So we spent an anxious half-hour, listening to the voices and sound of feet above, and wondering how the interview was going on. Evidently it began with an altercation, and once Billy's shrill treble joined in in a way which sounded very familiar. Eventually the angry tones of the woman ceased, and presently she returned to us, quiet in her manner, though still hunted-looking and mistrustful.

To our relief she was alone.

"I'm coming for him in the morning," said she as she pa.s.sed us.

We could never make out how Jack had subdued her and put her off. When we asked him, he said simply he begged her to wait a little, at any rate, till the boy was better, and had then promised to bring him home himself.

That night I shared Mr Smith's room--or rather I occupied it during his absence, leaving Jack and Billy in possession upstairs.

My reflections during the night were not pleasant. If it had not been for my folly, my sin, in times past, the calamity of this evening would never have happened. These "friends" of former days were not to be shaken off as easily as they had been picked up, and meanwhile it was not I who was made to suffer, but Jack and Billy, who had never been guilty of my follies and sins. And, more than this, I felt the burden of Mr Smith's secret still hanging unrelieved on my mind. And how was I to get rid of it and tell. Jack all, while this anxiety about Billy lasted?

In the early morning Mr Smith returned, and I confided to him all my troubles. He was very sympathetic, and agreed with me that the present was hardly the time to tell Jack his secret. And yet it was plain to see he was in terrible suspense till it should be all over.

We did not sleep much that night, and in the morning hastened to the room above. To our relief, we found Billy much better. He was even grinning as usual as we entered, and greeted us both in very like his old familiar way.

"What cheer!" said he, feebly but cheerily. "I _are_ got a dose off that there Mashing! He do give yer toppers!"

"Come, hush, Billy!" said Jack, pleasantly; "didn't I tell you not to talk?"

"Yaas," said the boy, relapsing abruptly into silence.

His mother, as we rather antic.i.p.ated, did not put in an appearance. My uncle did, and, after ascertaining that all was going on well, went off, leaving, greatly to my astonishment and not a little to my gratification, a sovereign in my hand as he said good-bye.

There was something kindly about my uncle, after all!

Leaving Mr Smith in charge, Jack and I went down to the office that morning with lighter hearts than we had expected to have.

Crow was waiting for us outside the office, with an anxious face.

"I say," said he, as he came up, and not heeding Jack's wrathful looks, "is it true what I hear, that that boy was killed last night?"

"Who told you so?" demanded Jack.

"I heard it from Daly. And Masham has bolted. Is it true, then?"

"No!" said Jack, "and no thanks to you it isn't, you coward!"

Crow had evidently been too much frightened by the news he had heard to resent this hard name. He answered, meekly, "I'm glad it's not true.

I'm ashamed of that affair last night, and there's no harm in telling you so."

This was a good deal to come from a fellow like Crow. We did not reply, but entered the office.

There, for a few hours at least, hard work drove away all other cares.

At dinner-time Jack rushed home, and brought back a further good report of the patient, whom the doctor had seen, and p.r.o.nounced to be making satisfactory progress.

As for me, I stayed at the office and made up for the lost time of the evening before. Part of my work was a grand balancing up of the petty- cash, which, as Hawkesbury was due back next morning, I would then have to be prepared to hand over. It was no small satisfaction to find that my accounts were right to a penny, and to know that in the fair copy of those accounts which I drew up no ingenuity or patience would be able to discover an error. Indeed, I was so particular, that, having made a minute blot in my first fair copy, I went to the trouble of writing out another, absolutely faultless, preserving the other in my desk, as an occasional feast to my own eyes in my self-satisfied moments.

That evening I was strongly tempted to unburden my secret to Jack as we walked home. But I could not bring myself up to the point. At least, I could not do so till we got to the door of our lodgings, and then it was too late, for Jack had rushed to Billy's bedside, and it was hopeless to get him to think of anything else. So I had to wait on, and once more to endure the sight of Mr Smith's anxious, frightened face.

The following morning brought a letter from my uncle, addressed, not to me, but to Jack Smith. It contained a five-pound note, which he said might be useful when Billy's doctor's bill had to be paid, and anything that was over might go to buy the boy a suit of clothes! My uncle was certainly coming out in a new light! It was like him writing to Jack instead of me, and I thought nothing of that. But for him to send a five-pound note for the benefit of a little stranger was certainly a novelty, which surprised as much as it encouraged me about my relative.

The money, as it happened, was very opportune, for neither of us was very flush of cash at the time.

Billy, who was now steadily recovering from the shock of his blow, pleaded very hard to be allowed to get up, and only Jack's express command could keep him in bed.

"Ga on, governor," said he, "let's get up. I ain't a-getting no coppers for that there penny bang, no more I ain't; and I ain't a-larnin'

nothink, and she," (we knew only too well whom he meant), "may be up to all manner of larks, and me not know nothink about it."

"You shall get up soon, when you're better," was Jack's reply.

"I are better, governor."

"Yes, but you won't be unless you lie still for a day or two more, and do what you're told," said Jack, firmly.

Whereat the boy subsided.

Hawkesbury turned up at his place at the office in a benevolent frame of mind, and received over my petty-cash and the beautiful copy of accounts which accompanied it with the utmost condescension.

He was extremely obliged to me, he said, for taking charge of the accounts during his absence, and had no doubt he would find everything correct when he went through the figures. He hoped it had not given me much extra work, and that during his absence I had been in the enjoyment of good health and spirits.

All which "gush" I accepted with due grat.i.tude, wondering inwardly whether he had been actually made a partner since I last saw him--he was so very gracious.

"By the way," said I, when the ceremony was at an end, and feeling a little mischievously inclined, as well as being anxious to vent my feelings on the point--"by the way, your particular friend Masham came to our lodging the other evening."

"Ah, did he?" said Hawkesbury, blandly; "I'm glad he called. He wanted to see you again. He took rather a fancy to you that day, you know."

"Did he?" said I. "I think he was rather sorry he called, though."

"Why?"

"Why, because Smith gave him the thrashing he deserved, and the thrashing he's not likely to forget in a hurry either!"

"I don't understand," said Hawkesbury. "What has Smith to do with my friend Masham?"

"Just what he has to do with any other blackguard," retorted I, warming up.

"Batchelor, you are forgetting yourself, I think," said Hawkesbury. "I hope what you are saying is not true."

"If you mean about Masham being a blackguard," said I, "it's as true as that he is your friend."

"I really don't know what all this means," said Hawkesbury, haughtily.

"I must ask Masham himself."

"I'm afraid you won't find him," I said. "He nearly murdered the boy who was with us at the time. And as the report went out that the child was actually dead, he is prudently keeping out of the way for the present. I'm sure he will be--"

"Excuse me, Batchelor," said Hawkesbury, interrupting. "I really haven't time to talk now. Kindly get on with your work, and I will do the same."

I may not have derived much good by this edifying conversation, but I had at least the satisfaction of feeling that Hawkesbury now knew what I thought of his friend.