though he was

bigger, he was not a very great deal bigger; and if there is any truth in
the stories I have so often told, our family has been used to fight
against odds for many generations.
I thought about this a good deal, and measured Johnson Minor with my
eye. At last I got Henrietta to wrestle and box with me for practice.
She was always willing to do anything Tomboyish, indeed she was
generally willing to do anything one wanted, and her biceps were as
hard as mine, for I pinched them to see. We got two pairs of gloves,
much too big for us, and stuffed cotton wool in to make them like
boxing-gloves, as we used to stuff out the buff-coloured waistcoat
when we acted old gentlemen in it. But it did not do much good; for I
did not like to hurt Henrietta when I got a chance, and I do not think
she liked to hurt me. So I took to dumb-belling every morning in my
night-shirt; and at last I determined I would have it out with Johnson
Minor, once for all.
One afternoon, when the boys had been very friendly with me, and
were going to have me in the paper chase on Saturday, he came up in
the old way and began asking me about my father, quite gravely, like a
sort of poor imitation of Weston. So I turned round and said, "Whatever
my father was--he's dead. Your father's alive, Johnson, and if you
weren't a coward, you wouldn't go on bullying a fellow who hasn't got
one."
"I'm a coward, am I, Master Honourable?" said Johnson, turning scarlet,
and at the word Honourable I thought he had broken my nose. I never
felt such pain in my life, but it was the only pain I felt on the occasion;
afterwards I was much too much excited, I am sorry that I cannot
remember very clearly about it, which I should have liked to do, as it
was my first fight.
There was no time to fight properly. I was obliged to do the best I could.
I made a sort of rough plan in my head, that I would cling to Johnson as
long as I was able, and hit him whenever I got a chance. I did not quite
know when he was hitting me from when I was hitting him; but I know
that I held on, and that the ground seemed to be always hitting us both.

How long we had been struggling and cuffing