Burr Junior Part 38

The General looked at him sharply.

"Not kill it?"

"No, sir. Please let it go."

"To live on my rabbits, eh? There, put it in your pocket. And now, you be off with you, and if I don't have your skins well loosened to-morrow, I'll--You'll see."

He marched off in one direction, while our guard took us in the other, talking at us all the time.

"Disgraceful!" Mr Rebble said. "The Doctor will be nearly heart-broken about such a stigma upon his establishment. I don't know what he'll say."

"They will be expelled, I presume," said Mr Hasnip softly. "It is very sad to see such wickedness in those so young."

"I'm afraid so," replied Mr Rebble; and they kept up a cheerful conversation of this kind till we reached the school, where we were at once ordered up to our dormitory, and dropped down upon the sides of our beds to sit looking at each other.

"I say, you've done it now," said Mercer at last; "and I did think we were going to have such fun."

"Fun!" I said; "it's dreadful!"

"It was capital fun till they all came and spoiled it for us. I wouldn't care about being expelled--at least not so much, only my father will be so disappointed."

This made me think of my mother, and of what my uncle would say if I were dismissed from the school in disgrace; and I shivered, for this was the most terrible part of all.

"I tell you what," said Mercer, "we're in for it, and no mistake; and we didn't do it to steal. We only wanted a bit of sport and some rabbits to stuff. Let's tell the doctor we're very sorry, and ask him to flog us. It would be too bad to expel us in disgrace. What do you say?"

"They may flog me," I said sadly; "but I couldn't go home again in disgrace like that."

"Of course not; and it's too bad to call it poaching. I'm sorry we went, though, now."

"Yes," I said, "I'm sorry enough;" and we sat there, miserable enough, waiting till the other boys came up, and it was time to go to bed.

We had not begun to undress, when the door was opened, and three heads were thrust in, and to our disgust, as we looked up, we saw that they belonged to our three princ.i.p.al tormentors, who began at us in a jeering way.

"Hallo, poachers!" said Burr major; "where are the rabbits?"

"I say," cried Hodson, "you fellows are going to be expelled. Leave us the stuffed guys, Senna."

"He won't," cried d.i.c.ksee; "he'll want the skins to make a jacket--a beggar!"

"You're a set of miserable cowards," I said indignantly, "or you wouldn't come and jump upon us now we are down."

"You give me any of your cheek, Burr junior, and I'll make you smell fist for your supper."

"Pst! Some one coming!" whispered Hodson, and the three scuffled away, for there were footsteps on the stairs, and directly after Mr Rebble appeared.

"Mercer, Burr junior," he said harshly, "Doctor Browne requests that you will not come down till he sends for you in the morning. As for you, young gentlemen, you will take no notice of the door being fastened; I shall be up here in time to let you out. Good-night."

He went out, and closed and locked the door, and we heard him take out the key and go down the stairs.

"Well, that's a rum one!" cried Mercer. "I say, Burr, old Rebble made an Irish bull, or something like it. How can we go down if the door's locked?"

"It's because they're afraid we shall run away," I said bitterly. "They needn't have thought that."

And somehow that first part of our punishment seemed to be the most bitter of all. It kept me awake for hours, growing more and more low-spirited; and, to make me worse, as I lay there listening to the loud breathing of the boys, Mercer having gone off like the rest, as if nothing was the matter, I could hear an owl come sailing about the place, now close at hand, and now right away in the distance, evidently in Sir Hawkhurst's old park, where, no doubt, it had a home in one of the great hollow beeches. Every now and then it uttered its mournful _hoi, hoi, hoi, hoi_! sounding exactly like some one calling for help, and at times so real that I was ready to awaken Mercer and ask him if he thought it was a bird; but just as I had determined to do so, he spoke half drowsily from his pillow.

"Hear the old owl," he said. "That's the one I told you about the other night. It isn't the same kind as we saw in old Dawson's oast-house.

They screech. Get out, you old mouser! I want to sleep."

The owl kept on with its hooting; but Mercer had what he wanted, for he dropped asleep directly, and I must have followed his example immediately after, for the next thing I remember is feeling something warm on my face, which produced an intense desire to sneeze--so it seemed, till I opened my eyes, to find that the blind had been drawn, and Mercer was tickling my nose with the end of a piece of top string twisted up fine.

"Be quiet. Don't!" I cried angrily, as I sat up. "Hallo! where are the other fellows?"

"Dressed and gone down ever so long ago. Didn't you hear the bell?"

"No; I've been very sound asleep," I said, beginning to dress hurriedly.

"Shall we be late? Oh!"

"What's the matter?"

"I'd forgotten," I said; for the whole trouble of the previous evening had now come back with a rush.

"Good job, too," said Mercer. "That's why I didn't wake you. Wish I was asleep now, and could forget all about it. I say, it ain't nice, is it?"

I shook my head mournfully.

"It's always the way," continued my companion, "one never does have a bit of fun without being upset after it somehow. We went fishing, and nearly got drowned; I bought the ferret, and we lost it; we went in for lessons in boxing, and I never grumbled much, but oh, how sore and stiff and bruised I've often been afterwards. And now, when we go for just an hour to try the ferret, we get caught like this. There's no real fun in life without trouble afterwards."

"One always feels so before breakfast," I said, as dolefully as Mercer now, and I hurriedly finished dressing. Then we went to the window, and stood looking out, and thinking how beautiful everything appeared in the morning sunshine.

"I say, Tom," I said at last, "don't you wish you were down-stairs finishing your lessons, ready for after breakfast?"

"Ah, that I do!" he cried; "and I never felt so before."

"That's through being locked up like in prison," I said philosophically.

"Yes, it's horrid. I say, the old Doctor won't expel us, will he?"

"I hope not," I said.

"But he will old Magglin. You see if he don't."

"Well, I'm not sorry for him," I said; "he has behaved like a sneak."

"Yes; trying to put it all on to us."

We relapsed into silence for some time. We had opened the window, and were looking out at the mists floating away over the woods, and the distant sea shining like frosted silver.

"Oh, I do wish it was a wet, cloudy morning!" I said at last.