Dr. Jolliffes Boys | Page 4

the moment except through fear of the consequences, and unfortunately many of his propensities were vicious.
He had taken up cricket rather warmly, and seemed less inclined to get tired of it than of most healthy and innocent diversions, and cricket kept him out of mischief; so it was very unlucky, both for himself and for those over whom he had influence, that his jealousy of Crawley had led him to make such an idiot of himself.
CHAPTER TWO.
SLAM'S.
About a mile from Weston College there was a dilapidated old house with a large yard and an orchard. There had been a farm attached to it once, but the land had been taken into the next estate, and the old homestead let separately many years before. The landlord would gladly have got rid of the present tenant, but he had a long lease, and, while he paid his rent, he was secure, and could snap his fingers at the squire, the clergyman, the magistrates, and all other people who did not appreciate him. Not that he ever did so snap his fingers; on the contrary, Mr Slam, though practically defiant, was remarkably civil, not to say obsequious, in his demeanour when he came into contact with the gentry. By profession he was a rat-catcher, and he had an intimate knowledge of the habits and frailties of all the small predatory animals of Great Britain, and knew well how to lure them to their destruction. In a game-preserving community such talents ought, one would imagine, to have met with appreciative recognition; but unfortunately Slam was suspected of being far more fatal to pheasants, hares, and rabbits than to all the vermin he destroyed. He protested his innocence, and was never caught in the act of taking game; but if anyone wanted to stock his preserves, Slam could always procure him a supply of pheasants' eggs, and more than one village offender who had been sent to expiate his depredations in jail was known to have paid visits to Slam's yard.
Slam was a dog-fancier as well as a rat-catcher, and therefore doggy boys were attracted to his premises, which, however, were sternly interdicted. In the first place they were out of bounds, though this of itself did not go for very much. There was no town very near Weston, and so long as the boys made their appearance at the specified hours they were not overmuch interfered with. Paper chases, or hare and hounds as they are sometimes called, were openly arranged and encouraged; and if boys liked to take walks in the country, they could do so with a minimum of risk. If they were awkward enough to meet a master face to face when out of bounds, he could hardly help turning them back and giving them a slight imposition; but if they saw him coming, and got out of his way, he would not look in their direction.
But to enter an inn, or to visit Slam's, was a serious offence, entailing severe punishment, and even expulsion, if repeated.
Yet one beautiful warm summer's evening, when the birds were singing and the grasshoppers chirruping, and all nature invited mankind to play cricket or lawn-tennis, if there were no river handy for boating, four youths might have been seen (but were not, luckily for them) approaching the forbidden establishment. A lane with high banks, now covered with ferns and wild flowers, and furrowed with ruts which were more like crevasses, ran up to the house; but they left this and went round the orchard to the back of the yard, in the wall of which there was a little door with a bell-handle beside it. On this being pulled there was a faint tinkle, followed by a canine uproar of the most miscellaneous description, the deep-mouthed bay of the blood-hound, the sharp yap-yap of the toy terrier, and a chorus of intermediate undistinguishable barkings, some fierce, some frolicsome, some expectant, being mixed up with the rattling of chains. Then an angry voice was heard amidst the hubbub commanding silence, and a sudden whine or two seemed to imply that he had shown some practical intention of being obeyed. A bolt was drawn, the door opened, and a short wiry man, dressed in fustian and velveteen, with a fur cap on his head and a short pipe in his mouth, stood before them.
"Come in, gents," said he. "Your dawg's at the other end of the yard, Mr Stubbs, that's why you don't see him. He's had an orkardness with Sayres, Mr Robarts' dog, as was in the next kennel, and I thought they'd have strangled themselves a-trying to get at one another, and so I had to separate them."
"Will it be safe to let him loose?" asked Stubbs.
"No fear; he will never go near the other