The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch | Page 5

for his
age, and strongly built. At present his form is arrayed in a brand-new
suit of grey; his collar is new and his tie is new, his boots are new and
his socks are new; everything is new about him, down to the very guard
of his hat, and he himself is the newest and purest of all. Was ever such
a radiant young hero turned loose into the world?
And now, over and above his other glories, he had me to crown all. The
graceful curve of my chain on his waistcoat gave that garment quite a
distinguished appearance, and the consciousness of a silver watch in
his pocket made him hold his head even higher than usual.
"He is a beauty!" again he broke out, "exactly the kind I like most. I'll
take ever such a lot of care of him." And so saying, he began to swing
me at the end of the chain, till I suddenly came sharply into collision
with the door of the cab.
"Hullo," exclaimed my young master, "that won't do. I'll put him away
now. It was good of you, father."
With that we reached the railway station, and in the bustle that ensued
I was for the time forgotten.
Charlie's trunks were duly labelled for Randlebury, and then came the
hardest moment of all, when father and son must part.
"I wonder if you'll be altered, Charlie, when I see you again."
"Not for the worse I hope, anyhow," replied the boy, laughing.
"Tickets, please!" demanded the guard.
"There goes the bell," said Charlie, pulling me out of his pocket.
"They're very punctual. Hullo, we're off! Good-bye, father."
"Good-bye, boy, and God bless you."
And there was a close grasp of the hand, a last smile, a hasty wave

from the window; and then we were off.
How many grown-up men are there who cannot recall at some time or
other this crisis in their lives, this first good-bye from the home of their
childhood, this stepping forth into the world with all that is familiar
and dear at their backs, and all that is strange and unknown and
wonderful stretching away like a vast landscape before them? How
many are there who would not give much to be back once more at that
threshold of their career; and to have the chance of living over again
the life they began there with such bright hopes and such careless
confidence? Ah, if some of them could have seen whither that
flower-strewn path was to lead them, would they not rather have
chosen even to die on the threshold, than take so much as the first step
forth from the innocent home of childhood!
But I am wandering from my story. For half an hour after that last
good-bye Charlie leaned back in the corner of his carriage and gave
himself up to his loneliness, and I could feel his chest heaving to keep
down the tears that would every now and then rise unbidden to his
eyes.
But what boy of thirteen can be in the dumps for long? Especially if he
has a new watch in his pocket. Charlie was himself again before we
had well got clear of London, and his reviving spirits gradually
recalled to his memory his father's parting gift, which had for a while
been half forgotten amid other cares.
Now again I was produced, I was turned over and over, was listened to,
was peeped into, was flourished about, was taken off my chain, and put
on again with the supremest satisfaction. At every station we came to,
out I came from his pocket, to be compared with the railway time. By
the clock at Batfield I was a minute slow--a discrepancy which was no
sooner discovered than I felt my glass face opened, and a fat finger and
thumb putting forward my hand to the required time. At Norbely I was
two minutes fast by the clock, and then (oh, horrors!) I found myself put
back in the same rough-and-ready way. At Maltby I was full half a
minute behind the great clock, and on I went again. At the next station
the clock and I both gave the same time to a second, and then what

must he do but begin to regulate me! After a minute calculation he
made the astounding discovery that I had lost a minute and a quarter in
four hours, and that in order to compensate for this shortcoming it
would be necessary for him to move my regulator forward the two
hundred and fortieth part of an inch. This feat he set himself to
accomplish with the point of his scarf-pin while the train was jolting
forward at the rate of thirty miles an hour!
I began to