Having wrung a somewhat unwilling consent, Katrine hurried away before Githa had time to change her mind. In defiance of all school rules she and Gwethyn went straight to the village, and called at Mr. Freeman's lodgings. They found their friend painting in his studio, and, having first pledged him to strictest secrecy, poured out their story.

"Whew! Poor little chap!" he exclaimed. "He seems to have got himself into a precious mess! Sleeping on straw, did you say? And living on sc.r.a.ps his sister brings him? No, no! He mustn't think of running off to America. So Mr. Ledbury is his uncle? The solicitor at Carford? Well, as it happens, he's doing some legal business for me at present, so I fancy I might open negotiations with him, very diplomatically, of course.

Don't be afraid! I'll stand the boy's friend. It's high time they were thinking what to make of him. Leave it in my hands, and I'll see if I can't talk the uncle round."

"Oh, thanks so much!" exclaimed the girls. "You don't know what a relief it is to hand the matter over to you. Now we must scoot, or we shall get into trouble at school ourselves."

On this occasion, Katrine and Gwethyn went straight to Mrs. Franklin's study, and reported themselves for having broken bounds. The Princ.i.p.al glared at them, entered the offence in her private ledger, and harangued them on its enormity; but as they had made voluntary confession, she gave them no special punishment. On the whole, they considered they had got off rather more easily than they had expected.

"I can't bear to think of that poor laddie sleeping all alone in that dismal old house," said Katrine, as the sisters went to bed that night.

"It gives me the creeps even to imagine it. He looked a jolly boy. He and Githa seem to have hard luck. It was too bad to leave them utterly to their uncle's charity."

"The grandfather ought to have provided for them properly," agreed Gwethyn. "People should make just wills before they die."

Githa came to school the next morning with dark rings round her eyes.

She admitted having lain awake most of the night, worrying about her brother.

"If Mr. Freeman can't help us, Ceddie means to start to-night for Liverpool," she whispered to Gwethyn during the interval.

The three girls spent an anxious day. They wondered continually if their friend were working on their behalf, and with what success. At about half-past three, Mr. Freeman called at the school, and asked Mrs.

Franklin's permission to speak to Katrine. He had good news to report.

He had seen Mr. Ledbury and had spoken to him about Cedric, without betraying the boy's whereabouts, which indeed he did not himself know.

He found that Mr. Ledbury exhibited the utmost relief at hearing tidings of the runaway. He said he had been making inquiries, and discovered, through information given him by one of the under masters, that the school was not what he had thought it to be, and that the punishment given to his nephew had been excessive and brutal in the extreme. He was sorry that he had ever placed the boy in Mr. Hawkins's charge, and should at once remove him. He sent a message to Cedric, telling him to return home, and that all would be forgiven. He seemed anxious to do his best for his nephew, and to give him a good start in life.

"I was able to make a proposition," added Mr. Freeman, "which opens a way for the boy's immediate future. My brother is in the Admiralty Department, and I am almost sure that I can persuade him to give Cedric a nomination for the navy. They want lads of his age at present, and I should think the life would just suit the young chap. So let his sister tell him to go home. I don't suppose his uncle will exactly kill the fatted calf for him, but he won't be thrashed or sent back to school.

I'll guarantee that."

Githa's eyes shone with grat.i.tude when Katrine told her the result of Mr. Freeman's kind offices as peacemaker.

"Oh! I am so relieved--so thankful! Ceddie would love to get into the navy! It would be far nicer than enlisting as a private. How proud I should be of him in his uniform! I'll fly now on my bike to the Grange, and get Ceddie to come straight home with me. I believe Aunt Julia will be glad. Oh, how ripping to have Cedric at home again! You and Gwethyn are just the biggest trumps on earth!"

As Mr. Freeman had prognosticated, the runaway was not received with any great outward demonstration of joy by his uncle and aunt, though both were secretly much relieved at his reappearance. Matters took an unexpected turn, however, for the poor lad had caught cold by sleeping on damp straw in the empty house, and was confined to bed with a sharp attack of rheumatism. His illness brought out all the kindness in his aunt's nature. She had always had rather a soft corner for him, though she had not been willing to admit it, and had generally persuaded herself that the two children were a burden. She nursed him well now, and was so good to him during his convalescence that Githa's manner thawed, and the girl was more at ease with her aunt than she had ever been before--a wonderfully pleasant and unusual state of affairs.

Mr. Freeman's representations at the Admiralty had the desired effect.

Cedric received his nomination, and in due course, when the doctor would p.r.o.nounce him fit, was to go up for his examination. He was wild with enthusiasm.

"If I can only get quickly into the fighting line," he declared, "won't I just enjoy myself!"

"Get well first," commanded Githa, whose sisterly pride seemed to think her brother destined to become at least an admiral.

CHAPTER XIV

A Midnight Alarm

Mr. Bob Gartley had not the best of reputations in Heathwell. He had more than once been convicted on a charge of poaching, and had served time in Carford jail. Of late his aversion to work had become so marked that his presence in the bosom of his family seemed a doubtful benefit to his wife and his olive branches. The numerous young Gartleys learnt rapidly to scuttle out of reach of the parental fist, and spent a great portion of their time sitting upon curb-stones or playing under hedgerows, oblivious of damp or dirt, while poor Mrs. Gartley, who received the brunt of her spouse's ill-humour, covered up her bruises and put the best face she could on the matter towards the world. Her labours had to provide for the household; her better half's uncertain and occasional earnings being liable to be forestalled at the "Dragon".

"Why they gives him credit pa.s.ses me!" she confided to Mrs. Stubbs, who, having gone through similar experiences, was loud in her condolence.

"It be a speculation on Stephen Peters's part," replied the worthy vendor of antiques. "He knows he can get it in kind, if not in cash, and he be fond of a pheasant for his Sunday's dinner. But Bob had best be careful, for the keepers are on the watch more than ever, and if he is taken again so soon, he'll get an extra hard sentence."

"I'm sure I've warned him till I'm hoa.r.s.e, but it seems no use. He never listens to I."

One Sunday morning, the obdurate Bob Gartley might have been found sitting by the fireside in his own kitchen. He was attired in his shirt-sleeves, and had not yet had the temerity to attempt either washing or shaving, but he consoled himself for these deficiencies by puffing away at his pipe, and taking an occasional glance into a saucepan whence issued a savoury odour strongly suggestive of hare, or some other unlawful delicacy. The seven little Gartleys, having found their father in a very unsabbatical frame of mind, had wisely removed themselves from his vicinity, and were at present scrambling about in the road, awaiting with impatience the arrival of the dinner-hour, coming to the door occasionally to indulge in antic.i.p.atory sniffs, but being promptly scared away by a warning growl from the arm-chair.

"Keep they brats out of my sight!" roared Mr. Gartley fiercely, turning to his wife, who was making a slight endeavour to tidy up the cottage.

"Why can't you pack 'em off to Church and Sunday School? I were always sent regular when I were a boy."

"Much good it's done for you!" retorted Mrs. Gartley scornfully. "Not but what I'd send the children if they'd any decent clothes to their backs. I'd be 'shamed to let 'em go, though, in the same rags they wears week in and week out, and their toes through the ends of their boots!"

"It don't be fair as we poor folks should have to take the leavin's of everything," remarked Mr. Gartley, waxing sententious. "Why shouldn't my children be dressed as well as Captain Gordon's?"

"Because you can't buy 'em the clothes, I suppose. What's the use of askin' such questions?"

"I'd like to see 'em in white dresses and tweed suits," continued Mr.

Gartley, who might have been a model father as far as aspirations were concerned; "a-settin' off proper and regular to Church of a Sunday."

"Precious likely, when all you've got goes at the 'Dragon'."

"It's a shame as some should be rich and some poor. There were a man come round last election time, and said as how everything ought to be divided up equal, share and share alike, and the workin' cla.s.ses wouldn't stand bein' oppressed much longer. They'd rise and throw off the yoke. Those was his very words. Some as is doin' nothing now would have to set their hands to work."

"If you mean yourself, it might be a good business."

"No, it's the idle rich I be talkin' of, like Mr. Everard or Captain Gordon, or even Parson; for what does he do, I should like to know, beyond preach, and that's an easy enough job. What right have Captain Gordon or Mr. Everard to the hares and pheasants? They be wild things, and I says let anybody take 'em as can catch 'em. The folks in Scripture went out huntin', and we're not told as it was called poachin'. They didn't bring Esau up before the magistrates for gettin' his venison."

Mrs. Gartley shook her head. Such reasoning was utterly beyond her powers of argument.

"I reckon times was different then," she ventured. "They be cruel bad for us poor folks just now."

"We'd be as good as anybody else if we had the money," urged her husband. "You're a fine-lookin' wench still, Jane, if you'd a silk dress and a big hat with feathers like Mrs. Gordon's."

"What's the use o' talkin'?" replied Mrs. Gartley, amazed at the unwonted compliment. "I'm never likely to wear a silk dress this side o'

the grave."

"Unlikelier things has come to happen than that! We might be somebodies if----"

"If what?"

"If something I've got in my mind was to come off."

"What do you mean?"