Poison Island | Page 7

by the constable's dispersing the throng with a "Clear along, now, like good fellows!"
The wide-mouthed man helped me into my jacket, shook hands with me, and said I had no science, but the devil's own pluck-and-lights. Then he, too, faded away into the night; and I found myself alongside of Doggy Bates, marching up the street after Mr. Stimcoe, who declaimed, as he went, upon the vulgarity of street-fighting.
By-and-by it became apparent that in the soothing flow of his eloquence he had forgotten us; and Doggy Bates, who understood his preceptor's habits to a hair, checked me with a knowing squeeze of the arm, and began, of set purpose, to lag in his steps. Mr. Stimcoe strode on, still audibly denouncing and exhorting.
"It was all my fault!" Master Bates pulled up and studied my mauled face by the light of a street-lamp. "The beggar heard me shouting his own name, silly fool that I was!"
I begged him not to be distressed on my account.
"What's the use of half a fight?" he groaned again. "My word, though, won't Stimcoe catch it from the missus! She sent him out to get change for your aunt's notes--'fees payable in advance.' I know the game--to pay off the bailey; and he's been soaking in a public-house ever since. Hallo!"
We turned together at the sound of footsteps approaching after us up the street. They broke into a run, then appeared to falter; and, peering into the dark interval between us and the next lamp, I discerned Captain Coffin. He had come to a halt, and stood there mysteriously beckoning.
"You--I want you!" he called huskily. "Not the other boy! You!"
I obeyed, having a reputation to keep up in the eyes of Doggy Bates; but my courage was oozing as I walked towards the old man, and I came to a sudden stop about five yards from him.
"Closer!" he beckoned. "Good boy, don't be afraid. What's your name, good boy?"
"Harry Brooks, sir."
"Call me 'sir,' do you? Well, and you're right. I could ride in my coach-and-six if I chose; and some day you may see it. How would you like to ride in your coach-and-six, Harry Brooks?"
"I should like it finely, sir," said I, humouring him.
"Yes, yes, I'll wager you would. Well, now--come closer. Mum's the word, eh? I like you, Harry Brooks; and the boys in this town "--he broke off and cursed horribly--"they're not fit to carry slops to a bear, not one of 'em. But you're different. And, see here: any time you're in trouble, just pay a call on me. Understand? Mind you, I make no promises." Here, to my exceeding fright, he reached out a hand, and, clutching me by the arm, drew me close, so that his breath poured hot on my ear, and I sickened at its reek of brandy. "It's money, boy--money, I tell you!"
He dropped my arm, and, falling back a pace, looked nervously about him.
"Between you and me and the gatepost, eh?" he asked.
His hand went down and tapped his pocket slily, and with that he turned and shuffled away down the street. I stared after him into the foggy darkness, listening to the tap of his stick upon the cobbles.
CHAPTER IV.
CAPTAIN COFFIN STUDIES NAVIGATION.
Events soon to be narrated made my sojourn in tutelage of Mr. Stimcoe a brief one, and I will pass it lightly over.
The school consisted of four boarders and six backward sons of gentlemen resident in the town, and assembled daily in a large outhouse furnished with desks of a peculiar pattern, known to us as "scobs." Mr. Stimcoe, who had received his education as a "querister" at Winchester (and afterwards as a "servitor" at Pembroke College, Oxford), habitually employed and taught us to employ the esoteric slang--or "notions," as he called it--of that great public school; so that in "preces," "morning lines," "book-chambers," and what-not we had the names if not the things, and a vague and quite illusory sense of high connection, on the strength of which, and of our freedom from what Mrs. Stimcoe called "the commercial taint," we made bold to despise the more prosperous Rogerses up the hill.
Upon commerce in the concrete--that is to say, upon the butchers, bakers, and other honest tradesmen of Falmouth--Mrs. Stimcoe waged a predatory war, and waged it without quarter. She had a genius for opening accounts, and something more than genius for keeping her creditors at bay. She never wheedled nor begged them for time; she never compromised nor parleyed, nor condescended to yield an inch to their claims for decent human treatment. She relied simply upon browbeating and the efficacy of the straight-spoken lie. A more dauntless, unblushing, majestic liar never stood up in petticoats.
She was a byword in Falmouth; yet, strange to say, her victims kept a sneaking fondness for