The Master of the Shell | Page 8

that no preparations--"
"'Tain't got to do with me. You'd best go to the doctor's house, out of

that gate, across the little square, the house on the far side of the
chapel."
Railsford, leaving his luggage stacked on the pavement outside the
porter's lodge, started off with flushed cheeks to the lion's den. The
doctor, said the maid, was in, but was at dinner. The gentleman had
better call again in half an hour.
So Railsford, in the closing twilight, took a savage walk round the
school precincts, in no mood to admire the natural beauties of the place,
or to indulge in any rhapsodies at this near view of the scene of his
coming triumphs. In half an hour he returned, and was shown into the
doctor's study.
"How do you do, Mr. --;" here the doctor took up his visitor's card to
refresh his memory--"Mr. Railsford?"
"I was afraid, sir," said Mark, "I had mistaken your letter about coming
to-day; there appears to be no one--no one who can--I have been unable
to ascertain where I am to go."
The doctor waited patiently for the end of this lucid explanation.
"I rather wonder it did not suggest itself to you to call on me for
information."
Railsford wondered so too, and felt rather sheepish.
"Your train must have been late. I expected you an hour ago."
"I think we were up to time. I walked from Blankington here."
"Really--I wish I had known of your intention."
"I trust," said Railsford, struck by a horrible suspicion, "you were not
waiting dinner for me."
"Not in the least," said the doctor, with a grim smile; "but I had
calculated on taking you round before nightfall. We must defer our visit

till the morning. Talking of dinner," he added, "you will be ready for
something after your journey, will you not?"
As Railsford was nearly famishing, he could only colour up and reply--
"Thank you."
The doctor rang the bell.
"See that Mr. Railsford gets dinner. I have to go out," he added, "but
you will, no doubt, make yourself at home;" and the great man
withdrew, leaving the new master in a very crestfallen and disturbed
state of mind.
If this was a sample of the sympathy he might expect at head-quarters,
Moss's prognostications, after all, were not quite baseless. He made the
best of his solitary dinner, and then sallied out in the dark to try to find
the porter's lodge once more and rescue his luggage. That functionary
was still absent, and Mark was compelled himself to haul his
belongings in under cover, and leave word with the little girl that they
were to be taken over to Mr. Railsford's rooms as soon as her father
came in. Then taking with him a bag which contained what he wanted
for the night, he returned to the head-master's house and made a point
of retiring to rest before his host reappeared on the scene.
Once more luck was against him.
"You vanished early last night," said the doctor, blandly, at breakfast
next morning. "I brought Mr. Roe in to supper, thinking you and he
might like a chat about the work in the Shell, about which he could
have given you some useful hints. However, early hours are very
commendable."
"I am extremely sorry," faltered Railsford. "I had no idea you would be
home so early. I should have liked to meet Mr. Roe so much."
"Take some more coffee?" said the doctor.

After breakfast Mark was conducted in state to his house. The floors
were all damp and the carpets up; beds and washstands were piled up in
the passages, and nowhere was a fire to be seen.
"There are your rooms," said the doctor, pointing out a suite of three
apartments opening one into the other, at the present time reeking of
soft-soap and absolutely destitute of furniture. "You will find them
comfortable and central. The inner room is the bedroom, the middle
your private sitting-room, and this larger one the house-parlour. Now
we will go to the dormitories and studies. You understand your head
boys--those in the Sixth and Fifth--have a study to themselves; the
Shell have studies in pairs, and the junior school-work in the common
room. But all these points you will make yourself familiar with very
shortly. As a house-master, you will of course be responsible for
everything that takes place in the house--the morals, work and play of
the boys are under your supervision. You have four Sixth-form boys in
the house, who are prefects under you, and in certain matters exercise
an authority of their own without appeal to you. But you quite
understand that you must watch that this is not abused. The house dame,
Mrs. Farthing, superintends everything connected with the