"He isn't hurt much," cried Dexter indignantly.

"How dare you, sir!" roared Sir James.

"He's killed; he's killed!" cried Lady Danby, clasping her hands, and rocking herself to and fro as she gazed at the shrieking boy, who only wanted a cold sponge and a towel to set him right.

"Ow!" yelled Edgar, as he appreciated the sympathy of his mother, but believed the very worst of his unfortunate condition. The lady now bent over him, said that he was killed, and of course she must have known.

Edgar had never read _Uncle Remus_. All this was before the period when that book appeared; but his conduct might very well be taken as a type of that of the celebrated Brer Fox when Brer Rabbit was in doubt as to whether he was really dead or only practising a ruse, and proceeded to test his truth by saying, as he saw him stretched out--

"Brer Fox look like he dead, but he don't do like he dead. Dead fokes hists up de behime leg, en hollers _wahoo_!"

Edgar, according to Brer Rabbit's ideas, was very dead indeed, for he kept on "histing up de behime leg, en hollering _wahoo_!" with the full power of his lungs.

By this time the alarm had spread, and there was the sound of steps upon a gravel walk, which resulted in the appearance of the supercilious footman.

"Carry Master Edgar up to the house," said Sir James, in his severest magisterial tones.

"Carefully--very carefully," wailed her ladyship piteously; and she looked and spoke as if she feared that as soon as the boy was touched he would tumble all to pieces.

Dexter looked on, with his eyes turning here and there, like those of some captured wild animal which fears danger; and as he looked he caught sight of the footman gazing at him with a peculiar grin upon his countenance, which seemed to be quite friendly, and indicated that the man rather enjoyed the plight in which his young master was plunged.

Master Edgar howled again as he was raised, and directly after began to indulge in what the plantation negroes used to call "playing 'possum"-- that is to say, he suddenly became limp and inert, closing his eyes, and letting his head roll about, as if there were no more bone left in his body, while his mother wrung her hands, and tried then to hold the head steady, as the footman prepared to move toward the house.

"Now, sir," said Sir James sternly, "come here. We will have a few words about this in my library."

Accustomed for years past to obey, Dexter took a step forward to accompany the stern-looking man before him to the house; but such a panorama of troublous scenes rose before his mind's eye directly, that he stopped short, gave one hasty glance round, and then, as Sir James stretched forth his hand, he made one bound which landed him in a clump of hollyhocks and dahlias; another which took him on to the gra.s.s; and then, with a rush, he dashed into a clump of rhododendrons, went through them, and ran as hard as he could go toward the house.

For a few moments Sir James was too much astounded to speak. This was something new. He was accustomed to order, and to be obeyed.

He had ordered Dexter to come to him, and for answer the boy had dashed away.

As soon as Sir James could recover his breath, taken away in his astonishment, he began to shout--

"Stop, sir! Do you hear? How dare you?"

If a hundred Sir Jameses had been shouting it would not have stayed Dexter, for he had only one idea in his head just then, and that was to get away.

"Put down Master Edgar, and go and fetch that boy back."

"Carefully! Oh, pray, put him down carefully," cried Lady Danby pa.s.sionately.

Just then Master Edgar uttered a fresh cry, and his mother wailed loudly.

"No, never mind," cried Sir James, "carry him up to the house; I will fetch that young rascal."

He strode off angrily, evidently believing in his own mind that he really was going to fetch Dexter back; but by that time the boy had reached the house, ran round by the side, dashed down the main street, and was soon after approaching the bridge over the river, beyond which lay the Union and the schools.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

AN EXPLANATION.

For a few moments Dexter's idea was to go to the great gates, ring the porter's bell, and take sanctuary there, for he felt that he had disgraced himself utterly beyond retrieving his character. Certainly, he never dared go back to the doctor's.

He felt for a moment that he had some excuse, for Edgar Danby had brought his punishment upon himself; but no one would believe that, and there was no hope for the offender but to give up everything, and go back to his former life.

But, as the boy reached the gloomy-looking workhouse entrance, and saw the painted bell-pull, through whose coating the rust was eating its way, he shivered.

For there rose up before him the stern faces of Mr Hippetts and Mr Sibery, with the jeering crowd of schoolfellows, who could laugh at and gibe him for his downfall, and be sure to call him Gentleman Coleby, as long as they were together, the name, under the circ.u.mstances, being sure to stick.

No, he could not face them there, and beside, though it had never seemed so before, the aspect of the great building was so forbidding that he shrank away, and walked onward toward the outskirts of the town, and on, and on, till he found himself by the river.

Such a sensation of misery and despair came over him, that he began walking along by the bank, seeing nothing of the glancing fish and bright insects which danced above the water. He had room for nothing but the despondent thoughts of what he should do now.

"What would the doctor think of him? What would Helen say?" He had been asked out to spend the day at a gentleman's house, and he had disgraced himself, and--

"Hullo!"

Dexter looked up sharply, and found that he had almost run against his old fishing friend of the opposite side of the river.

"Hullo!" stammered Dexter in reply.

"Got dry again?" said the boy, who was standing just back from the water's edge, fishing, with his basket at his side, and a box of baits on the gra.s.s.

"Got dry?" said Dexter wonderingly.

"Yes! My!" cried the boy, grinning, "you did have a ducking. I ran away. Best thing I could do."

"Yes," said Dexter quietly; "you ran away."

"Why, what yer been a-doing of? Your face is scratched, and your hands too. I know: you've been climbing trees. You'll ketch it, spoiling your clothes. That's got him."

He struck and landed a small fish, which he took from the hook and dropped into his basket, where there were two more.

"They don't bite to-day. Caught any down your garden!"

"No," said Dexter, to whom the company of the boy was very cheering just then. "I haven't tried since."

"You are a fellow! Why, if I had a chance like you have, I should be always at it."

"I say, what did you say your name was?"

"Bob Dimsted--Bob," said the fisher, throwing in again. "I know what yours is. You come out of the workus."

"Yes," said Dexter sadly, as he wondered whether he did not wish he was there now. "I came out of the workus--workhouse," he added, as he remembered one of Helen's teachings.

"Why don't you get your rod some day, and a basket of something to eat, and come right up the river with me, fishing? There's whackers up there."