Quicksilver Part 78

"Fastened up to that old tree."

"Oh, is it!" cried Bob derisively. "I should like to see it, then.

Come and show me!"

Dexter ran to the water's edge, and found the place on the bark where the chain had rubbed the trunk, but there was no sign of the boat.

"Now then," cried Bob fiercely, "where is it?"

"I don't know," said Dexter dolefully. "Yes, I do," he cried. "The chain must have come undone, and it's floating away."

"Oh, is it?" said Bob derisively. "Then you'd better go and find it!"

"Go and find it?"

"Yes; we can't go to sea in our boots, can we, stoopid?"

"But which way shall I go, Bob? Sometimes the tide runs up, and sometimes it runs down."

"Yes, and I'll make you run up and down. You're a nice un, you are! I just shet my eyes for a few minutes, and trust you to look after the boat, and when I wake up again you're fa.s.s asleep, and the boat gone."

"I'm very sorry, Bob, but I was so tired."

"Tired! You tired! What on? Here, go and find that boat!"

Dexter started off, and ran along the bank in one direction, while Bob went in the other, and at the end of half an hour Dexter came back feeling miserable and despondent as he had never felt before.

"Found it, Bob!" he said.

For answer his companion threw himself down upon his face, and began beating the ground with his fists, as if it were a drum.

"I've looked along there as far as I could go," said Dexter sadly.

"What shall we do!"

"I wish this here was your stoopid head," snarled Bob, as he hammered away at the bare ground beneath the tree. "I never see such a chap!"

"But what shall we do?" said Dexter again.

"Do? I dunno, and I don't care. You lost the boat, and you've got to find it."

"Let's go on together and walk all along the bank till we find somebody who has seen it."

"And when we do find 'em d'yer think they'll be such softs as to give it to us back again!" This was a startling question.

"I know 'em," said Bob. "They'll want to know where we got it from, and how we come by it, and all sorts o' nonsense o' that kind. Say we ain't no right to it. I know what they'll say."

"But p'r'aps it's floating about?"

"P'r'aps you're floating about!" cried Bob, with a snarl. "Boat like that don't go floating about without some one in it, and if it does some one gets hold of it, and says it's his."

This was a terrible check to their adventurous voyage, as unexpected as it was sudden, and Dexter looked dolefully up in his companion's face.

"I know'd how it would be, and I was a stoopid to bring such a chap as you," continued Bob, who seemed happiest when he was scolding. "You've lost the boat, and we shall have to go back."

"Go back!" cried Dexter, with a look of horror, as he saw in imagination the stern countenance of the doctor, his tutor's searching eyes, Helen's look of reproach, and Sir James Danby waiting to ask him what had become of the boat, while Master Edgar seemed full of triumph at his downfall.

"Go back?" No he could not go back. He felt as if he would rather jump into the river.

"We shall both get a good leathering, and that won't hurt so very much."

A good leathering! If it had been only the thrashing, Dexter felt that he would have suffered that; but his stay at the doctor's had brought forth other feelings that had been lying dormant, and now the thrashing seemed to him the slightest part of the punishment that he would have to face. No: he could not go back.

"Well, whatcher going to do!" said Bob at last, with provoking coolness.

"You lost the boat, and you've got to find it."

"I will try, Bob," said Dexter humbly. "But come and help me."

"Help yer? Why should I come and help yer? You lost it, I tell yer."

Bob jumped up and doubled his fists.

"Now then," he said; "get on, d'yer hear? get on--get on!"

At every word he struck out at Dexter, giving him heavy blows on the arms--in the chest--anywhere he could reach.

Dexter's face became like flame, but he contented himself with trying to avoid the blows.

"Look here!" he cried suddenly.

"No, it's you've got to look here," cried Bob. "You've got to find that there boat."

Dexter had had what he thought was a bright idea, but it was only a spark, and it died out, leaving his spirit dark once more, and he seemed now to be face to face with the greatest trouble of his life. All his cares at the Union, and then at the doctor's, sank into insignificance before this terrible check to their adventure. For without the boat how could they get out of England? They could not borrow another. There was a great blank before him just at this outset of his career, and try how he would to see something beyond he could find nothing: all was blank, hopeless, and full of despair.

Had his comrade been true to him, and taken his share of the troubles, it would have been bad enough; but it was gradually dawning upon Dexter that the boy he had half-idolised for his cleverness and general knowledge was a contemptible, ill-humoured bully--a despicable young tyrant, ready to seize every opportunity to oppress.

"Are you a-going?" cried Bob, growing more brutal as he found that his victim made no resistance, and giving him a blow on the jaw which sent him staggering against one of the trees.

This was too much; and recovering himself Dexter was about to dash at his a.s.sailant when he stopped short, for an idea that seemed incontrovertible struck him so sharply that it drove away all thought of the brutal blow he had received.

"I know, Bob," he cried.

"Know? What d'yer know?"

"Where the boat is."

"Yer do?"

"Yes: that man followed us and took it away."

Bob opened his mouth, and half-closed his eyes to stare at his companion, as he balanced this idea in his rather muddy brain.