"Good; but write it down so that I don't forget. It's so easy to have
things drop out of your memory."
Tom obeyed, and the visitor took up the slip of paper, glanced at it,
and nodded.
"That's right. Nice clear hand, that one can read easily."
"And Uncle James said my writing was execrable," thought Tom.
"Good-bye for the present, boy. Tell your uncle I've been, and that I
shall come on in time for dinner. Bye. Be a good boy, and stick to
your reading."
He nodded, shook hands rather coldly, and went out, leaving Tom looking
wistfully after him with the big Directory in his hands.
"They neither of them like me," he said to himself, feeling sadly
depressed, when he started, and turned sharply round.
"On'y me, Mr Tom," said the clerk. "I'll take that. Directories
always live in my office. I say, sir."
"Yes, Pringle."
"I used to wish I'd got a lot of rich old uncles, but I don't now.
Wouldn't give tuppence a dozen for 'em. Ketched again!--All right, Mr
Tom, sir; I'll put it away."
For the door opened once more, and their late visitor thrust in his
head.
"Needn't tell your uncle I shall come to-night."
Pringle disappeared with the Directory, and Uncle Richard gazed after
him in a grim way as he continued--
"Do you hear? Don't tell him I shall come; and you needn't mention that
I said he wouldn't want me, nor to his wife and boy neither. Bye."
The door closed again, and the inner door opened, and Pringle's head
appeared once more.
"Nor we don't neither, nor nobody else don't. I say, Mr Tom, I thought
it was the governor. Ever seen him before?"
"Only twice," said Tom. "He has been abroad a great deal. He only came
back to England just before dear mother--"
Tom stopped short, and Pringle nodded, looked very grave, and said
softly--
"I know what you was going to say, Mr Tom."
"And I saw him again," continued the lad, trying to speak firmly, "when
it was being settled that I was to come here to learn to be a lawyer.
Uncle James wanted Uncle Richard to bring me up, but he wouldn't, and
said I should be better here."
"Well, perhaps you are, Mr Tom, sir," said Pringle thoughtfully. "I
don't know as I should care to live with him."
"Nor I, Pringle, for--Here, I say, I don't know why I tell you all
this."
Pringle grinned.
"More don't I, sir. P'r'aps it's because we both get into trouble
together, and that makes people hang to one another. Steps again. Go
it, sir."
The clerk darted away, and Tom started leading once more; but the steps
passed, and so did the long, dreary afternoon, with Tom struggling hard
to master something before six o'clock came; and before the clock had
done striking Pringle was ready to shut up and go.
"You'll take the keys, sir," he said. "Guv'nor won't come back now.
I've got well on with that deed, if he asks you when he comes home.
Good-evening, sir."
"Good-evening, Pringle," said Tom; and ten minutes later he was on his
way to his uncle's house in Mornington Crescent, where he found dinner
waiting for him, and though it was only cold, it was made pleasant by
the handmaid's smile.
Tom began a long evening all alone over another law-book, and at last,
with his head aching, and a dull, weary sense of depression, he went up
to the bedroom which he shared with his cousin, jumped into his own bed
as soon as he could to rest his aching head, and lay listening to a
street band playing airs that sounded depressing and sorrowful in the
extreme, and kept him awake till he felt as if he could never drop off,
and cease hearing the rumble of omnibuses and carts.
Then all at once Mr Tidd came and sat upon his head, and made it ache
ten times worse, or so it seemed--Mr Tidd being the author of one of
the books his uncle had placed in his hands to read.
He tried to force him off, but he would not stir, only glared down at
him laughing loud, and then mockingly, till the torture seemed too much
to be borne; and in an agony of misery and despair he tried to escape
from the pressure, and to assure his torturer that he would strive hard
to master the book. But not a word could he utter, only lie there
panting, till the eyes that glared looked close down into his, and a
voice said--
"Now then, wake up, stupid. Don't be snoring like that."