The Great Shadow and Other Napoleonic Tales | Page 5

the pitch of my lungs and nursing one of my legs, which
felt as if a red-hot ring were welded round it.
It was not long, as may be imagined, before the whole household, from
the headmaster to the stable boy, were out in the garden with lamps and
lanterns. The matter was soon cleared: the man carried off upon a
shutter, and I borne in much state and solemnity to a special bedroom,
where the small bone of my leg was set by Surgeon Purdie, the younger
of the two brothers of that name. As to the robber, it was found that his
legs were palsied, and the doctors were of two minds as to whether he
would recover the use of them or no; but the Law never gave them a
chance of settling the matter, for he was hanged after Carlisle assizes,
some six weeks later. It was proved that he was the most desperate
rogue in the North of England, for he had done three murders at the
least, and there were charges enough against him upon the sheet to have
hanged him ten times over.
Well now, I could not pass over my boyhood without telling you about
this, which was the most important thing that happened to me. But I
will go off upon no more side tracks; for when I think of all that is
coming, I can see very well that I shall have more than enough to do
before I have finished. For when a man has only his own little private
tale to tell, it often takes him all his time; but when he gets mixed up in

such great matters as I shall have to speak about, then it is hard on him,
if he has not been brought up to it, to get it all set down to his liking.
But my memory is as good as ever, thank God, and I shall try to get it
all straight before I finish.
It was this business of the burglar that first made a friendship between
Jim Horscroft, the doctor's son, and me. He was cock boy of the school
from the day he came; for within the hour he had thrown Barton, who
had been cock before him, right through the big blackboard in the
class-room. Jim always ran to muscle and bone, and even then he was
square and tall, short of speech and long in the arm, much given to
lounging with his broad back against walls, and his hands deep in his
breeches pockets. I can even recall that he had a trick of keeping a
straw in the corner of his mouth, just where he used afterwards to hold
his pipe. Jim was always the same for good and for bad since first I
knew him.
Heavens, how we all looked up to him! We were but young savages,
and had a savage's respect for power. There was Tom Carndale of
Appleby, who could write alcaics as well as mere pentameters and
hexameters, yet nobody would give a snap for Tom; and there was
Willie Earnshaw, who had every date, from the killing of Abel, on the
tip of his tongue, so that the masters themselves would turn to him if
they were in doubt, yet he was but a narrow-chested lad, over long for
his breadth; and what did his dates help him when Jack Simons of the
lower third chivied him down the passage with the buckle end of a
strap? But you didn't do things like that with Jim Horscroft. What tales
we used to whisper about his strength! How he put his fist through the
oak-panel of the game-room door; how, when Long Merridew was
carrying the ball, he caught up Merridew, ball and all, and ran swiftly
past every opponent to the goal. It did not seem fit to us that such a one
as he should trouble his head about spondees and dactyls, or care to
know who signed the Magna Charta. When he said in open class that
King Alfred was the man, we little boys all felt that very likely it was
so, and that perhaps Jim knew more about it than the man who wrote
the book.

Well, it was this business of the burglar that drew his attention to me;
for he patted me on my head, and said that I was a spunky little devil,
which blew me out with pride for a week on end. For two years we
were close friends, for all the gap that the years had made between us,
and though in passion or in want of thought he did many a thing that
galled me, yet I loved him like a brother, and wept as much as would
have