His Big Opportunity | Page 7

a few minutes; then Dudley said,
"I should have been your murderer if you had died. That has been the worst of it. But you did like saving a drowning fellow, didn't you?"
"Ye-es, but it wasn't quite real--at least it isn't as if you really had tumbled in by accident."
"Well but I only did what you said we must do. I made an opportunity."
And after this remark Roy had nothing more to say; but neither he nor Dudley ever enlightened any one as to the true cause of the accident.
When Roy had quite recovered, the two boys set out one afternoon to visit their greatest friend in the village. This was the old man every one called "old Principle." He lived by himself in a curious three-cornered house at the extreme end of the village, and kept a little general shop where everything but eatables could be obtained.
"I keep every article that man, woman, or child can want for their use, for their homes, their work or their play; but food and drink I will not cater for. It's against my principles to sell perishable goods, and I will not be the one to minister to the very lowest animal wants of my fellow creatures."
This was his favorite speech, from which it may be judged he was somewhat of a character.
He had several hobbies, and was a well-read man and superior to those around him; and perhaps this was the cause of his holding himself aloof from most of the villagers. They termed him "cranky and cracked," but his goods were always acceptable, and he was thoroughly successful in his business. When his shop was closed he would go out on the hills, and there spend his time studying geology and botany. He knew the name of every plant and insect, and the strata of the earth for many miles round; and it was out of doors that the boys first made his acquaintance.
They found him on this afternoon seated behind his counter mending an eight-day clock.
"Well, old Principle, how are you?" said Roy, climbing up to the counter and sitting comfortably on it with his legs dangling in mid air; "we haven't seen you for ages."
"Are you going out this evening?" enquired Dudley, as he proceeded to follow Roy's example.
"To be sure, when my work is done," responded the old man pushing up his spectacles and regarding the boys with kindly eyes; "these light evenings are my delight, as you know. If you sit still till I have finished this clock, I will show you a treasure I found yesterday."
"Can you mend everything?" asked Roy, curiously; "I never knew you understood about clocks."
"I've learned to mend most things," was the answer; "it isn't given to every one to make, and I'm one of the menders in the world not the makers. There's one thing I can't mend--and that is broken hearts."
There was silence: Roy broke it at last by saying with knitted brow, "I'd rather be a maker than a mender, but lots of people aren't either."
"Quite right," nodded the old man; "most folk are breakers."
"I wish I was as clever as you," said Dudley; "you mend umbrellas, and kettles, and plates, and windows, and gates, and all sorts. How did you learn?"
"Well, I ain't ashamed of owning that my father was just a travelling tinker, and when I was a little fellow I used to go round with him and see him do most things. It was from travelling through the country I learned to love it so. And my father, he was a thoughtful man, and when I used to ask where the tin came from, and where the iron and where the lead, he took to learning of it up so that he could answer me; and then I came to find that most of our comforts come from underground, and so I fell to digging. Ah, youngsters, earth is a wonderful treasure house!"
The clock was done. Old Principle put it carefully by and then mounted on some wooden steps, and took down a tin saucepan. The boys knew the shelf well; as though apparently it was just a row of tinware for sale, many a pot and pan held treasures that geologists would have given a great deal to possess.
Now when old Principle held out a peculiar shaped stone with loving pride, Roy and Dudley pressed forward to look at it.
"I know, it's a Roman hammer," shouted out Dudley.
"It's a Saxon jug," suggested Roy.
"It's part of a jaw of a mammoth many thousands of years old, and there are two teeth in perfect preservation," old Principle said solemnly.
"Where did you find it?"
"Ah, you must come and see! In a cave that I have only just discovered, and which must originally have been by the side of