“They may thank her for it, that they may,” grumbled Mary, as if speaking to the fire, “for if it wasn’t for her I wouldn’t stop a day longer in their nasty, disagreeable old house. There!”
The toast was by this time done, and Mary was scraping away at a burnt spot, when the bell began to ring more violently than before, with the result that, instead of running off with the toast, Mary deliberately placed it upon the fender and went across to one of the dresser drawers, out of which she took a clean duster.
“Ring away!” she grumbled. “There’s a duster for you, boy. And look here; you must be hungry. Stop a minute and I’ll cut you a slice. Ah, ring away! You don’t frighten me.”
To my horror, she coolly spread thickly a slice of bread, cut it, and handed it to me before buttering the toast with which she at last crawled out of the kitchen, while I literally fled to the office, laid the bread and butter on the desk, and stopped to listen.
At the end of half an hour the bell rang again, and soon after Mary came sulkily into the office with a mug of half-cold weak tea and some lumps, not slices, of bread and butter. These she thrust before me, and I was sadly making my breakfast when Mr Blakeford entered the place.
“Come, make haste!” he said sharply; and as I glanced up at him I read in his face that for some reason or another he had taken a great dislike to me. I could not tell then, nor did I know for long afterwards, why this was; but it grew more evident hour by hour that he hated the sight of my anxious young face, and that my sojourn with him was to be far from pleasant.
He took his seat at the table while I tried to finish my breakfast, but his coming had completely taken away my appetite, and at the end of a few minutes I hastened to take the mug and plate to the kitchen, and then returned to the office.
“Now, sir,” Mr Blakeford began, “just look here. Your father owed me a large sum of money when he died, and I have taken you on here quite out of compassion. Do you hear?”
“Yes, sir,” I faltered.
“Well, you’ve got to learn to be of use to me as soon as you can. You can write, I suppose?”
“Yes, sir – not very well,” I faltered.
“Of course you can’t. No boy brought up as you have been, without going to a school, could be expected to write a decent hand. But look here, you’ll have to try and write well; so take that paper to the desk and copy it out in a neat round hand.”
I took the paper with trembling hands, climbed to the desk, spread the sheet of foolscap ready upon a big piece of blotting-paper, and took up one of the pens before me.
Those were the days before steel nibs had become common, and the pen I took was a quill split up and spoiled.
I took another and another, but they were all the same; and then, glancing at the inkstand, I found that it was dry.
I hardly dared to do it, but he glanced up at me to see if I had begun, and I ventured to say that there was neither pen nor ink.
“Of course not, blockhead. Get down and fetch some off the chimney-piece.”
I gladly obeyed; and then, resuming my seat, with the words on the paper dancing before my eyes, made my first essay as Mr Blakeford’s clerk.
The writing before me was not very distinct, but I managed to decipher it pretty well, getting a little puzzled as to the meaning of “ads.” and “exors.,” with various other legal contractions, but after the first line or two going steadily on, for, bad as my education had been, I was able to write a boy’s neat round hand, consequent upon often copying out lists for my father, or names to label the collections we made.
I had been writing about half an hour, working away diligently enough, when I heard the chair on the other side of the partition scroop, and Mr Blakeford came up behind me. I fully expected a severe scolding or a blow when he took up my sheet of foolscap and scanned it over, but he threw it down before me again with a grunt.
Soon afterwards he rose and went out, leaving me busy over my task, writing till I grew giddy and my head began to ache.
About the middle of the day Mary came in with some bread and meat; and about six o’clock there was another mug of thin tea and some pieces of bread and butter. Then the night came on, the gas was lighted, and I finished my first day in what seemed to be, and really was, as I look back upon it now, little better than a prison.
The days crept slowly by as I took my place each morning at the desk, finding always something fresh to copy in a neat round hand, and at this I patiently toiled on, with my old griefs growing more dull as a little hope began to arise that I might soon see little Hetty to speak to again; but though from time to time I heard the voice and the sound of a piano upon which some one was industriously practising, she never came near the office.
Mr Blakeford seemed as brutal to everyone in the house as he was to me. The only person who did not seem afraid of him was Mary, and upon her his angry scoldings had no effect whatever. To me she was harsh and uncouth as on my first arrival, but, seeing that the amount given me for my meals was disgracefully small, after the first week she did take care that I had a sufficiency of food, although it only took one form.
I remember upon one occasion, having to go to the kitchen door, and finding her muttering angrily to herself, while upon seeing me she exclaimed:
“They’ve been going on about too much butter being used again. Come here!”
I went closer to her, and she hurried into the larder, and came out with a roll of fresh butter and a new loaf, cutting off a thick piece and plastering it excessively with butter.
“There!” she exclaimed, “you go back into the office, and don’t you show your face here again until you’ve eaten up every scrap of that. I’ll teach ’em to grumble about the butter.”
From that day forward Mary was always cutting me great slices of new bread and thickly spreading them with butter.
“There,” she used to say ungraciously, “I don’t like boys, but they shan’t half-starve you while I’m here.”
I was so moved by her unexpected kindness – for it really was done out of goodness of heart – that, having become somewhat hardened to being a confederate in this unlawful acquisition of provender, on one occasion I threw my arms round her neck and kissed her.
“Why, you impudent young scamp, what d’yer mean?” she exclaimed, in astonishment.
“Please, Mary,” I said, “I didn’t mean to be impudent; it was because you were so good to me.”
“Good? Stuff!” she said roughly, “I’m not good. There, get along with you, and don’t you do that again.”
I certainly should have run a good chance of being half-starved but for Mary and another friend.
One day when I opened my desk, I found just inside it a plate with an appetising piece of pudding therein, and concluded that it was Mary’s doing; but I could not be sure, for her benevolence always took the form of thick slices of bread and butter.
The next day there was a piece of cake; another day some apples; another, a couple of tartlets; and at last I determined to hide and see who was the donor of these presents, so welcome to a growing boy. I had made up my mind at last that they came from Hetty, and I was right; for going inside the large paper cupboard one day, instead of going out to fetch the newspaper according to custom, this being one of my new duties, I saw the office door gently open and Hetty’s little head peering cautiously in. Then, satisfied that no one was near, she ran lightly to the big desk; I heard it shut down hastily, and then there was a quiet rustling noise, the office door closed and she was gone.
This went on regularly, and at last one day it occurred to me that I should like to make her a present in return. I had a few shillings, the remains of my pocket-money, and I turned over in my own mind what I should