Dick Chambers
Since the afternoon when Gwen had stopped behind in Stedburgh to
arrange about the broken china, and had been obliged to walk home, she
had seen nothing more of Dick Chambers. She looked out for him every
morning on the bus, but he was not there, and she was just wondering
what had become of him when he turned up in the most unexpected
quarter. It was the Saturday morning after the prize-giving. Saturday
was a whole holiday, and therefore a blissful day, every moment of
which was appreciated. Gwen was returning about ten o'clock from an
errand she had been sent to do in the village, and as she opened the
Parsonage gate she saw in the middle of the front walk a boyish figure
that looked familiar.
"Hello! What are you doing here?" she exclaimed.
"Come on business of a rather particular character," grinned Dick.
"Didn't you know your Father's coaching me?"
"He never said so!"
"He is, though. I'm to come three days a week, from nine to ten, and
I've just made a start this morning. I say, he's a ripping chap!"
"I agree with you there," remarked Gwen. "But why aren't you going to
school?"
"Thereby hangs a tale! I happened to do an idiotic thing one
afternoon--fainted in the lab, and had to be picked up in the midst of
fragments of glass that I'd smashed to smithereens. Then Dad got some
wretched specialist to come down and see me, and the fellow said I
must stop school for this term at any rate."
"Oh, I'm so sorry! Do you feel ill?"
"No. I'm all right--but it's rather rotten, for I'm knocked off
'footer'."
"How sickening for you! I know how wild I should be if I mightn't play
hockey. What may you do?"
"Only just loaf about--not even golf."
"May you go walks?"
"Oh, yes! but it's rather slow mooning about on the moors by oneself."
"Have you been to see Stack Head, where the sea-birds build? Or the
chasms? Oh! you ought to go there! I'll show you the way if you like!"
"I wish you would!"
"There'd be heaps of time this morning--that's to say if I may go,"
added Gwen, suddenly recollecting that she had promised Beatrice on
her honour not to go anywhere without leave. "Oh, here's Dad, so I can
ask him."
"Yes, by all means take Dick to Stack Head, the walk will do him
good," replied Mr. Gascoyne. "Be careful, and don't scramble about too
much, that's all--those cliffs are dangerous, remember!"
"We'll go as cautiously as two pussy-cats," said Gwen.
"Hardly an apt simile!" laughed Mr. Gascoyne, pointing to Pluto, the
black Persian, that was careering madly up a tree at the moment.
"However, you're used to Skelwick rocks, and Dick will have to learn
his footing. Only please don't learn it at the expense of your neck,
Dick! We haven't gone far enough with the Latin prose yet!"
"You needn't be afraid for me, sir, though I came a cropper over old
Cicero this morning," laughed Dick.
It was a beautiful, sunny day in early November; one of those late
autumn days when a little crisp hoar frost lingers in the hollows, but
in the full sunshine it is almost as warm as summer. Gwen fetched a
favourite stick, her indispensable companion on the moors, and,
discarding her jacket, set forth joyously for a five-mile tramp. She
loved the great bare headland that rose behind the Parsonage; there
was a sense of freedom in leaving the houses of the village, and
seeing only sea and sky around, and feeling the short, fine grass
under her feet. It was a stiff climb to the top of the plateau, but
once up there was a tolerably flat walk of about a couple of miles to
the jagged rocks that formed the end of the promontory.
"Isn't it glorious?" said Gwen, when, the scrambling part finished,
they sat for a moment or two on a rock to take breath. Below lay the
clear, grey, even, shimmering surface of the sea, a little hazy at the
horizon, and changing to deepest green as it neared the cliffs, where
the sea-birds wheeled round screaming in sheer joy of life. "Don't you
feel as if you could take a jump from the edge and just go sailing
down like a gull, and land gently on the water, and float off?"
"Better not try the experiment unless you provide yourself with a
parachute! An aeroplane could make a good start up here. Do you ever
get any guillemots' eggs? Or puffins'?"
"Not often; though sometimes the lighthouse men bring us a few. Are
you collecting eggs?"
"Rather! I've got nearly five hundred. I could do with a razor-bill's
or a puffin's."
"You'll have to wait till next summer. June and July are the best
months. I can show you where the birds sit, though. They haven't
proper nests, they just squat on the rocks, packed as close together
as sardines. It's wonderful to see them. And the noise they make! No,
it isn't here, it's over by the chasms; we shall get there soon."
Half an hour's brisk walking brought them to what must have seemed to
the ancient inhabitants of these islands the end of the world. The
headland descended in a sheer precipice into the water, while
wicked-looking rocks showed a black point here and there among the
surf as a warning to any vessel to give them a wide berth. The cliff
was hardly less dangerous than the rocks below, for its surface was
torn into great rugged chasms, each as deep as the sea level, though
often only a few feet in breadth. These curious natural rents wound in
tortuous course to the edge of the precipice, sometimes crossing one
another, and thus leaving islands stranded between, or long
promontories, from the ends of which there would be no escape except
by a jump. Gwen and Dick picked their way carefully along. There was
scarcely need for Mr. Gascoyne's warning; each felt the entire
necessity for extreme caution. Peeping over the edges of the chasms
they could see green ferns growing in splendid clumps in clefts of the
rock, and farther down darkness or a glint of water.
"Ugh! It would be horrible to tumble there!" declared Gwen, shivering
as she gazed into the dim depths. "You don't feel as if you'd ever
come up again, do you? Why, what's that? Did you hear?"
"Nothing but the gulls."
"It's like someone shouting. There it is again--behind us."
"By Jove! it is someone calling. Has anybody slipped down one of these
holes? We'd best go and see, but do be careful. Hello, there! We're
coming!"
Walking, as Gwen had said, like cautious cats, they threaded their way
along the narrow strips of land till they reached the particular chasm
whence the shouts issued. Looking over, they could see on a ledge
about six feet down a little corduroyed, blue-jerseyed figure, and a
frightened, freckled face that peered upwards. Gwen recognized the
urchin in a moment: it was Johnnie Cass, the scapegrace of a family of
fisher folk who lived in the village, and the naughtiest boy in
Winnie's Sunday School class. He was in no immediate danger, for the
ledge was wide, but the wall of rock above him was too steep to admit
of his climbing up.
"Johnnie, what are you doing down there?" she called.
"Oh! boo-hoo-hoo!" wailed the scared voice from below. "I were
reachin' after a sea-gurt with a broke wing and down I cooms!"
"Serve you right, too! How do you intend getting back?"
"I don't know--I wish my mother was 'ere!" and again he broke into a
howl of woe.
"I'm glad she's not--she'd make a worse noise than you, from my
experience of her," murmured Gwen. "Look here!" she continued, turning
to Dick, "I suppose we've got to fish this little wretch up somehow."
"If I reach down can you catch hold of my hand and let me pull you?"
shouted Dick to the snivelling Johnnie.
"Nay! I durstn't stir an inch--oh! where's my mother?"
"He's lost his nerve--that's what's the damage. If I go down for him
could you give me a haul back?"
Gwen shook her head.
"You're too heavy. Better do it the other way. I'll go down, hand up
the kid, and then you shall pull me back. Nonsense! I'm not bothered
with nerves. Shan't mind in the least!"
It seemed the more feasible plan, for the six feet of rock that
sheered down to the ledge was so steep and smooth of surface as to
render it impossible for anyone to climb it without assistance; and it
would be comparatively easy for Dick to drag Gwen's lighter weight to
the top, though a difficult matter for her to pull him. If her heart
went into her mouth as she let herself over the edge, Gwen did not
show it. She was not given to exhibiting the white feather, and both
at school and at home kept up a well-deserved reputation for pluck.
Five seconds landed her by Johnnie's side, and once there she tried
not to look into the gulf below. After some amount of cajoling, she
persuaded the young rascal to take his dirty little fists out of his
eyes, and allow himself to be hoisted up within reach of Dick's firm
grip; then a successful heave did the rest. Johnnie was soon in
safety, but it was much harder work for Gwen to follow; there was
nobody to boost her, and not an inch of ledge on the rock to make a
foothold.
"It's good practice for Alpine climbing!" she gasped, as with
dishevelled hair and grazed face she at last scrambled back. "I
thought my arms were being dislocated."
Dick was rubbing his own arms ruefully, but he did not complain. He
had turned very white. Perhaps the effort of pulling up two people had
been rather too much for him. Gwen suddenly remembered with
compunction that he was ill, and not even allowed the exertion of
golf, much less "footer". She wished she had thought of it before and
gone to the lighthouse for help.
"I'm an idiot," she told herself. "It was I who suggested he should do
the hauling part. I hope he hasn't done himself any harm."
Meantime Johnnie Cass stood surveying Gwen with the grin of Puck.
"Yer face is bleedin', and yer hair's all over yer eyes. Aye, yer do
look a sight!" he volunteered.
Gwen shook him! She really couldn't help it; it relieved her feelings
so very much. After all, it is rather nervy work to go down a chasm;
and though she wouldn't own that she had minded in the least, her legs
seemed weak and queer, and her hands were hot and trembling, and there
was a funny buzzing sound in her head. She was rather ashamed of
herself for losing her temper, however, and tried suddenly to be
dignified.
"Johnnie Cass," she protested solemnly, "you ought to be grateful to
me for saving your life instead of making impertinent remarks!"
Dick burst out laughing.
"Bravo!" he said. "Look here, you kid, if you don't want your head
punched as well you'd best obliterate yourself."
Johnnie took the hint and fled away over the moor, bolting for home
with all possible speed and lifting up his voice as he went in a
melancholy howl. Dick and Gwen sat down on a rock to recover
themselves.
"You've got some pluck--for a girl," said Dick, throwing a pebble into
the chasm. "I didn't expect you'd really go down there and fetch him.
Girls generally stand by and shriek."
"Not modern girls," affirmed Gwen. "They used to do the shrieking
business in oldfashioned novels. It's gone out of fashion since hockey
came in."
"I thought ladies were supposed to scream and wring their slim, fair
hands!"
"Shows you haven't got any sisters! Do my hands look slim and fair?"
"Well, no, they're a good deal more like a boy's," admitted Dick.
"I often wish I were a boy," sighed Gwen regretfully.
"Don't! You're a jolly sight nicer as you are," returned Dick, getting
up to go.
The pair did not reach the Parsonage until after one o'clock, and
Beatrice and Mr. Gascoyne were beginning to wonder what had become of
them.
"I hope Dick's none the worse," said Father rather anxiously when Gwen
poured out the tale of their adventure. "I'm afraid it's been a tiring
morning for him. He had better stop to lunch and have a good rest
afterwards before he attempts to walk home. I'll go and telephone to
his father from the post office and say we're keeping him. Perhaps Dr.
Chambers will say he mustn't come here again if we let him do rash
things!"
The family laughed at the humorous account of the rescue of Johnnie
Cass which Dick and Gwen gave at the dinner table.
"You needn't have expected gratitude from that imp!" said Winnie, who
had suffered many hard experiences in Sunday School. "Possibly his
mother may thank you, but I doubt even that."
"All the same Gwen did her best, and that's a satisfaction," said
Father. "Johnnie's a clever little lad in spite of his naughtiness,
and may turn out better than we expect Some day he may even thank you
for having saved his life. Gwen must keep her eye on him. He owes her
so much it ought to make a bond between them."
"Well, I wish her joy of her protégé," said Winnie, with a dubious
shake of her head.
After that Dick spent many Saturday mornings at the Parsonage. His
father would not allow him to invite his own friends as they always
proved rather too much for him, but the boy was lonely, and found the
Gascoynes pleasant companions. Gwen especially, who was nearest his
own age, became his particular chum, and the two carried out many
experiments together in the way of photography, amateur bookbinding,
and one or two other hobbies in which they were mutually interested.
Dick's lessons with Mr. Gascoyne were over by ten o'clock, and he
generally stayed an hour or two longer, adapting himself so well to
the household that he soon seemed to be almost one of the family.
Giles and Basil adored him, and haunted his footsteps as much as they
were allowed, but their mischievous young fingers generally worked
such havoc among slides and specimens that Gwen was often forced to
turn them out and lock the door upon them.
"Monkeys from the zoo are tame and well-behaved compared with Stumps
and Bazzie," she declared. "If one wants one's things ruined commend
me to two small brothers!"
Gwen was delighted to have found so congenial a friend. Beatrice and
Winnie, being both older, were naturally companions for one another
and were inclined to treat her entirely as one of the younger ones,
forgetting how fast she was growing up, and it was difficult to make
childish little Lesbia interested in anything. Here at last was
somebody who appreciated birds' eggs, and butterflies, and collections
of shells, and pressed flowers; someone who did pen-and-ink drawings
a great deal better than herself, and who knew exactly how to make
lantern slides, and could even manage to mend the toy printing press
that Giles had broken.
Dick was clever with his fingers, and as he was not allowed to read
very much he spent long hours at home constructing wonderful boxes for
birds' eggs, or stretchers for butterflies and moths, or preparing
slides for the microscope.
"I'm going to be a doctor when I grow up," he confided to Gwen, "so
microscopic work will be a help to me. Dad's teaching me a little
scrap of dispensing now, just to amuse me."
"I hope he doesn't let you make up the bottles of medicine!" laughed
Gwen. "I pity the patients."
"Rather not, but I see what goes in them. If you'll come over to the
surgery some day I'll make you taste something for laughing!"
"We should be lost without Dick now," said Gwen one day at tea. "What
shall we do when he goes back to school?"
"I'm afraid that won't be just yet," said Mr. Gascoyne. "He doesn't
get strong as fast as his father hoped. He's a nice lad, not
brilliant, but very painstaking over his work. It's quite a pleasure
to teach him."