THE LOST MONEY.
YES, it was Salome's birthday, I remember that quite well; it was so
strange that it should happen on that day, when we were all so happy
and in such good spirits. It was strange that a day which began so
brightly should end, at least for me, so sorrowfully.
I was awake as soon as it was light that morning, and I crept out of
bed to look at Salome. She was sleeping in a little cot near me, for
Bartholomew and Jude were constantly having attacks of croup, and my
mother was obliged to have them in her room, lest they should be taken
ill in the night, and she should not be near them. So she let me take
care of Salome, and sometimes in the night she would wake, and put her
little hand through the bars of her cot, that I might hold it in mine
till she fell asleep again.
The bright morning sunshine was streaming through a hole in the
shutter, and fell on Salome's face as she lay asleep. It made her look
very pretty, I thought, and very much like the picture of a little
angel which was on one of our Christmas cards. Beside her bed was my
present for her, laid on a chair, that she might find it as soon as she
woke. It was a wax doll. I had saved up my money for a long time to buy
it, and it seemed as if Salome's birthday would never come, I had been
waiting for it so long.
But it had come at last, and it was a bright beautiful day, just as
I had so often hoped it might be. I was very impatient for Salome to
wake; but I did not like to disturb her. However, after a time, Simon
woke, and jumped out of bed, when he caught sight of the doll, and then
Salome opened her eyes and saw it too. I shall never forget how pleased
she was, nor how she threw her arms round my neck, and called me her
own dear Peter.
[Illustration: SHE CALLED ME HER OWN DEAR PETER.]
Then the others woke, and every one of them had a present for Salome;
even little Jude had a packet of sweets for her, which he had bought
with his own money.
It was hard work to leave Salome when school-time came, and we went off
very reluctantly. But father would not hear of our having a holiday,
and I think mother was rather glad that he would not. Our holidays
were no holidays for her. Poor mother, they were her hardest days!
So we kissed Salome and set off for school—Andrew, and Philip, and
Bartholomew, Matthew, and Thomas, and Simon, and myself. James helped
father in the shop now, for he was sixteen, and thought himself quite a
man. John was apprenticed to a bookbinder in the town; but I was still
at school.
I was in the first class—the sixth standard it would be called now; but
there were no such things as standards in those days. I was old enough
to leave school, mother said. A lad of fourteen ought to be earning his
own bread, she told my father again and again, and father always nodded
his head in assent; but he could not decide what was to be done with
me. I sometimes wished he would make up his mind, and wondered why it
was such a difficult matter to decide.
But I found out afterwards that our father's mind was never made up
in a hurry. Mother told us once that father had taken five years to
consider whether he should ask her to be his wife or not. So I need not
have been surprised that he could not settle in a hurry what to do with
his boys. Only I wondered sometimes, if the third boy's future was so
hard to plan out, and took so many months to settle, what he would do,
and how many years it would take him to decide what was to be done with
his tenth boy, when the time arrived for little Jude to be started in
life!
And so it came to pass that I was the eldest boy in the school. We did
not go to the school nearest to our house, which would have been far
more convenient, but we went to the same school father had attended
when he was a boy, and which was about a mile farther into the town.
It was a long walk for us, and on wet days we grumbled a good deal at
having to go so far; but father knew the master well, and did not like
us to leave. He was the son of father's old master, and was a really
good teacher, and got us on well.
The lessons seemed very long and tedious that morning, for I was
longing to be at home again with Salome. As soon as school was over,
I caught up my cape and ran down the street. But I had not gone far,
when I heard the master's voice calling me. I ran back to see what he
wanted. He was holding a paper in his hand.
"Here, Peter," he said, "you're a trustworthy lad! I want you to do a
bit of business for me. Isn't Trafalgar Street somewhere up your way?"
I told him it was only five minutes' walk from our house.
"I thought so," he said; "I want you to pay this bill for me. Do you
know Betson's shop in Trafalgar Street? He is a seed merchant."
I knew it quite well.
"My wife owes him five shillings," he said; "here is the money and the
bill. Get it receipted, and bring it back to me to-morrow. You need not
go till after school this afternoon; you will be pressed for time now,
and you must not lose your dinner. Thank you, Peter," he said, as I
told him I would be sure to do it; "it will save me a long walk!"
I was very much pleased that he trusted me, and walked along with an
important air. I carried the bill in one hand, and the five shillings
in the other. I should have put it in my pocket, but I had stuffed it
so full of nuts for Salome, which I had bought for her on my way to
school, that it would hold nothing more. I thought I would put the
money and bill safely away as soon as I got home.
But I had not gone much farther when Tom Walsh, who was in the same
class I was, came softly up behind me, and, thinking he would give
me a start, jumped suddenly on my back. I did not hear him coming,
and the jerk he gave me sent the money out of my hand, and it rolled
along the pavement. Tom ran away, laughing, and left me to pick it up,
which I thought was very rude and unkind. The shillings rolled in all
directions. I ran after than as quickly as I could, and picked them up
but to my horror and dismay I discovered, when I came to count them,
that I had only found four of them.
Where could the other shilling be? What had become of it? I hunted for
it all over. I looked on the pavement, in the gutter, on the road,
everywhere; but it was nowhere to be seen. There was an iron grating
over the drain, close by; it must have rolled in there. If so, it was
gone forever, and it was of no use hunting any more. I turned away from
the place in despair.
"What shall I do?" I said to myself.
I had not a penny in the world. We did not get much pocket-money, and
all my little hoard of savings had been spent on Salome's birthday
present.
I knew what I ought to do. I ought to tell my father of my loss, and
ask him to give me another shilling. But I felt very much afraid to
do this, for the thing which made him most angry was any kind of
carelessness. If we broke anything, or tore anything, or lost anything,
he always punished us very severely. And yet I could not bear the
thought of the disgrace and humiliation of having to go back to school,
and confess my loss to my master. He would never trust me again, and I
should be filled with shame and confusion if I had to acknowledge my
carelessness before my companions.
What was to be done? My conscience told me that I ought to tell my
mother about it when I got in; but I did not want to spoil Salome's
birthday, and there she was at the shop door looking out for me.
I wrapped up the four remaining shillings in the bill, gave her the
nuts out of my pocket, and put the bill and money in their place.
Salome was so merry and happy, I could not bear to make her cry on her
birthday, and I knew she would cry if father was angry with me. So I
resolved to say nothing about my loss to any one at least, not until
the evening.
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