was a policeman sitting at a desk, like a clerk, with a big book before him. I could see him through the other doorway, and they talked for a few minutes; and then Mr Revitts came back, and stood staring at me.
“P’r’aps I’m a fool,” he muttered. “P’r’aps I ain’t. Anyhow, I’ll do it. Look here, youngster, I’m going to trust you, though as you’ve absconded I ought to take you before a magistrate or the inspector, but I won’t, as you’re a friend of my Mary.”
“Thank you, sir,” I said.
“And if you turn out badly, why, woe betide you.”
“Please, sir, I won’t turn out badly if I can help it; but Mr Blakeford said I was good for nothing.”
“Mr Blakeford be blowed! I wouldn’t ask him for a character for a dorg; and as for Mary, she don’t want his character, and he may keep it. I’ll take her without. I wouldn’t speak to any one like this, youngster; but you know that gal’s got a temper, though she’s that good at heart that – that – ”
“She’d nurse you so tenderly if you were ill,” I said enthusiastically, “that you wouldn’t wish to be better.”
He held out his hand and gave mine a long and solemn shake.
“Thankye, youngster,” he said, “thankye for that. You and I will be good friends, I see. I will trust your word, hang me if I don’t. Here, come along.”
“Are you – are you going to take me up, sir?” I faltered, with a shiver of apprehension.
“I’m a-going to give you the door-key where I lodges, my lad. I’m on night duty, and shan’t be home till quarter-past six, so you may have my bed and welcome. Now, look here,” he said, “don’t you go and let anybody fool you. I’m going to show you the end of a long street, and you’ll go right to the top, then turn to the right along the road till you come to the fourth turning, and on the right-hand side, number twenty-seven, is where I lodges. Here’s the key. You puts it in the lock, turns it, shuts the door after you, and then goes gently upstairs to the second-pair back.”
“Second-pair back, sir?” I said dubiously.
“Well there, then, to the back room atop of the house, and there you may sleep till I come. Now then, this way out.”
It was a change that I could not have believed in, and I accompanied the constable wonderingly as he led me out of the police-station and through several dark-looking streets, till he stopped short before a long dim vista, where straight before me two lines of gaslights stretched right away till they seemed to end in a bright point.
“Now, then,” he said, “you can’t make any mistake there.”
“No, sir.”
“Off you go then to the top, and then you’ll find yourself in a big road.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Turn to the right, and then count four streets on the right-hand side. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Go down that street about halfway, till you see a gaslight shining on a door with number twenty-seven upon it. Twenty-seven Caroline Street. Now, do you understand? Straight up to the top, and then it’s right, right, right, all the way.”
“I understand, sir.”
“Good luck to you then, be off; here’s my sergeant.”
I should have stopped to thank him, but he hurried me away; and half forgetting my weariness, I went along the street, found at last the road at the end, followed it as directed, and then in the street of little houses found one where the light from the lamp shone as my guide had said.
I paused with the key in my hand, half fearing to use it, but summoning up my courage, I found the door opened easily and closed quietly, when I stood in a narrow passage with the stairs before me, and following them to the top, I hesitated, hardly knowing back from front. A deep heavy breathing from one room, however, convinced me that that could not be the back, so I tried the other door, to find it yield, and there was just light enough from the window to enable me to find the bed, on which I threw myself half dressed, and slept soundly till morning, when I opened my eyes to find Mr Revitts taking off his stiff uniform coat.
“Look here, youngster,” he said, throwing himself upon the bed, “I dessay you’re tired, so don’t you get up. Have another nap, and then call me at ten, and we’ll have some breakfast. How – how – ” he said, yawning.
“What did you say, sir?”
“How – Mary look?”
“Very well indeed, sir. She has looked much better lately, and – ”
I stopped short, for a long-drawn breath from where Mr Revitts had thrown himself upon the bed told me plainly enough that he was asleep.
I was too wakeful now to follow his example, and raising myself softly upon my elbow, I had a good look at my new friend, to see that he did not look so big and burly without his greatcoat, but all the same he was a stoutly built, fine-looking man, with a bluff, honest expression of countenance.
I stayed there for some minutes, thinking about him, and then about Mary, and Mr Blakeford, and Hetty, and I wondered how the lawyer had got on before the magistrates without me. Then, rising as quietly as I could, I washed and finished dressing myself before sitting down to wait patiently for my host’s awakening.
The first hour passed very tediously, for there was nothing to see from the window but chimney-pots, and though it was early I began to feel that I had not breakfasted, and three hours or so was a long time to wait. The room was clean, but shabbily furnished, and as I glanced round offered little in the way of recreation, till my eyes lit on a set of hanging shelves with a few books thereon, and going on tiptoe across the room, I began to read their backs, considering which I should choose.
There was the “Farmer of Inglewood Forest,” close by the “Old English Baron,” with the “Children of the Abbey,” and “Robinson Crusoe.” Side by side with them was a gilt-edged Prayer-book, upon opening which I found that it was the property of “Mr William Revitts, a present from his effectinat friend Mary Bloxam.” On the opposite leaf was the following verse: —
“When this yu see, remember me,
And bare me in yure mind;
And don’t forget old Ingerland,
And the lass yu lef behind.”
The Bible on the shelf was from the same source. Besides these were several books in shabby covers – Bogatsky’s “Golden Treasury,” the “Pilgrim’s Progress,” and the “Young Man’s Best Companion.”
I stood looking at them for a few minutes, and then reached down poor old “Robinson Crusoe,” bore it to the window, and for the fourth time in my life began its perusal.
In a very short time my past troubles, my precarious future, and my present hunger were all forgotten, and I was far away from the attic in North London, watching the proceedings of Robinson in that wonderful island, having skipped over a good many of the early adventures for the sake of getting as soon as possible into that far-away home of mystery and romance.
The strengthening of his house, the coming of the savages, the intensely interesting occurrences
