The Lost Middy Part 6

"I feel sure he would, Tom."

"Well, Master Aleck, I dessay you knows best, but come I will if you'd like me to, sir."

"Yes, I know that, Tom," cried the boy, warmly, "but it would be better for me to go in alone."

"Think so, sir?"

"Yes, I'm sure of it."

"Well, p'raps you're right, sir. It seems more brave British seaman to face the enemy straightforward like. Not as I mean, sir, as the captain's a enemy, but on'y just standing for one till the row's over.

D'yer see?"

"Yes, I see, Tom, and I've been thinking, too, that it will be enough for me to go in and face uncle at once, and for you not to wait to be paid for this journey."

"Oh, I don't want no paying, my lad, for a little job like this. Think of the times when you've give me pretty nigh all the fish you've caught!"

"But uncle said you were to be paid, Tom."

"Very well, sir. Let him pay me then nex' time he sees me. That'll be all right. You'll be sending a rock through the boat's planks afore long, and I shall have to come over and put a bit o' noo planking in.

The captain will pay me then. I say, it's time we put her about. We can make a good bit this reach. Strikes me that the wind's more abeam than when we started."

"Is it?" said Aleck, drearily, and he felt that it would have been far more satisfactory for it to be dead ahead, or to be blowing so fiercely that they would be compelled to put back to Rockabie, and his return home deferred to another day.

As it was, it became more and more favourable, and an easy pa.s.sage was made round the great promontory, while the current that rushed round the point and raced outward was so calmed down by the tide being just at the turn that the boat glided round and into smooth water, the stack rocks soon after coming into sight, and, with what seemed to the lad like horrible rapidity, they ran in under the rocks and pa.s.sed the regular rookery of sea-birds, whose cries were deafening when they were close in.

"Say when," cried the sailor, who had given up the tiller to Aleck and stepped forward ready to lower the sail.

"Now!" cried the lad, dismally, a few minutes later; and down came the sail, while in obedience to the rudder the boat glided in between the two walls of perpendicular rock, running in for some little distance before it became necessary for the sailor to help her along by means of the boat-hook and guide her right into her little haven.

Here Tom Bodger was quite at home, and as active as the boat's owner, stumping about inside, and then hopping off one of the thwarts on to the rocks, ready to take mast, yard, oars, and boat-hook up into their places, securing the boat's painter to the big ring-bolt, and then taking one side while Aleck took the other and swinging her right up on to the rocks.

"There we are, then," said the sailor, a few minutes later; "all ship-shape and snug. Shall I put them baits back in the coorge?"

"No, no, Tom," said Aleck, dismally; "empty the bucket into the sea, and give them a chance for their lives."

"Ay, that's right, Master Aleck, for they begin to look as if they'd been too long in the bucket."

This latter was emptied, and then the couple began to ascend the gap towards the opening into the sunk garden. Tom stopped after getting over the stones like the rock-hopper penguin.

"I'll slip off now, Master Aleck, case the captain may be out in the garden," whispered the sailor.

"Yes, you'd better go now, Tom. Do I look so very bad?"

"Tidy, sir, tidy; but don't you mind that. Go right at him, and let him know as soon as you can that you beat. You'll be all right then. Maybe he'll let out at you at first, but all the time he'll be beginning to feel that you leathered a big hulking chap as is the worst warmint in Rockabie, and you'll come out all right. Day, Master Aleck!"

"Good day, Tom, and thank you. I'll remind uncle about your shillings if he forgets."

"He won't forget, sir; the captain's a gen'leman as never forgets nothing o' that sort. Now then, sir, ram your little head down and lay yourself aboard him. Nothing like getting it over. Head first and out of your misery, same as when I learned you to swim."

Tom Bodger shut one eye, gave the lad a frown and a knowing look, and then away he went up a rugged staircase-like pathway to the top of the cliff, looking every moment, while Aleck watched, as if he would slip off, but never slipping once, and finally turning at the top to take off and wave his hat, and then he was gone.

CHAPTER FIVE.

"Oh, dear!" groaned Aleck. "How am I to face him?" and he went on till only a few steps divided him from the cultivated garden, where he stopped again. "I wonder where he is. In the study, I suppose--write, write, write, at that great history. Can't I leave it and get into my room with a bad headache? It's only true. It aches horribly. I'll send word by Jane that I'm too poorly to come down. Bah!" muttered the boy. "What nonsense; he'd come up to me directly with something for me to take. I wonder whether he is in his room or out in the garden. He mustn't see me till I've been up into my room and done something to my hair. Perhaps he's in the summer-house and I can get in and upstairs without his seeing me. Oh, if I only--"

"Hullo! Aleck, lad, what are you doing there? Why are you so late?

Dinner has been ready quite an hour."

The captain had suddenly appeared from behind a great clump of waving tamarisk, and stood looking down at the lad.

"I was coming to see if you were in sight, and--why, what in the name of wonder is the matter with you? Where have you been? Why, by all that's wonderful, you've been fighting!"

"Yes, uncle," said the lad, with a gasp of relief, for it seemed to him as if, instead of taking the bold plunge, swimming fashion, he had been suddenly dragged in.

"I thought so," cried the captain, angrily. "Here--no, stop; come up to the house, to my room. We can't talk here."

"I don't see why not," thought the lad, dismally. "There's plenty of room, and we could get it over more easily, even if he does get into a furious pa.s.sion with me."

But the captain had wheeled round at once and began to stump back along over the sh.e.l.l and crunching spar-gravel path, his chin pressed down upon his chest, and not uttering a word, only coughing slightly now and then, as if to clear his voice for the fierce tirade of angry words that was to come.

He did not glance round nor speak, but strode on, evidently growing more and more out of temper, the lad thought, for as he walked he kept on kicking the loose sh.e.l.ly covering of the path over the flower beds, while the silence kept up seemed to Aleck ominous in the extreme.

"But, never mind," he thought; "it must soon be over now. What a sight I must look, though! He seemed to be astonished."

Culprit-like, the lad followed close at his uncle's heels till the side entrance was reached, where, with what seemed to be another sign of his angry perturbation, the old officer stopped short, rested one hand upon the door-post to steady himself, and began to very carefully do what was not the slightest degree necessary, to wit: he sc.r.a.ped his shoes most carefully over and over again--for there was not even a sc.r.a.p of dust to remove.

"Stand back a moment, sir," cried the captain, suddenly. "Jane has heard us, and is carrying in the dinner. Don't let her see you in that state."

Aleck shrank to one side, and then as a door was heard to close, started forward again in obedience to his uncle's order.

"Now in, quick--into the study."

He led the way sharply, and Aleck sprang after him, but the ascent of so many steps gave the maid time to re-open the little dining-room door, from which point of vantage she was able to catch a glimpse of the lad's face, which looked so startling that she uttered an involuntary "Oh, my!" before letting her jaw drop and pausing, her mouth wide open and a pair of staring eyes.

"Come in!" roared the captain, angrily, as Aleck paused to turn for a moment at the door; and instead of entering, stood shaking his head deprecatingly at the maid, while his lips moved without a sound escaping them as he tried to telegraph to one who took much interest in his appearance: "Not hurt much. I couldn't help it!"

He started violently then at his uncle's stern command, uttered like an order to a company of men to step into some deadly breach, and the next moment the door was closed and the old man was scowling at him from the chair into which he had thrown himself, sending it back with the legs, giving forth a sound like a harsh snort as they sc.r.a.ped over the bare oaken floor.

Aleck drew a long deep breath and tried to tighten up his nerves, ready for what he felt was going to be a desperate encounter with the fierce-looking old man whom from long experience he knew to be harsh, stern, and troubled with a terrible temper, which made him morose and strange at times, his fits lasting for days, during which periods he would hardly speak a word to his nephew, leaving him to himself save when he came upon him suddenly to see that he was not wasting time, but going on with one or other of the studies which the old man supervised, or working in the garden.

"I want you, though you lead this lonely life with me, Aleck," he would say, frowning heavily the while, "to grow up fairly learned in what is necessary for a young man's education, so that some day, when I am dead and gone out of this weary world, you may take your place as a gentleman--not an ornamental gentleman, whose sole aim is to find out how he can best amuse himself, but a quiet, straightforward, honourable gentleman, one whom, if people do not admire because his ways are not the same as theirs, they will find themselves bound to respect."

These strange fits of what Aleck, perhaps instigated by Jane, their one servant, called "master's temper," would be followed by weeks of mental blue sky, when the black clouds rolled away and the sun of a genial disposition shone out, and the old man seemed as if he could not lavish enough affection upon his nephew. The result of all this was that the boy's feelings towards the old man, who had always occupied the position of father to him as well as preceptor, were a strange mingling of fear of his harshness, veneration of his learning and power of instructing him in everything he learned, and love. For there were times when Aleck would say, gloomily, to himself, "I'm sure uncle thoroughly hates me and wishes me away," while there were times when he was as happy as the days were long, and ready to feel certain that the old man loved him as much as if he were his own child.

"He must," thought the boy, "or he wouldn't have nursed and coddled me up so when I had that fever and the doctor told Jane that he had done all he could, and that I should die--go out with the tide next day.

That's what I like in uncle," he mused, "when he isn't out of temper-- he's so clever. Knew ever so much better than the doctor. What did he say then? 'Doctors are all very well, Aleck, but there are times when the nurse is the better man--that is, when it's a c.o.c.k nurse and not a hen. You had a c.o.c.k nurse, boy, and I pulled you through.'"