Cashel Byrons Profession | Page 8

pardon, and implored him to assist her to recover
her darling boy. When he suggested that she should offer a reward for
information and capture she indignantly refused to spend a farthing on
the little ingrate; wept and accused herself of having driven him away
by her unkindness; stormed and accused the doctor of having treated
him harshly; and, finally, said that she would give one hundred pounds
to have him back, but that she would never speak to him again. The
doctor promised to undertake the search, and would have promised
anything to get rid of his visitor. A reward of fifty pounds wag offered.
But whether the fear of falling into the clutches of the law for
murderous assault stimulated Cashel to extraordinary precaution, or
whether he had contrived to leave the country in the four days which
elapsed between his flight and the offer of the reward, the doctor's
efforts were unsuccessful; and he had to confess their failure to Mrs.
Byron. She agreeably surprised him by writing a pleasant letter to the
effect that it was very provoking, and that she could never thank him
sufficiently for all the trouble he had taken. And so the matter dropped.
Long after that generation of scholars had passed away from Moncrief
House, the name of Cashel Byron was remembered there as that of a
hero who, after many fabulous exploits, had licked a master and bolted
to the Spanish Main.

III

There was at this time in the city of Melbourne, in Australia, a wooden
building, above the door of which was a board inscribed
"GYMNASIUM AND SCHOOL OF ARMS." In the long, narrow
entry hung a framed manuscript which set forth that Ned Skene,
ex-champion of England and the colonies, was to be heard of within
daily by gentlemen desirous of becoming proficient in the art of
self-defence. Also the terms on which Mrs. Skene, assisted by a
competent staff of professors, would give lessons in dancing,
deportment, and calisthenics.
One evening a man sat smoking on a common wooden chair outside the
door of this establishment. On the ground beside him were some tin
tacks and a hammer, with which he had just nailed to the doorpost a
card on which was written in a woman's handwriting: "WANTED A
MALE ATTENDANT WHO CAN KEEP ACCOUNTS. INQUIRE
WITHIN." The smoker was a powerful man, with a thick neck that
swelled out beneath his broad, flat ear-lobes. He had small eyes, and
large teeth, over which his lips were slightly parted in a good-humored
but cunning smile. His hair was black and close-cut; his skin indurated;
and the bridge of his nose smashed level with his face. The tip,
however, was uninjured. It was squab and glossy, and, by giving the
whole feature an air of being on the point of expanding to its original
shape, produced a snubbed expression which relieved the otherwise
formidable aspect of the man, and recommended him as probably a
modest and affable fellow when sober and unprovoked. He seemed
about fifty years of age, and was clad in a straw hat and a suit of white
linen.
He had just finished his pipe when a youth stopped to read the card on
the doorpost. This youth was attired in a coarse sailor's jersey and a pair
of gray tweed trousers, which he had considerably outgrown.
"Looking for a job?" inquired the ex-champion of England and the
colonies.
The youth blushed and replied, "Yes. I should like to get something to

do."
Mr. Skene stared at him with stern curiosity. His piofessional pursuits
had familiarized him with the manners and speech of English
gentlemen, and he immediately recognized the shabby sailor lad as one
of that class.
"Perhaps you're a scholar," said the prize-fighter, after a moment's
reflection.
"I have been at school; but I didn't learn much there," replied the youth.
"I think I could bookkeep by double entry," he added, glancing at the
card.
"Double entry! What's that?"
"It's the way merchants' books are kept. It is called so because
everything is entered twice over."
"Ah!" said Skene, unfavorably impressed by the system; "once is
enough for me. What's your weight?"
"I don't know," said the lad, with a grin.
"Not know your own weight!" exclaimed Skene. "That ain't the way to
get on in life."
"I haven't been weighed since I was in England," said the other,
beginning to get the better of his shyness. "I was eight stone four then;
so you see I am only a light-weight."
"And what do you know about light-weights? Perhaps, being so well
educated, you know how to fight. Eh?"
"I don't think I could fight you," said the youth, with another grin.
Skene chuckled; and the stranger, with boyish communicativeness,
gave him an