Chapter 6
"I'll tell you to-morrow morning, madam," said Uncle Paul.
"Then if you wouldn't mind, sir--I don't want to hurry you and the young gentleman--but it's my time, and if you will excuse me I'll say good-night."
"Good-night, Mrs Champernowne; good-night, and pleasant rest to you,"
said Uncle Paul heartily, "and--Yes? You were going to say something?"
"If you wouldn't mind, sir, being sure that the candles are well out."
"Oh, of course; of course."
"And it's a very hot night, sir."
"Yes, madam; we have found that out."
"So if you'll be kind enough to shut and slip the bolt of the front door I'll leave it for you to do so when you go up to bed."
"Certainly, Mrs Champernowne, certainly. Once more, good-night."
Their landlady smiled benevolently on both, and the next minute they heard the little old staircase creaking beneath her tread, this being followed by the cracking of the boards in the little room over the kitchen, the visitors both listening till all was silent again.
Somehow as Rodd sat opposite to his uncle, his head seemed to be unusually heavy, and he rested more and more upon his two thumbs, which he had placed for support beneath his chin.
There was a faint pinging sound, the trumpeting of a gnat flitting about the room, and then the deep boom of a beetle somewhere outside the open window. There was a hot delicious odour, too, floating in over the flowers in the garden, a portion of whose scent the warm air seemed to be taking up to mingle with that which it had swept off the moor.
And then as Rodd listened and gazed across the table between the two candles, whose tops were growing tiny brown mushrooms as they silently asked to be snuffed, it seemed to the boy that his uncle's face looked dim and misty, and then that it swelled and swelled and began to float up like a faintly seen balloon, till it died right away. And all was still but the _um-um-um_ of the great beetle or chafer which had pa.s.sed in through the window, and began circling round just below the whitewashed ceiling, against which its wings brushed from time to time with a faint fizz, till all at once Rodd started up, for his uncle exclaimed--
"Why, Pickle, what are you about?"
"I--I--nothing, uncle," said the boy hastily. "Why, I believe, sir, you were going to sleep!"
"Oh, I am quite wide awake, uncle," cried the boy.
"Humph, yes--now. You see, my boy, these hydras are most extraordinary things, and to-morrow morning in the bright suns.h.i.+ne we will get the microscope to work, and I'll show you how they--"
_Burr_--_burr_--_burr_--_hum_--_hum_--_hum_--_um_--_um_.
Was that Uncle Paul talking in a low tone with his voice getting farther and farther away, or was it that big chafer spinning round and round the room? Now it nearly died out, and then it grew louder again and seemed to double into a duet, just as if the great stag beetle had whisked in at the cas.e.m.e.nt and had joined in the nocturnal valse, the duet seeming to be intended to lull the naturalist and his nephew to sleep in the soft musky sweetness
How long it lasted, who could say, but all at once there was a sudden start, and Uncle Paul's hand came down with a thump upon the tablecloth after he had knocked over one of the candlesticks, making so much noise that, wide awake now, Rodd made a dash and stood the candlestick up again, before s.n.a.t.c.hing the candle from where it lay singeing the lavender and red-check cotton table-cover and beginning to deposit a big spot of grease.
"Bless my heart, Pickle!" cried Uncle Paul. "I believe I was going to drop asleep."
"I am afraid I was asleep, uncle," replied the boy. "You were saying that hydras--that hydras--er--er--er--something about hydras."
"Yes, yes, yes, but never mind. Perhaps we had better go to bed, and I'll finish what I was saying in the morning. There, light the two flat candlesticks, and we will have a good long snooze. That's right; put out the others. No, no; use the extinguisher! Don't blow them out, or there will be such a smell."
Then--
"Shall I shut the window, uncle?"
"Oh, no, I don't think you need. The place is like an oven. Heigho-- ha--hum! Yes, I am sleepy. Come along. Good-night, my boy. I am going to sleep with my chamber window wide open, and you'd better do the same."
"But I say, uncle, we shall hardly want our candles. Look at the moon.
It is almost as light as day."
All the same they took the candles up with them, the stairs creaking again beneath their tread as if uttering a protest against them for their forgetfulness in not attending to their hostess's request to close and bolt the door; but they were too sleepy to do anything more than slip off their things on reaching their rooms, while almost directly after, the moon was s.h.i.+ning in right across Rodd's snowy white bed, the pillow being in the darkness, which also formed a black bar across the foot, so that only the boy's hands and breast lay in the light.
One moment after laying his head down in that black velvety darkness Rodd Harding was wide awake and thinking that all outside the window was silver, a broad streak of which came straight over him to die away in the wall on his left; the next, he was far away in the land of dreams, wandering over the moor, his confused visions taking the form of escaping prisoners flying before soldiers in scarlet coats.
And then after a blank pause which seemed to have lasted only a few minutes, Rodd opened his eyes upon the bright silvery light once more, to find that it struck across from the window in the opposite direction, for he was wide awake, listening to a soft tap, tap, tap, evidently administered by a knuckle upon his door.
CHAPTER FIVE.
THE MILK IN THE COCOA-NUT.
"Yes, all right, Mrs Champernowne; get up directly. I say, what's o'clock?"
"Oh, I don't know, my dear," came in agitated tones, "but would you come to the door and speak to me a minute?"
There was a b.u.mp on the floor as Rodd sprang out of bed, and then--
"What is it?" whispered the boy, who was moved by his caller's evident distress. "Don't say uncle's ill!"
"No, no, my dear, but I am in great trouble. You--you didn't shut the front door."
"Oh!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Rodd.
"And--and, my dear, there have been thieves and robbers in the night.
They have stripped my little larder, and I don't know what they haven't taken besides. Do, pray, make haste and dress, and come down and help me! I am in such trouble, I don't know what I shall do."
"All right; I'll make haste and come down," cried Rodd, feeling guilty all over, and then trying to excuse himself by shuffling the blame on to the right shoulders. "It was uncle she asked," he muttered, as he ran round to the other side of the bed for the chair upon which he had hang his clothes when he undressed. "Why, hallo!"
He stood staring at the chair for a moment or two, and then ran round the foot of the bed, opened the door two or three inches, and called in a subdued tone so as not to awaken his uncle, though if he had been asked why, he could not have told, beyond saying that he felt then that it was the right thing to do--
"Mrs Champernowne! Mrs Champernowne!"
"Yes, my dear," came from the foot of the stairs. "Oh, you have been quick!"
"No, no, I haven't," cried Rodd pettishly. "Here, I say, have you taken away my trousers?"
"Gracious me, no, my dear! What should I want with your trousers?"
"Take them down to brush perhaps," muttered the boy to himself, as he ran back to the other side of the bed and raised the counterpane.
"Haven't slipped off and gone under," he muttered, and then as a fresh thought struck him he clapped his hands to his forehead and stood staring before him. "The thieves!" he exclaimed. "They haven't been in here and taken all my clothes?"
He was silent for a few minutes, as he stared vacantly about the room.