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Quicksilver; The Boy With No Skid To His Wheel, a fiction by George Manville Fenn |
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Chapter 29. An Act Of Folly |
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_ CHAPTER TWENTY NINE. AN ACT OF FOLLY Bedtime at last, and as Dexter bade the doctor and his daughter "good-night," it seemed to him that they had never spoken so kindly to him, and the place had never appeared to be so pleasant and homelike before. His heart sank as he went up to his room, and he felt as if he could not go away. The lessons Mr Limpney had given him to write out were not done; but he had better stop and face him, and every other trouble, including the window he had broken, and never owned to yet. It was impossible to go away and leave everybody who was so kind. A harsh word would have kept him to the point; but now he wavered as he sat down on the edge of his bed, with his mind in a whirl. Then, as he sat there, he pictured in his own mind the figure of Bob Dimsted, waiting for him, laden with articles of outfit necessary for their voyage, and behind Bob loomed up bright sunny scenes by sea and land; and with his imagination once more excited by all that the boy had suggested, Dexter blinded himself to everything but the object he had in view. He had planned in his own mind what he would take with him, but now it had come to the point he felt a strange compunction. Everything he possessed seemed to him as if it belonged to the doctor, and, finally, he resolved to take nothing with him but the clothes in which he stood. He began walking about the room in a listless way, looking about at the various familiar objects that he was to see no more, and one of the first things to strike him was a teacup on the washstand, containing Mrs Millett's infusion, bitter, nauseous, and sweetened to sickliness; and it struck Dexter that the mixture had been placed in a cup instead of a glass, so as to make it less objectionable in appearance. He could not help smiling as he took up the cup and smelt it, seeing at the same time the old dame's pleasant earnest face--a face that suddenly seemed to have become very loving, now he was to see it no more. He set down the cup, and shook his head, and then, as if nerving himself for the task, he went to the drawers, took out a key from his pocket, and then, from the place where it lay, hidden beneath his clean linen, brought forth the old clothes-line twisted and knotted together--the line which had done duty in the loft as a swing. He listened as he crossed to the door, but all was still downstairs, and it was not likely that any one would come near his room that night; but still he moved about cautiously, and taking the line with his hands, about two feet apart, snapped it again and again with all his might, to try if it was likely to give way now beneath his weight. It seemed firm as ever, but he could not help a shiver as he laid it by the window, and thought of a boy being found in the shrubbery beneath, with a broken leg, or, worse still, neck. Then as he waited for the time to glide by, so that all might be in bed before he made his escape, a sudden chill ran through him. He had remembered everything, as he thought; and yet there was one thing, perhaps the simplest of all, forgotten. He was going to take no bundle, no money, nothing which the doctor had in his kindness provided for him; but he could not go without a cap, and that was hanging in the hall, close to the drawing-room door. The question arose whether he should venture down to get it now, or after the doctor had gone to bed. It took him some time to make up his mind; but when he had come to a decision he opened his door softly, listened, and stole out on to the landing. All was very still as he looked over the balustrade to where the lamp shed its yellow rays all round, and to his mind more strangely upon the object he wanted to obtain than elsewhere. It was a very simple thing to do, and yet it required a great deal of nerve, for if the drawing-room door were opened just as he reached the hat-stand, and the doctor came out, what should he say? Then there was the risk of being heard, for there were, he knew, two of the old oaken stairs which always gave a loud crack when any one passed down, and if they cracked now, some one would be sure to come out to see what it meant. Taking a long catching breath he went quickly to the top of the stairs, and was about to descend in a desperate determination to go through with his task, when an idea struck him, and bending over the balustrade he spread his hands, balanced himself carefully, and then slid down the mahogany rail, round curve after curve as silently as could be, and reaching the curl at the bottom dropped upon the mat. Only five or six yards now to the hat-stand, and going on tiptoe past the entrance to the drawing-room, he was in the act of taking down the cap, when the handle rattled, the door was thrown open, and the hall grew more light. In his desperation Dexter snatched down the cap, and stood there trying to think of what he should say in answer to the question that would be asked in a moment-- "What are you doing there!" It was Helen, chamber-candlestick in hand, and she was in the act of stepping out, when her step was arrested by words which seemed to pierce into the listener's brain:-- "Oh, about Dexter!" "Yes, papa," said Helen, turning. "What do you think about--" Dexter heard no more. Taking advantage of Helen's back being turned as she bent over towards the speaker, the boy stepped quickly to the staircase, ran up, and had reached the first landing before Helen came out into the hall, while before she had closed the door he was up another flight, and gliding softly toward his own room, where he stood panting as he closed the door, just as if he had been running a distance which had taken away his breath. It was a narrow escape, and he was safe; but his ears tingled still, and he longed to know what the doctor had said about him. As he stood listening, cap in hand, he heard Helen pass his door singing softly one of the ballads he had heard that evening; and once more a curious dull sensation of misery came over him, as he seemed to feel that he would never hear her sing again, never feel the touch of her soft caressing hand; and somehow there was a vague confused sense of longing to go to one who had treated him with an affectionate interest he had never known before, even now hardly understood, but it seemed to him such gentleness and love as might have come from a mother. For a moment or two he felt that he must open the door, call to her, throw himself upon his knees before her, and confess everything, but at that moment the laughing, mocking face of Bob Dimsted seemed to rise between them, and his words buzzed in his ear--words that he had often said when listening to some account of Dexter's troubles-- "Bother the old lessons, and all on 'em! I wouldn't stand it if I was you. They've no right to order you about, and scold you as they do." The weak moments passed, and just then there was the doctor's cough heard, and the closing of his door, while directly after came the chiming of the church clock--a quarter past eleven. Half an hour to wait and think, and then good-bye to all his troubles, and the beginning of a new life of freedom! All the freedom and the future seemed to be behind a black cloud; but in the fond belief that all would soon grow clear Dexter waited. Half-past eleven, and he wondered that he did not feel sleepy. It was time to begin though now, and he took the line and laid it out in a serpentine fashion upon the carpet, so that there should be no kinks in the way; and then the next thing was to fasten one end tightly so that he could safely slide down. He had well thought out his plans, and, taking one end of the line, he knotted it securely to the most substantial place he could find in the room, passing it behind two of the bars of the grate. Then cautiously opening his window, a little bit at a time, he thrust it higher and higher, every faint creak sending a chill through him, while, when he looked out upon the dark starlight night, it seemed as if he would have to descend into a black gulf, where something blacker was waiting to seize him. But he knew that the black things below were only great shrubs, and lowering the rope softly down he at last had the satisfaction of hearing it rustle among the leaves. Then he waited, and after a glance round to see that everything was straight, and the letter laid ready upon the table, he put out the candle. "For the last time!" he said to himself, and a great sigh came unbidden from his breast. A quarter to twelve. Dexter waited till the last stroke on the bell was thrilling in the air before setting his cap on tightly, and passing one leg over the sill. He sat astride for a few moments, hesitating for the last time, and then passed the other leg, and lowered himself down till he hung by his hands, then twisted his legs about the rope, seized it with first one hand then the other, and hung by it with his whole weight, in the precarious position of one trusting to an old doubled clothes-line, suspended from a second-floor window. It was hard work that descent, for he could not slide on account of the knots; and, to make his position more awkward, the rope began to untwist--one line from the other,--and, in consequence, as the boy descended slowly, he bore no small resemblance to a leg of mutton turning before a fire. That was the only mishap which occurred to him then, for after resting for a few moments upon the first-floor sill he continued his journey, and reached the bottom in the midst of a great laurel, which rustled loudly as he tried to get out, and then tripped over a horizontal branch, and fell flat. He was up again in an instant, and, trembling and panting, made a couple of bounds which took him over the gravel walk and on to the lawn, where he stood panting and listening. There was a light in the doctor's room, and one in Helen's; and just then the doctor's shadow, looking horribly threatening, was thrown upon the blind. He must be coming, Dexter thought, and, turning quickly, he sped down the lawn, avoiding the flower-beds by instinct, and the next minute had reached the kitchen-garden, down whose winding green walk he rapidly made his way. _ |
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