To The West | Page 8

I thought, "how it is possible that Mr Dempster and Mr John could be cousins;" and then I went on thinking about the interview at the office when Mr Dempster was so harsh.
This kept my attention till I reached the Deans', and then I walked straight in to find Mrs Dean making believe to read, while Esau was bending his head slowly in a swaying motion nearer and nearer to the candle every moment. In fact I believe if I had not arrived as I did, Esau's hair would have been singed so as to need no cutting for some time. As it was, he leaped up at a touch.
"Oh, here you are!" he said. "If you hadn't come I believe I should soon have dropped asleep."
CHAPTER FOUR.
HOW MR. DEMPSTER USED HIS CANE.
My life at the office grew more miserable every day, and Mr Isaac Dempster more tyrannical.
That's a big word to use, and seems more appropriate to a Roman emperor than to a London auctioneer; but, on quietly thinking it over, it is quite correct, for I honestly believe that that man took delight in abusing Esau and me.
Let me see; what did some one say about the employment of boys? "A boy is a boy; two boys are half a boy; and three boys are no boy at all."
Of course, as to the amount of work they do. But it is not true, for I know--one of the auction-room porters told me--that Mr Dempster used to keep two men-clerks in his office, till they both discharged themselves because they would not put up with what the porter called "his nastiness." Then we were both engaged.
That was one day when Dingle came down in his green baize apron and carpet-cap, and had to wait till our employer returned from his lunch.
"Ah!" he said, "the guv'nor used to lead them two a pretty life, and keep 'em ever so late sometimes."
"But he had more business then, I suppose?" I said.
"Not he. Busier now, and makes more money. Nobody won't stop with him."
"Yes, they will," said Esau. "You said you'd been with him fourteen years."
"Yes," said Dingle, showing his yellow teeth, "but I'm an auctioneer's fixtur', and going ain't in my way."
"Why not?" asked Esau.
"Got a wife and twelve children, squire, and they nails a man down."
Just then Mr Dempster came in, ordered Dingle to go into his room, and we could hear him being well bullied about something, while as he came out he laughed at us both, and gave his head a peculiar shake.
"Off!" he whispered. "Flea in each ear."
I mention this because it set me thinking that if we two lads of sixteen or seventeen did all the work for which two men were formerly kept, we could not be quite so useless and stupid as Mr Dempster said.
I know that my handwriting was not so very good, and I was not quite so quick with my pen as Esau, but his writing was almost like copper-plate, and I used to feel envious; though I had one consolation--I never made Esau's mistakes in spelling.
But nothing we ever did was right, and as the weeks went on, made bright to me now by my visits up in North London, Esau would throw down his pen three or four times a day, rub his hands all over his curly head, and look over the top of the desk at me.
"Now then," he used to say; "ready?"
"Ready for what?"
"To go and 'list. We're big enough now."
"Nonsense!"
"'Tain't nonsense," he said one morning, after Mr Dempster had been a little more disagreeable than usual about some copying not being finished, and then gone out, leaving me thinking what I could do to give him a little more satisfaction, so as to induce him to raise the very paltry salary he paid me. "'Tain't nonsense. Mother says that if I stop I shall some day rise and get to be Lord Mayor, but I don't think Demp would like it, so when you're ready we'll go.--Ready?"
"No."
"You are a fellow!" said Esau, taking up his pen again. "I say, though, I wish we could get places somewhere else."
"Why not try?"
"Because it would only be to do writing again, and it's what makes me so sleepy. I'm getting worse--keep making figures and writing out catalogues till my head gets full of 'em."
"It is tiring," I said, with a sigh. "But do go on; he'll be so cross if that list isn't finished."
"Can't help it. I'm ever so much more sleepy this morning, and the words get running one atop of another. Look here," he cried, holding up a sheet of ruled paper. "This ought to have been `chest of drawers,' and it's run into one word, `chawers'; and up higher there's another blunder, `loo-table,'--it's gone wrong