Well, Burr, have you made acquaintance with all your schoolfellows?"

I turned scarlet, and was at a loss as to what to say. But there was no occasion for me to feel troubled--the Doctor did not want an answer. He nodded pleasantly, the ladies bowed and pa.s.sed on with him, while Mercer hurried me away.

"What a game!" he said; "and you've only made friends with one. I say, poor old Reb's been fishing all day again for roach, and never caught one. He never does. I wish he'd had the ducking instead of me."

"Nonsense!" I said. "You don't."

"Oh, but I just do," he said. "I say, let's go round and see cook."

"What for?"

"To ask her to dry our clothes for us. This way." He ran off, and I followed him, to pa.s.s through a gate into a paved yard, across which was a sloping-roofed building, at the side of the long schoolroom.

Mercer tapped at a door, and a sharp voice shouted,--

"Come in!"

"Mustn't. Forbidden," said Mercer to me, and he knocked again.

"Don't want any!" shouted the same voice, and a big, sour-looking, dark-faced woman came to the door.

"Oh, it's you, is it, Master Mercer? What do you want?"

"I say, Cookie, this is the new boy."

"Nice pair of you, I'll be bound," she said roughly.

"We've been out, and had an accident, and tumbled into a pond."

"Serve you both right. Wonder you weren't both drowned," she said sharply.

"Don't tell anybody," continued Mercer, in no wise alarmed. "We nearly were, only Jem Roff at Dawson's farm came and pulled us out."

"Oh, my dear bairns," cried the woman, with her face and voice changing, "what would your poor mammas have said?"

"It's all right, though," said Mercer, "only our things are soaked. Do have 'em down and dried for us by the morning."

"Why, of course I will, my dears."

"And, Cookie, we haven't had any dinner, and it's only bread and b.u.t.ter and milk and water."

"Yes; coming," cried the woman, as a door was heard to open, and a voice to call.

"Go along," she said. "They're calling for the bread and b.u.t.ter. You look under your pillows when you go to bed."

"It's all right," said Mercer. "Come along. She came from our town, and knows our people. My father set her brother-in-law's leg once, after he'd tumbled off a hay stack. Isn't she a gruff one when she likes! This way. Let's get in our places now."

We went in to tea, which was only tea for Mr Rebble, who had a small black pot to himself, and a tiny jug of cream; but the bread and b.u.t.ter and milk and water were delicious, and I had made so good a meal that I had forgotten all about our visit to the cook till we had been in bed some time. I was just dozing off to sleep, when I was roused up by Mercer's hand laid across my mouth.

"Don't speak," he whispered; "the others are asleep. Boiled beef sandwiches in a paper bag, and two jam puffs."

"What?" I whispered. "Where?"

"Here--in my fist. They were tucked under my pillow. Now, then, pitch in."

I sat up in bed, and Mercer sat up in his. It was so dark that we could hardly see each other, but the darkness was no hindrance to our eating, and the next minute there was a sound which may be best expressed as ruminating, varied by the faint rustle made by a hand gliding into a paper bag, followed after a long interval by a faint sigh, and--

"Good-night."

"Good-night."

"Think we shall catch cold?"

"I hope not."

"If we do, I've got some capital stuff in a bottle to cure colds, and I'll give you some."

"Thank you," I said, and there was a pause.

"Are you asleep?" I said after a time, during which I had lain thinking about our experience of the day.

"No."

"What are you thinking about?"

"I was wondering whether Mr and Mrs Jem Roff ate all that eel."

Mercer did not say any more just then, and I seemed to glide back into the cottage, where Mrs Roff was frying eel in a pan over the fire, and just as they had asked me to supper, and I was taking my place, a big bell began to ring, and Mercer shouted,--

"Now, Burr junior, time to get up."

I started and looked round, to see that the sunshine was flooding the room, and that the occupants of the other beds were sitting up grinding their knuckles into their eyes, and yawning as if in chorus.

CHAPTER SIX.

We were none the worse for our adventure at the pond, and I very soon settled down to my school life, finding it, as life is, a mixture of pleasure and pain, joy and sorrow, all just as intense to the boy fifty or sixty years ago as it is now that schools are conducted upon very different principles, and a much higher grade of education is taught.

Perhaps a great deal of the teaching at Meade Place would be looked upon now as lax; but in those days the Doctor's school bore a very high character for the boys it had turned out, many of whom had gone into the East India Company's Service, and the princ.i.p.al drawing-room was decorated with presents sent to him by old pupils, Indian jars and cabinets, bra.s.s lotahs and trays, specimens of weapons from Delhi, and ivory carvings; while from pupils who had gone to China and j.a.pan, came bronzes, porcelain, screens, and lacquer of the most beautiful kind.

Neither were the ladies forgotten, Mrs Browne and her daughters being well furnished with Indian scarves, muslin, and Canton c.r.a.pe shawls.

It was, of course, on account of his connection with so many officers that my uncle had chosen this school as the one most likely to prepare me for my future career.

When I first went down, Mr Rebble was the only a.s.sistant the doctor had; but I soon learned that the French master came twice a week from Rye, that the other usher had left to go into partnership with a friend in a school at Lewes, and that another was coming in a few days.

The Doctor was one of my informants, for, after pa.s.sing me through a general examination as to my capabilities, he told me that I was in a most hopeless state of ignorance, and that as soon as the a.s.sistant master, Mr Hasnip, arrived, I should have to go under his special charge.