The boy's heart was full of the future as usual, and when Dudley burst into his room with a radiant face to offer his good wishes, he turned to meet him gravely.

But Dudley was too occupied in tugging in a small basket to notice it.

"This is my present, old chap. Just open it and see if you don't like it."

Roy's little face became illumined with smiles a moment after, when he saw two beautiful little white mice amongst the straw looking up at him with calm curiosity out of their bright beady eyes.

"They're tame," said Dudley, delightedly; "old Principle has had them, taming them for over a month. Their names are Nibble and Dibble. Look! This is Dibble with the little black spot on his nose. You never guessed, did you? I've been down to see them lots of times and they'll eat food out of my hand. You just see!"

Roy was too excited over his mice to eat much breakfast, and when Rob came up to him immediately afterward with a new cricket ball, bought out of his small wages, he declared he was the "luckiest fellow in the world."

Miss Bertram presented him with a handsome writing case, and every one of the servants had some trifle to offer him. At ten o'clock he went to his grandmother's room.

This was also part of the programme.

Mrs. Bertram received him very impressively, as was her wont.

"Sit down, Fitz Roy; you are getting a big boy; have you been measured this morning?"

"Yes, granny, and I really have grown an inch and a half since last year. That isn't very bad, is it?"

"Your father was very much taller at your age. I cannot understand it."

Roy began to feel rather depressed. "General Newton will be here soon, I suppose," continued Mrs. Bertram, precisely, "and I wish you to convey him a message from me. Give him my very kind regards, and ask him to excuse me from coming down to see him this morning. I have had a very bad night, and am not feeling fit for any extra fatigue. I hope he will find you improved in manners and appearance. I could wish you talked and laughed less and thought more. You must endeavor to realize your responsibilities when you visit Norrington Court this afternoon. It is a very large and important property for a little boy like you to be heir to, and I hope you will fill the position worthily when you come of age. Your uncle was the most respected and honored man in the county, and if your dear father had lived to come back from Canada, he would have walked in your uncle's steps."

"And who will walk in mine when I'm dead, granny?"

"My dear, you must learn not to interrupt grown-up people when they are speaking."

"I'm very sorry, but do tell me if I died before I grew up, would Dudley have my house?"

"Yes, by the terms of the will he would, as his father came next in age to yours."

"That is what Aunt Judy means, when she calls me Jonathan and says when I brag, that I must remember my namesake never came to the throne at all. I like to think that Dudley may have it, he would make a grander master than me, wouldn't he?"

Mrs. Bertram gave a little sigh. Roy's delicacy was a sore point with her, and she could never get reconciled to his small stature.

"Well," said Roy, after a pause; "I'll do my very best, granny, to grow up a big strong man. I take my tonics now whenever nurse gives them to me, and I never pour them out of the window as I used to do. And I'm hoping to do something great before I die, and I'm trying to grow up a good man. Do you think that will do?" he added, a little anxiously, as he fancied his grandmother's gaze rested on him with some dissatisfaction.

She did not reply, only drew out her purse from her pocket, and Roy knew this was a signal for his dismissal.

"Now," said Mrs. Bertram, "this is the sovereign that I usually give you. I hope you will spend it wisely. Tell me when it is gone what you have done with it. I hope you will spend a happy day. Give me a kiss and leave me. Oh, if only you were more like your handsome father!"

Roy took his gift, thanked her for it, and giving his grandmother a kiss, left the room very quietly.

Outside the door he paused on the door-mat, and drew his jacket across his eyes with a strangled sob.

"It's a pity God won't make me strong, but I don't seem to be able to do it myself."

And then with a shout for Dudley, a minute after he was tearing round the house, showing his pet mice to all, and chattering away as if he had not a care upon him.

General Newton arrived soon after and took a more cheering view of his ward's appearance than had his grandmother.

"You'll grow into a splendid fellow yet," he said, patting him on the shoulder, "and you'll out-top your cousin. Have you been in many scrapes lately?"

"They're good boys on the whole," replied Miss Bertram, smiling; "except when they try to be philanthropists, and then they come to grief."

"Oh, that's the last idea, is it? When I was here before they were going to be travelling peddlers. Have you made a choice of any profession yet, either of you?"

"Yes, I'm going to be a traveller and discoverer," said Roy, with decision.

"Oh, indeed! Then you've still the love for exploration. How is your friend old Principle? Is he still unearthing wonders and keeping them in his kettles?"

"He is busy in a cave now," said Dudley, eagerly; "would you like to come and see it one day?"

"No, thank you. And are you lads still devoted friends?"

"David and Jonathan, still," said Miss Bertram; and the old general laughed heartily.

Before he left, he also gave Roy a sovereign, which made the little fellow confide to Dudley,

"I've put granny's in my right hand pocket, and the general's in my left, they won't mix together well, because hers is such a solemn one, and his is so jolly!"

It was a happy little party that set off for Norrington Court. The boys were on their ponies, and Miss Bertram in her pony trap, with Rob sitting behind, proud in the consciousness of a new suit of clothes, and delighted at being included in the number.

Up a long stately avenue of elms and beeches, with bracken and ferns covering mossy glades in the distance, and then Roy and Dudley flung themselves off their ponies before an old stone house with ivy-covered walls and turrets. Everything had been brightened up for their visit. The flowers on the terraces were one mass of sweet perfume and color, the drives weeded and rolled, and the velvet turf in only such a condition as centuries of care can make it. The old housekeeper opened the door in her very best black silk, and two or three more faithful retainers stood in the background.

Roy spoke to them all with boyish frankness and grace, and then eagerly demanded if tea might be on the terrace. Miss Bertram agreed and while she went indoors for a chat with the housekeeper, the boys tore round the place dragging Rob after them. The stables of course were visited, and an old groom who had known the boys' fathers when boys, welcomed them with great warmth.

"Ye must grow quicker, Master Fitz Roy. We want to see you here among us. I'm looking to see all these stalls occupied by hunters and sich like again. 'Tis mournful work to live year in and year out with only two bosses for company!"

"Tell us about the old times, Ben, do!"

Ben sat down and spread his hands out on his knees reflectively.

"All the young gentlemen were born riders," he said, slowly; "I mind how Master Randolph would tear up the avenue after a long ride. 'There, Ben' he'd say to me, chucking me the rein, and jumpin' off as light as a feather, 'we've worked our spirits h'off—Ruby and me!' When the old squire were alive, he'd have all three young gentlemen up, and then he'd mount them and bring them down to Ruddocks stream, and see them jump it. He used to say, 'No grandson of mine is worth calling a Bertram if he can't take that leap before he is twelve year old!' They all did it before they was ten, and he used to stand chuckling and rubbing his hands as he saw them do it."

"Is that the stream at the bottom of the back meadow?" asked Dudley, eagerly; "the one with the hedge in front?"

"Ay, to be sure!"

"But we have never jumped it," exclaimed Roy. "And I think we ought to for we're his great-grandsons."

"We shan't be twelve for a long time yet," said Dudley, "but we really ought to try."

"Well, we'll do it this evening after tea; and you shall come and see us do it, Ben."

Ben grinned from ear to ear.

"You'll go over it like a bird, if so be as your pony is accustomed to sich things!"

"We haven't taken very high jumps," admitted Dudley, candidly.

"Oh, we shall do it," said Roy, with a little toss of his head; "we'll make them go over!"

And then they turned to other subjects.

"What do you think of my house, Rob?" asked Roy, later on as he was escorting his humble friend through the empty rooms and corridors upstairs.

"It'll take a powerful number of people to fill it," said Rob, with awe.

"I shall have a lot of friends to stay with me, of course, and then I shall marry; men always do that, don't they?"

"I b'lieve they mostly does," was the grave reply.

"And won't you like to come and live with me here?"

"That I should."

"Well," said Dudley, from a few paces behind; "if you're going to travel, you won't use your house much, Roy. If Rob is going to be your follower, I'll come and live here when you're abroad, and when you come home, I'll go away."

"No you won't, you know we shall want you too."

And seeing the frown on Dudley's face, Roy turned back and linked his arm in his. "Look here," he added, "Rob shall be your follower as well as mine, and we will all go out to look for a new country together, and when we've found it, we will come back and have a jolly time in this old house."

"I shall have to work for my living," Dudley replied, gruffly.

"Yes. I was thinking," and the earnest look came into Roy's eyes as he spoke; "I was thinking this morning, I mustn't just live as I like to live when I grow up. There will be an awful lot to be done. Old Principle was telling me the other day that the reason some people are overworked is because other people don't work enough, and an idle man puts his burden of work on other people's backs."

"We don't want old Principle's sermons here," exclaimed Dudley, having recovered his good humor. "Aren't you awfully hungry? I'm sure tea must be ready."

They went to the terrace where a most elaborate repast was set out, which they thoroughly enjoyed. After it was over all the servants came up to drink Roy's health; the old butler Pike made a little speech, and Roy responded; his words lingering in the memories of those who heard him for long afterward.

Miss Bertram, as she looked at his upright, slender little figure, and noted the intense emphasis with which he spoke, felt a pang go through her, as she wondered if his frail young life would be cut short before he reached manhood.

"I'm awfully much obliged to you all for your good wishes. I'm determined when I grow up and come to live with you that I'll do all the good I can to everybody. I hope I'm getting stronger, and I think I may be able to do as much as other people. But whatever I am, I promise you I'll do my very best for the property!"

Then three cheers were given for the little master; and after the ceremony was over, Miss Bertram told her little nephews to amuse themselves quietly for another half hour before they returned home.

Their plans were already arranged, and they went straight to the stables for their ponies to try the leap the old groom had mentioned to them.

He had already saddled them, and a few minutes after, they came through the small paddock in front of the spot.

It was rather an awkward hedge, though not a very high one with a broad stream of running water the other side.

Old Ben began to get a little nervous as he saw the boys eyeing the leap rather doubtfully.

"Has the hedge grown since our fathers were little boys?" asked Dudley.

"A wee bit, perhaps, though we do keep it cut pretty much to the same level. It's a deal thicker than it used to be, but don't you try it if you hain't sure of your ponies. It 'ud be a awful thing if you hurt yourself and couldn't do it!"



"If we try it at all, we shall do it," said Roy, spiritedly, and then he and Dudley rode back to put their steeds to a gallop.

Old Ben watched them breathlessly. Dudley seemed to be hesitating.

"I say, old fellow, don't let us do it to-night."

Roy's look was one of astonishment mingled with a little contempt.

"Not do it! Are you afraid?"

Dudley's color rose. "I'm not afraid of our courage," he said, boldly, "but of our ponies: they have never been accustomed to it."

"Then they can learn to-night. Now then, there's plenty of room for us both abreast. One—two—three—off! Hurrah for the Bertrams!"

The ponies were fresh, the hedge was cleared; but as old Ben was in the act of waving his cap aloft to give a cheer—there was a crash—a sharp cry—and a sickening thud the other side of the hedge. And when the old groom with beating heart and trembling limbs, reached the farther bank, Roy and his horse were prostrate on the ground. Dudley had cleared it safely, and now having flung himself from his horse was leaning over Roy in agony of terror.

"He's dead, Ben—he's dead—his pony rolled over him—oh, fetch a doctor, quick!"

Ben took the unconscious little figure in his arms, with a heavy groan; and Dudley tore on to the house almost frantic with fright.

Every one was in confusion at once, but it was Rob who tore off for the doctor, and brought him in an incredibly short time, considering that he lived three miles away.

To Dudley, listening outside the bedroom door, it seemed years before the doctor came out, and when he did, he was too overcome to speak to him. But seeing the white unnerved face of the boy, Doctor Grant put his hand kindly on his shoulder.

"Cheer up, my boy, it might have been worse—he is only stunned, and leg broken. I hope he will pull round again."

And then Dudley burst into a passionate fit of tears, with relief at the doctor's words.



IX

MAKING HIS WILL

It was long before the cousins met; Roy's delicate constitution had received such a shock that his condition for some time was a cause of grave anxiety. His leg did not heal, and then the terrible word was whispered through the house "amputation"!

It was a lovely evening in September when after a long talk with the doctor in the library Miss Bertram came out, her usually determined face quivering with emotion.

"I will tell him to-night, Doctor Grant, and we shall be ready for you to-morrow afternoon at three."

She went upstairs, and Dudley with scared eyes having heard her speech now crept out of the house after the doctor.

"Look here, Doctor Grant," he said, confronting him with an almost defiant air: "you're not going to make Roy a cripple!"

"I'm going to save his life, if I can," said the doctor, half sadly, as he looked down upon the sturdy boy in front of him.

"He won't live with only one leg, I know he won't, it will be too much of a disgrace to him; he'll die of grief, I know he will! Oh, Doctor Grant, you might have pity on him, it isn't fair!"

"Would you rather see him die in lingering pain?" enquired the doctor, gravely.

"Oh, I think it so awful! Why should he be the one to be smashed up. Look at me! I know everybody thinks it a pity it wasn't me. It would have made us so much more equal. Why should I be so strong, and he so weak! I tell you what! I've heard a story about joining on other men's legs. Now tell me, could you do it? Could you give him one of mine? I'd let you cut it off this minute—to-night, if you only would. If it would make him walk straight!"

Dudley seized hold of the doctor's coat excitedly, and Doctor Grant saw his whole soul was in his words.

"I'm afraid that would be an impossible feat, my boy. No—keep your own legs to wait upon him, and cheer him up all you can."

"Cheer him up!" was the fierce retort; "what could cheer him! I know he won't be able to live a cripple. He always says he is straight and upright though his chest is weak, and now when he knows it's no use trying to be strong any more, for he'll never be able to—when he knows he won't be able to play cricket, or football, or even climb the wall or run races—oh, it's awful—it will break his heart, and I wish I was dead!" After which passionate speech Dudley dashed away, and the doctor continued his walk shaking his head and muttering, "It's a bad lookout for the little fellow!"

Dudley ran across the lawn in his misery, and then nearly tumbled over Rob who was lying on the grass, his face hidden in his arms. He looked up and his eyes were red and swollen.

"Master Dudley, is it true, is he going to lose his legs?"

Dudley stood looking at him for a minute before he spoke, and then he said, "Yes, it's all that hateful doctor!"

Rob dropped his head on his arms again and a smothered groan escaped him.

Dudley continued his run out into the stableyard, from thence to the road, and he never stopped till he reached old Principle's little three-cornered shop.

Old Principle was busy serving customers when he came in; he gave him a friendly nod, and went on with his business whilst Dudley crept into the little back parlor, and sitting down in an old horsehair chair tried to recover his breath. It was not long before old Principle came after him.

"Well, my laddie," he said, laying his hand on the curly head, "there's sad news going through the village this morning, and I see by your face that 'tis true!"

Dudley nodded and then seizing hold of the old man's hand, leaned his head against it and burst into tears.

"Why does God do it!" he sobbed at length, "Roy is so much better than I am, he's always trying to please God, though he never talks about it, and I've prayed so hard that he might be made quite well!"

"Ay, and the good Lord is making him well perhaps though not by the way you planned. He might a been killed outright, and then what a trouble you'd have been in."

"This is nearly as bad," muttered Dudley.

"Now, laddie, don't harden your heart, are you one of the Lord's own children?"

"I don't know. I don't think I love God as much as Roy does."

"'Tis an awful bad principle," the old man continued, "to doubt and complain directly we can't understand the Almighty's dealings with us. He loves Master Roy better'n you and me, and the time will come when we'll thank the Lord with all our hearts for this accident."

This was utterly incomprehensible to Dudley.

"I feel very badly about it," old Principle went on, "and so do you, but the one I'm most sorry for is Ben Burkstone. I hear say he's fit to kill himself with despair!"

"Well," said Dudley, stopping his sobs for a minute; "I don't see it was his fault; it was the stupid pony; he funked it, and then fell and broke his knees; mine went over all right. Oh, why didn't it happen to me! If I had been spilled, I wouldn't have minded, and one leg wouldn't have been half so bad to me as to Roy!"

"I reckon you'd have got your leg all right again without having to lose it. 'Tis the laddie's delicate constitution that is so in his way. But I think you'll find Master Roy as plucky over the loss of his leg as he ever was. Now lift your heart up to God and ask Him that he may overrule it all for good. There goes the shop-bell!"

Old Principle disappeared, and Dudley soothed and comforted by his sympathy, retraced his steps to the house.

Meanwhile Miss Bertram had been going through the trying ordeal of breaking the news to the little invalid.

Roy was lying in bed, flushed and restless. His eyes looked unnaturally large and bright, as he met his aunt's anxious gaze.

"I'm so tired of pain, Aunt Judy, and I can't get to sleep."

Miss Bertram sat down and smiled her brightest smile.

Taking his thin little hand in hers she said tenderly,

"Yes, dear, you've been a brave little patient, but I hope you won't have much more to bear. You would like to be free from it, wouldn't you?"

"Am I going to die?"

"We hope you're going to get quite well again, if God wills, and if you will be a good boy and let the doctor cure you."

Roy's eyes were fixed intently on his aunt now.

"How are they going to cure me?"

Then Miss Bertram nerved herself for the occasion.

"Roy, dear, you have been so patient since you lay here, that I know you will be patient over this. Doctor Grant says that your leg will never heal as it is, but he is sure you will get well and strong again if—if you will make up your mind to do without it."

"Does that mean he is going to cut it off?"

"Yes."

Dead silence, broken only by the flapping of the window-curtains in the breeze. Roy was not looking at his aunt now, but his eyes were fixed on the distant hills through the open window. A blackbird now hovering on some jasmine outside, suddenly lifted up his voice and burst into an exultant song. A faint smile flickered about Roy's lips.

"Do legs never grow again like teeth?"

The pathos of tone saved Miss Bertram from smiling at the comicality of the question.

"I'm afraid not, dear. Not until we reach heaven."

Then there was silence again, broken at last by Roy's saying in a very quiet tone,—

"I want to see Dudley."

Miss Bertram rose from her seat, but first she stooped to kiss him.

"You are quite a little hero," she said; "I will send David to you. My poor little Jonathan!"

A hot tear splashed on Roy's forehead; he put up his hand and stroked his aunt's face.

"Never mind, Aunt Judy, David made a better king than Jonathan would have I expect. Don't call Dudley just yet—I—I want to be alone."

Miss Bertram left him, but sat down outside his door on a broad window ledge and cried like a child.

And then a short time after, Dudley stole softly into the room and Roy's arms were clinging round his neck.

"Oh, Dudley, I've wanted you, kiss me!"

"You're going to get well, old chap, aren't you? You'll soon be out in the garden again."

Dudley was speaking in the gruff quick tones he used when trying to hide his feelings.

"We'll talk about that presently," said Roy, lying back on his pillows and making Dudley take a seat on his bed. "Dudley, do you know what a will is?"

"Yes; you've a strong will nurse always says."

"No, not that kind of one. Uncle James left a will when he died saying he left Norrington Court to father, and father left it to me. It's a piece of thick paper they write it down on, and it has some sealing wax on it. Aunt Judy showed me father's will once."

Dudley did not look enlightened, so Roy went on,—

"I want you to get a piece of paper and write down my will for me. I will tell you what to say."

Dudley slipped out of the room obediently and returned with a sheet of note paper, but this did not satisfy Roy. "It must be a large sheet—very large," was his command.

After some minutes' search Dudley came in with a sheet of foolscap, and then with pen and ink he began to write at Roy's dictation:

"When I am dead"—

But Dudley's pen stopped. "You are not going to die, Roy?"

"I hope I am," was the unexpected reply; "I've been asking God to make me. I shouldn't think many people lived after their legs were cut off: I know I don't want to!"

"But I want you to live," cried poor Dudley; "oh! Roy you couldn't be so mean as to leave me all alone. Oh, do unsay that prayer of yours. You mustn't die!"

"I'm going to get quite ready to die," persisted Roy; "and if you really loved me you wouldn't think of liking to see me alive hopping about on a wooden leg, I couldn't do it."

"Nelson lived with only one arm," said Dudley.

Roy lay back on his pillows to consider this; then he said in a tired voice:

"Will you write what I want?"

Dudley seized the pen and in round, childish hand wrote as follows:

"When I am dead, Dudley is to have Norrington Court for his very own, and he is to live there instead of me. He can have Dibble and Nibble too. Rob is to have my musical box. I leave him my best tool box, and father's red silk pocket-handkerchief which I keep in the old tobacco pot on my chimneypiece. I leave granny her sovereign which she gave me, and my book 'Heroes of old England.' Aunt Judy is to have my best four-bladed knife, and my prayer book. I want old Principle to have my silver mug and my new writing case. I leave nurse the sovereign my guardian gave me to get herself some new shoes, and I leave her my Bible."

Thus far; then Roy gave a tired sigh. Dudley having entered completely into the spirit of the thing looked up and said eagerly, "There's your telescope, you know, Roy! If you leave it to me, I'll let you look through it when we're off on our travels."

"I shall never travel with no legs—besides I shall be dead. I'll leave my telescope to you."

Dudley subsided at once; then after a silence he asked meekly, "Is that enough?"

"Yes, I'm so tired, put—'I leave all my old clothes to the village boys, and my cricket bat and stumps to Ben'—but wait a minute, Dudley—there are all the servants, and I've got such heaps of books and toys—I think we'll leave it like that."

Dudley looked at his paper with some pride.

"I've only made six mistakes and three blots," he said; "now may I drop the sealing wax over it? I've got a lovely red piece in my pocket."

"I think I have to write my name at the bottom first, I know father did. Give me the pen."

Dudley handed it, and wondered why Roy's fingers shook so as he signed his name.

"Is that all?"

"No, wait a moment. I want to write something myself."

And then in a large scrawl at the bottom of the paper Roy wrote—

"This boy died before he had time to serve the Queen, he tried to serve God, and he tried to do good to some people, only they turned out mistakes. He hopes the Queen will forgive him; he knows God will. Amen."

Dudley read this with awe.

"And is that a will?" he asked.

"Yes, let me drop some sealing wax; fetch a candle!"

Dudley was longing to do this part himself, but he generously said nothing, and presented Roy with a brass button out of his pocket, to stamp on the hot wax.

A lot of sealing wax was dropped indiscriminately all over the paper, and then old nurse appeared on the scene to order Dudley off.

"You've been far too long with him already, to my mind," she said; "if Miss Bertram wasn't beside herself she would never have given you permission at all; he ought to have been kept extra quiet, and he's worked himself all in a fever again." She put Roy gently back on his pillows, and did not notice in her short-sightedness the roll of paper being stuffed under his pillow. Dudley's spirits sank to zero, now he was about to be dismissed.

"Good-bye, Roy, ask to see me again, won't you?"

Roy held out his hand.

"I'll talk about it to-morrow," he said, faintly.

And Dudley crept out of the room feeling more forlorn and wretched than ever.



X

A CRIPPLE

It was all over; two doctors had been closetted in the bedroom for a very long time, and then Dudley and Rob, sitting on the garden steps, were told that everything had been successfully carried out, and Roy was as well and better than had been expected.

"I never saw such fortitude and calm self-control in my life," said Miss Bertram to her mother; "it was unnatural for a child of his age!"

"He is a true Bertram in spirit," said the grandmother, proudly; then she added with a sigh, "but, alas, not in body."

"Nurse," said Dudley that night as he was creeping into bed under her charge; "is Roy going to die?"

"I hope not," answered nurse, a little tearfully. "Doctor Grant says he'll make a good recovery, but he whispered himself to me—Master Roy did just before he took the sleeping draught—'Nurse I'll have my leg buried with me!' he says."

Dudley was silent for a minute, then he asked, solemnly, "And where is it, nurse?"

Nurse turned upon him tearfully and angrily,

"I believe as how you haven't one speck of feeling for that blessed darling, you naughty boy! To talk of such a thing in such a way with not a tear on your face! And to think of him laying there a helpless cripple, and him the owner of the biggest estate in the county!"

Dudley crept into bed feeling he had no more tears to shed, wondering when he would be allowed to see Roy again, and also wondering who was the possessor of his lost leg.

It was a fortnight before he was allowed to see the little invalid, and when the boys met, Dudley gazed with deep pity on Roy's white little face, looking smaller and whiter than ever. But he welcomed him with a smile.

"It's years since you were here, old chap."

"Yes," responded Dudley, "and it's been the most miserablest years of my life."

"I thought I was going to die then," continued Roy, with still the same smile; "but God wouldn't let me. He was determined I should live, and do you know I've been thinking it out. I really believe it is because He is going to let me do something great still. And Doctor Grant has been telling me of a man in Parliament who took all the house by storm, and brought in a most wonderful law that thousands of people blessed him for, and he—he had a cork leg!"

Certainly Roy had not lost his buoyancy of spirits. Dudley drew a deep breath of relief, and for the first time began to see brighter times ahead.

"And I'm going to have a cork leg," went on Roy, "a leg that if I press a spring I can kick out. Think of that!"

Dudley looked beaming, exclaiming,—

"And it will be very convenient to have a leg with no feeling, won't it, especially about the knee when you're crawling along a wall with broken bottles."

"I'm going to see Rob to-morrow," announced Roy, after a little more conversation. "Has he learned to read while I have been ill?"

Dudley shook his head.

"No, we tried one afternoon on the wall, but we were too miserable, so we stopped."

"Well, I can teach him here in bed. That's one thing you don't want a leg to do!"

"I say, Roy," Dudley asked, very cautiously; "don't you feel very funny without it?"

Roy looked away for a minute without answering, and then he said slowly:

"I try and not think about it. It will be worse when I get up—people might think when they see me in bed that I'm all right, but they'll know the truth when I'm up."

Then he added more cheerfully, "It's awfully queer, but do you know I'd never know it wasn't there as far as the feeling goes. Why I can feel the pain right down to my toes now. And at night I'm always dreaming I'm running races with you as fast as I can, and then I wake and can't believe I'll never run again."

As Roy grew stronger he had more visitors; Rob came to him every day for a reading lesson, and old Principle brought him books and sweets. Ben was allowed an interview, and the old groom, with tears running down his cheeks, besought Roy to forgive him.

"I never ought to allowed you, and 'twas me that egged you on and sent you to your death!"

"No, it was my own fault, Ben," said Roy, humbly, "and the thing that pains me most—more than breaking my leg—is to think that I should be the first Bertram who has failed. Dudley did it, and I didn't, and of course I shall never be able to try it again. Perhaps I was too proud of what I could do. We have a picture in the nursery of a boy standing on the top of a bridge, and then tumbling in the water; it's called 'Pride must have a fall.' I've had a fall, haven't I, Ben?"

Ben came out from that interview declaring that "Master Roy ought to be sainted!"

One afternoon Rob was finishing his reading lesson when he looked up and said, a little shyly,

"Master Roy, you mind what you were a telling me of once—about what your father told you. Do you think as how I could do it too?"

"Of course you could, Rob. All of us ought to serve God."

"I've been thinking a deal about it, and I should like to, if I knew how."

"Well, the Bible tells you. I remember nurse made me learn a text a long time ago, 'If any man serve me let him follow me.' It's just following Jesus I suppose, and doing what He wants us to do."

"How can we follow somebody we can't see?"

Roy knitted his brows. Rob's questions were hard to answer sometimes, and then a smile flashed across his face.

"I'll tell you. It's like this. On my birthday granny called me in to give me a birthday talk and, of course, she talked to me about my property. She said my uncle had managed it awfully well over there, and she hoped I would walk in his steps. That would be following him though he was dead, wouldn't it?"

"Ye-es," was the slow response.

"And so you see," Roy replied, leaning forward impressively, and his eyes glistening with earnestness, "we can each follow Jesus. Try and live as He did, and do and speak like Him. We read how He lived in the New Testament."

"And He was the one that died for us," Rob said, reflectively.

"Yes, He is the one you go to, to get your sins washed away. That comes first before we begin to serve Him."

"But I never could serve Him proper, always," objected Rob.

"No, nor more can any one. I'm awful, you know! Dudley says I think such a lot of myself. And of course Jesus never did. And I grumble and cry over my leg every day, and of course He wouldn't have done it. But Jesus forgives us again and again, and helps us to be good, and that's why we love Him, and because He died for us."

"Would He forgive me, and help me?" asked Rob; "are you quite sure He would care to have me for a servant?"

"Of course I'm sure. He wants everybody. You just ask Him."

Rob said no more. He was a lad of few words, and for some days did not touch on the subject again. His reading was progressing rapidly, and when Roy and Dudley found out that his birthday was near they laid their heads together and presented him with a handsome Bible, as they knew he was saving up his pennies to buy one.

His gratitude and delight overwhelmed them, and every day now, when his work was finished, he would sit down and spell out chapters of the gospels to himself.

As the days began to shorten, Roy grew so much stronger that he was able to be carried downstairs, and the first evening he was in the drawing-room, he asked Miss Bertram for the song of the two little drummer boys.

She sat down at the piano, and Dudley seeing Rob weeding a flower bed outside the open window, beckoned to him to come up closer and listen.

"It's the best song out," he shouted.

Roy's face shone as Miss Bertram's sweet voice rang out triumphantly.

—"'the fight was won, and the regiment saved By those two little dots in red!'"

"Oh, how I wish I could be a soldier!" was the muttered exclamation of Roy, "I shall never be able to serve the Queen now!"

"Nonsense," said Miss Bertram, briskly; "granny would tell you 'that all the Bertrams have always served the Queen, and only a few of them have been soldiers!'"

"Well, I suppose they have been sailors?" said Dudley.

"Not at all; we have only had one admiral, and three naval captains in our family during the last hundred years. Your father, Dudley, served the Queen as a governor in India quite as well as if he were fighting for her. Roy's father was her servant in Canada, though he had to do with politics; your uncle James served as a member of Parliament. The Queen has numbers of servants. I always think policemen are quite as brave as soldiers!"

"And what can a one-legged Bertram do?" Roy asked, with a pathetic smile that went straight to his aunt's heart.

"There's no reason why he shouldn't go into Parliament, and perhaps end by being a member of the cabinet."

"I never quite understand what that is," said Roy, contemplatively. "I don't think I should like to be shut up in a stuffy cupboard. They shut them up in it to talk, don't they, Aunt Judy?"

How Miss Bertram laughed! But whilst she was explaining what a cabinet was, Rob crept away from the window muttering, "I suppose as how I could be a policeman, but I'd a deal rather be a soldier!"



XI

A GIFT TO THE QUEEN

"Can I see Master Roy, please?"

It was Rob who spoke, and he seemed breathless with haste and importance, as he stood at the front door one cold afternoon the end of October.

"You can give me your message," the young footman said, rather superciliously.

"No, I can't," was the blunt retort; "ask Master Roy to speak to me."

Rob gained his point, and was ushered into the library where Roy and Dudley were amusing themselves in the firelight.

The old nursery was not much used now, and the library had begun to be considered the boys' room, partly because owing to it being on the ground floor, and opening into the garden, it was more convenient for Roy's use.

Roy was now the possessor of a cork leg; and with the help of a stick he was nearly as active as ever. His spirits were as high, and his purposes as plentiful as before his illness; and his grandmother and aunt marvelled that he could take his deformity so lightly. Yet there were times unknown to any, when Roy's brave little heart sank with the consciousness of it; and often in bed at night his pillow would be wet with tears.

"Oh, God," he would often pray, "you wouldn't let me die, do help me to do something worth living for. I feel my leg will keep away all the opportunities now, but please give me something big to do for you still."

"Hulloo, Rob, come on," was Roy's exclamation as he caught sight of his friend. "Just look at Nibble and Dibble, we're teaching them to draw a cart. It makes you die of laughing to look at them. There they go, and Dibble turns head over heels in his excitement!"

Roy's happy laugh rang out, but though Dudley joined him, Rob's face was grave and set.

"Please, can I speak to you on business, Master Roy?"

"Goody! What a long face!" exclaimed Dudley, pulling down his own in imitation of Rob's, and thereby causing a fresh peal of laughter from Roy. "Have you been a naughty boy, Rob, and has old Hal been thrashing you? Have you been skylarking on the top of the greenhouse, and smashed through on Hal's pate?"

"I should like to speak to Master Roy, alone," said Rob, a little wistfully; in no way disturbed by Dudley's teasing.

"Oh, it's one of your secrets again. I'll be off, Roy, I want to see old Principle!"

And Dudley dashed out of the room, whilst Rob came nearer and began his "business."

"Master Roy, I've been thinking a lot lately, and Miss Bertram asked me the other day if I'd like any other job for the winter as there's hardly enough work for me in the garden now. And yesterday I saw a chap in the village I used to know. He's a recruiting sergeant for the ——shire regiment, and he wants me to enlist straight away. I wouldn't have given it a thought only what you said about serving the Queen has stuck to me, and it does seem a chance, and somehow that song has been in my head ever since I heard Miss Bertram sing it. I'd like to be in a regiment."

Rob paused for breath, and Roy's eyes were wide open with wonder and astonishment.

"But, Rob, you aren't old enough to be a soldier yet!"

"I'm just the age—they take them at eighteen, and I was that the other day, only I don't look it."

"But you're going to be my servant. I couldn't let you go."

Rob's face fell.

"I thought I could have seven years—or even twelve years would hardly find you ready to take up your property. And then I'd come back to you and never leave you again!"

"But I want you with me now—always"—said Roy, in a distressed tone; "I couldn't do without you all that time, and it's horrid of you to want to get away from here, I think."

"All right, Master Roy, I won't go—I'll get a job in the village that will keep me close at hand."

Rob tried to speak cheerfully, and after waiting a minute to see if Roy would say any more, he left the room quietly; all the light having died out of his honest grey eyes.

Roy watched the antics of his mice in the firelight, but his thoughts were far away from them. At last he opened the door and made his way up to his grandmother's room to have his usual chat with her before tea.

"Granny, if a person you like will do anything you like, ought you to make that person do what you like instead of what they like?"

"It sounds like a riddle," said Mrs. Bertram, with a smile. "I won't ask who the person is, the question is whether you like that person or yourself best. Which do you?"

Roy did not answer for a minute, then he hung his head.

"I'm afraid I like myself best."

"If you give me more details, perhaps I can advise you."

"Well, granny, may I talk first to Dudley about it, and then I'll tell you. But you see it's like this—the person wants to please you, and you can't pretend to be pleased if he does what doesn't please you!"

"I think the best plan would be to leave yourself out of the question entirely, and only think of the other person; that would be the most unselfish way."

Roy knitted his brows and heaved a heavy sigh.

"Am I a very selfish person, granny?"

"You are much more selfish than Dudley is," said Mrs. Bertram, decidedly, who never minced matters with her grandsons.

Roy flushed a deep crimson, and his grandmother added,

"I do not say that you are altogether to blame, for Dudley has always given way to you and spoiled you; but you do not very often think of his wishes before your own."

"No, I never do."

Roy's tone was of the deepest dejection; but the sudden entrance of Dudley gave a turn to the conversation, and he gradually recovered his spirits.

When the two boys were at their tea half an hour later, Roy spread the whole matter before Dudley who looked at it in quite a different light.

"How stunning! And is he really going? Hurray! One of us will be a soldier, at any rate. I wish I was big enough to go with him."

"But I don't want him to go, and I told him so, and he isn't going!"

Dudley opened his eyes at this.

"You going to keep him back? Why you're the one that's always talking about serving the Queen, and fighting for her!"

"Yes, I should like to, but—but Rob is different. I want him to be with me."

"Then you don't care about serving the Queen, if you're going to do her out of a soldier who might fight for her!"

This was quite a new aspect of the affair.

"You think I'm like the dog in the manger? I can't go myself and I don't want him to. But if you go to a boarding school like Aunt Judy talks of, and I'm not allowed to go with you, and Rob is gone, I shall be left all alone; and I hate being alone, you don't know how I hate it—I think I should die!"

"Well, if I was you and knew I couldn't be a soldier myself, I would love to send some one instead of me—you know how they do in France. Old Selby was telling us. They pay a subsidy—substitute—don't you call it?—to go and fight for them."

"Yes, that is the coward's way," Roy said, scornfully.

He paused for a minute, and then his eyes flashed fire.

"Yes, Dudley, I'll let him go. It's me that's the coward to try and keep him back! You and I shall send him, and he shall be our substitute, and when we hear of him doing brave things, we shall feel it's ourselves. And we'll make him write letters to us and tell us all he is doing—oh, it will be splendid. How glad I am he has learned to read and write. Dudley, you just go and fetch him in, will you?"

Dudley crammed rather a large piece of cake into his mouth, and dashed out of the room; and a few minutes later dragged in the would-be soldier.

"We've settled you can go, Rob," said Roy, with a little of his masterful air about him; "only you're to go as our soldier. I think if I had had a good, broad, strong chest and never broke my leg, I should have enlisted, but you can go instead of me. Are you glad?"

"I'm sorry to leave you, Master Roy, but I'd dearly like to go."

"We must tell granny and Aunt Judy, and see what they say first. But I'm sure they'd like you to go."

No objection was made. Miss Bertram was rather pleased than otherwise.

"He will make a good soldier," she said, when talking it over with the boys; "he is a steady, reliable lad, with not too many ideas of his own, and implicitly obedient."

"Is that what makes a good soldier?" asked Roy. "I thought it was dash and bravery."

"Dash is a dangerous quality. Steady perseverance is better, Jonathan!"

The next few days were most exciting ones for the boys. Roy and Rob had many a long talk together, and very earnest and serious subjects were touched upon. Rob had little time left to bid his friends farewell, but he went to old Principle, as a matter of course.

"Yes," said the old man, a little proudly; "all the younger folks going out in life comes to me for a parting word. They laughs at me and my principles, but I'm proud of my nickname, and 'tis only right principles will make a man live right, and they knows it. What can I say to you, lad, but fear God and honor the Queen and those in authority under her. Never be afraid of holding to the right and denouncing the wrong, and may God Almighty take your body and soul in His keeping until we meet again."

Rob's last day came, and an hour before his departure, in company with his friend, the sergeant, he came up to the Manor to bid them all farewell. Roy had some farewell words with him in the privacy of his bedroom.

"We shall miss you awfully," he said, walking up and down the room to hide his emotion; "and it makes me wish I had your chance. But you'll remember, Rob, I look to you to be a rattling good soldier, much better than I should have been, and you'll be sure to do something grand and brave the very first opportunity, won't you? You must get the Victoria Cross, of course, and the account of you must be in the newspapers, so that we can read about you. And I shall pray that God will keep you safe, Rob. I hope you'll never have an arm or leg shot off, though I think that would be better than having them cut off. I hope you'll come back safe and sound. When shall we see you again?"

"The sergeant told me I should get a month or six weeks' leave this time next year, Master Roy."

"A year is a very long time. Rob, if I should die before I grow up, I want you to promise me that you will be Dudley's servant instead of mine. He will be master of Norrington Court, then, and I want you to live there."

"But you aren't going to die, Master Roy, you will live and do great things yet."

Roy shook his head a little sadly.

"Sometimes I wonder if I ever will. I won't give up trying, but I shall never be anything but half a man, with my cork leg and my weak chest. Dudley would make a much grander master. Still there's one thing I can do. I can serve God—and I've sent you to serve the Queen, and I can try to serve my fellow creatures. Good-bye, dear Rob, will you kiss me."

And then forgetting his dignity, Roy flung his arms round Rob's neck and hugged him passionately. "I'll never forget you carrying me home that night," he whispered in his ear, "I loved you from that time. And Rob you'll do what father told me to do—serve God first."

Rob nodded, and as he knelt on the ground holding the frail little figure to him, he made a promise there and then in his heart that he would never do or say anything that he would be ashamed of Roy's hearing.

"They're calling me, Master Roy, good-bye."

He was gone, and Roy sitting down on the floor, leaned his head against his bed and burst into tears.

Dudley found him there, and soon comforted him.

"Look here, if you like it, let us get upon the wall and see Rob and the sergeant drive by; we can just see the high road, and Rob had to go to the inn first, so we shall have plenty of time."

Roy's whole face beamed, he seized his stick and limped after Dudley without a thought of his leg, but when he reached the wall he came to a standstill.

"I'm afraid I can't climb it, Dudley, I've never been on it since my leg was broken!"

But Dudley would take no denial.

"Oh, yes, you can, I'll hoist you up, we'll manage it."

And "manage it" they did to Roy's intense delight, though Mrs. Bertram would have been horror-struck at the narrow escape the little invalid had, of falling to the ground during the proceeding.

When they saw the trap in the distance, they set up a wild cheer, and waved their handkerchiefs frantically, and when they were answered by a cheer and a fluttering piece of white, they felt quite satisfied at their farewell.

Before they got down from their high perch, Roy said, earnestly, "If God sent us Rob as an opportunity, Dudley, I wonder if we did him good."

"Well, you see he was such a lot bigger than us, and Aunt Judy says she never saw such a steady good boy; it's very difficult to do good to good people, because you want to be so extra good yourself."

"At any rate, we've made him the Queen's soldier."

"Yes," argued Dudley, provokingly; "but he was the first one that thought of it!"

"Oh, shut up," was Roy's impatient retort; "he told me himself it was the song of Jake and Jim that did it, and—and my talking to him."

"And I expect the sergeant thinks it's all his doing."

"But he wouldn't have gone unless I had told him he might."

And as usual Roy had the last word.



XII

LETTERS

Very disappointed were the boys at Rob's first letter, which arrived about a fortnight after he had gone to the regimental depot at a neighboring town.

"DEAR MASTER ROY:

"I hope you and Master Dudley are quite well as it leaves me at present. I like it first-rate, but it is hard work, and I have a good many masters, but I means to do my best. God bless you.

"From your faithful "ROB."

"That's not a letter at all!" said Roy, scornfully; "why he tells us nothing at all! Why he might have gone to school and told us more! That from a soldier. It's the stupidest rot I've ever heard!"

"I think you forget what a poor scholar Rob is," said Miss Bertram, reprovingly. "Now I think that is a remarkably good letter when I think what a short time he has been learning to write. You boys had better each write a proper letter to him yourselves, and ask him what you want to know. He will like to hear from you."

And so that afternoon, sitting up in state at the library table, the boys spread out their writing materials and began to write.

"I feel," said Roy, biting the end of his pen and looking up at the ceiling for an inspiration, "that I don't know quite how to begin. I should like to tell him not to write like an ass, when he knows he ought to tell us everything."

"All right, tell him so," said Dudley, squaring his elbow and frowning terribly as he prepared himself for the task. "You know what old Selby says: 'Make your paper talk, my boys, and make it talk in your own tongues.'"

After a great many interruptions from each other, and a few skirmishes round the table which resulted in the ink bottle being spilt, the letters were finished.

Roy read his aloud with pride to Dudley, who did the same to him.

"MY DEAR ROB:

"You must write us longer letters. I am quite sure there is lots to tell. What do you have to eat? And where do you sleep? Have you got a gun of your own? Do they let soldiers shoot rabbits on their half-holidays? Does the band play while you are at dinner? What are your clothes like, and what are you to be called, now you're a soldier? When will you be a sergeant, and is there any fighting coming off soon? Old Principle says you will be learning drill. What is drill? He says it's learning how to march, but Dudley and I can do that first-rate. How many masters have you got? Write to me to-morrow and tell me all. I hope you will remember you are our soldier, and be sure you do something very grand as quick as ever you can. Have you got a sword and a medal? Do you ride on a horse, and can you fire off the cannon? I miss you very much but you belong to us, and must come back full of glory.

"Your loving friend,

"FITZ ROY BERTRAM."

"MY DEAR ROB:

"I hope you like being a soldier. How many soldiers are there in the same house with you? Give them my love and tell them we hope they liked the cake we put in your box for them. Roy came down to old Principle's with me yesterday. He showed us a hammer out of his cave he dug up. He says you will not be a full blown soldier for a year. He had a cousin who was a sergeant in India—and had his brains burst out in battle. When do you begin to fight? Tell us if you feel funky, and what the enemy looks like, and who they are. We think you ought to write us a much jollier letter. Roy's leg is first-rate, and he is up on the garden wall now like a cat. We sit there to do our evening prep: for old Selby. Good-bye. We're on the lookout for your name in the newspapers the first battle that comes off.

"Roy's friend,

"DUDLEY."

"I don't think you've finished your letter properly," observed Roy, critically, as Dudley concluded reading his. "Why do you write you're my friend?"

"Because I am," was the prompt reply; "I'm not Rob's friend and I shan't tell him I am. I just write to him because you do, that's all."

"Don't you like him?"

"I don't want him for my friend; he's going to be a kind of servant. Besides I wanted him to remember that I was your friend. I knew you long before he did, and if he was dead now, or if he never had been born, I should have been your friend just the same. We could have got on all right without him."

This was not the first touch of jealousy that had appeared in Dudley's character. He had more than once quarrelled with Roy on account of the boy who he said had crept in between them, but on Roy always emphatically assuring him that Rob occupied a back place in his affections, Dudley would generally be appeased and become his sunny self again.

"I like Rob very much," said Roy, slowly, "'specially now he's a soldier. I was thinking in church last Sunday, when they were reading about David and Jonathan, that Jonathan had an armor-bearer. That's Rob. Only I can't go to battle, so I send him. Don't you think that's a nice idea?"

"Did he get killed?" asked Dudley, with interest; "I forget about him."

"It doesn't say—I expect he lived as long as Jonathan did, and then perhaps David took him to be his servant. That's what I've settled with Rob, that he shall be your servant if I die."

Dudley gave himself an impatient shake.

"Oh, shut up with that rot, you'll live as long as I do!"

Roy did not speak for a minute, then he said, slowly, "You remember my will that I made when I was so ill?"

"Yes, what did you do with it?"

"Aunt Judy found it the next morning on the floor nearly under the bed. She laughed a little at first, and then got quite grave when I explained it, and she took it away and locked it up somewhere. But if I never make another, you will remember that I have left Rob to you for your servant."

Dudley looked up with a comical gleam in his eye.

"And who gave Rob to you, old chap?"

"I took him—at least he gave himself to me."

Roy's tone was dignity itself, but Dudley laughed.

"Well he doesn't belong to you any longer; the Queen has got him."

"I have lent him to her, that's all."

"You talk of Rob as if he is a slave. He's a Briton, and 'Britons shall be free!'"

"So he is free, but he chose to be my servant when I grow up, and he shall be!"

Dudley dropped the argument, for Roy's face was flushing hotly, and he was wonderfully patient with him since his accident.

Miss Bertram entered the room at this juncture, and asked in her cheery brisk tones, "Would any boys like to drive me to the railway station in the pony trap? I am going up to London on business, and shall be away till to-morrow."

"Hurray," shouted Roy; "we'll come, and just read our letters, Aunt Judy! Won't they make Rob see how he ought to write?"

Miss Bertram took the letters in her hand, praised the little writers, and then sent them off to their rooms to get tidy for their drive.

A short time after, Roy mounted in front with his aunt, was driving her with pride along the high road; whilst Dudley from the back seat kept them lively with his chatter and flow of fun.

The boys always liked the bustle of the station; and getting a lad to hold the pony, they followed their aunt to the platform and saw her on board the train. Some friends spoke to her before the train went off and amongst them was a certain Captain Smalley.

"I say," said Dudley, nudging Roy; "he's an officer, and he is in the army, I expect he knows Rob."

"We'll ask him, directly the train is off."

But in the bustle of the last few minutes they missed seeing him; the young captain got into his dog-cart, and was well on his way home before the boys were ready to start in their trap.

"Oh, I say! See him in the distance! Whip up and let us catch him. Here, let me drive, it's my turn now!"

But Roy clutched hold of the reins.

"No, I want to."

"I tell you it's my turn!"

"It's the only thing I can do with one leg, it's a beastly shame of you!"

Dudley, who had nearly got possession of the coveted reins dropped them instantly.

"All right then, but go ahead!"

And then Roy with a shamed look put the reins in his cousin's hands.

"I'll give them up. Granny always says I'm selfish. It was awfully mean to talk of my leg. Now then hurry! Gee-up!"

Dudley took the reins with a gratified smile, applied the whip, and the spirited little pony dashed along the road at such a rate, that a porter looked after them in dismay.

"Those two young gents will come to their death afore they're satisfied," he remarked, and another man responded:

"Yes, the little one is pretty well smashed up already, but legs or no legs, boys allays keeps their sperrits!"

Captain Smalley was rather startled at hearing frantic shouts behind him, and when he pulled up wondering if some message were to be delivered, he was still more bewildered by what he heard.

"Hi, Captain Smalley! Stop for us. We've come two miles out of our way. Now then, Roy, go ahead!"

"Do you know Rob? We want you to tell us how he is. We can't get a word out of him; is there going to be any fighting? And how does he look in his clothes?"

"Who is Rob?" asked Captain Smalley.

"Why, he's a soldier like you. You must know him!"

A few more explanations were made, and then the young man laughed heartily.

"Your young friend is learning his recruit drill at the depot, I should think. If he were in my regiment I might not be able to give you much information about him. The army is a big affair, my boys, and I doubt if Rob and I will ever meet."

The boys' faces fell considerably.

"Do you think he likes it?" asked Roy, anxiously; "do you like being a soldier?"

"Of course I do, and if he has any stuff in him he will like it, too."

"And will he be sent to fight very soon?"

"I dare say he may do his seven years without a single fight!"

Roy looked very disappointed.

"If he doesn't fight, he might just as well have stopped at home. What's the good of being a soldier if you don't have any battles?"

"Soldiers prevent battles, sometimes."

This sounded nonsense to the boys. They bade the captain good-bye, and turned their pony's head homeward quite disconsolate.

"I'll write and tell him to come home if he's not going to do anything," said Roy, with his little mouth pursed up determinedly.

"We'll give him a chance, first. He may go out to fight. Captain Smalley didn't say for certain."

"I think Captain Smalley is funky himself about fighting, that's what I think!"

And with this disdainful assertion Roy dismissed the subject.



XIII

OLD PRINCIPLE

It was a soft, mild day in December. Mr. Selby's study seemed close and stifling to the boys as they sat up at the long table with books and slates before them, and a blazing fire behind their backs.

"This sum won't come right, Mr. Selby," groaned Roy; "and I've gone over it three times. It is made up of nothing but eights and nines. I hate nine. I wish it had never been made. Who made up figures, Mr. Selby?"

Roy's questions were rather perplexing at lesson time.

"I will tell you all about that another time," was Mr. Selby's reply. "Have another try, my boy: never let any difficulty master you, if you can help it."

A knock at the door, and Mr. Selby was summoned to some parishioner. He was often interrupted when with his pupils, but they were generally conscientious enough to go on working during his absence.

But Roy's lesson this morning was not interesting, and he was unusually talkative.

"It's no good trying to master this sum, it's all those nines. They're nasty, lanky, spiteful little brutes, I should like to tear them out of the sum-books."

"Expel them from arithmetic," said Dudley, looking up from a latin exercise, his sunny smile appearing. "Don't you wish we could have a huge dust hole to empty all the nasty people and things in that we don't like?"

"Yes—I'd shovel the nines in fast enough, and a few eights to keep them company, and then I would throw in all my medicine bottles, and my great coat, and—and Mrs. Selby on the top of them!"

This last clause was added in a whisper, for if there was any one that Roy really disliked, it was his tutor's wife. She was a kind-hearted woman, but fidgety and fussy to the last degree, and was always in a bustle. Having no children, she expended all her energies on the parish, and there was not a domestic detail in any village home that escaped her eye. She had spoken sharply to the boys that morning for bringing in muddy footprints, and her words were still rankling in Roy's breast.

"It's so awfully hot," Roy continued; "let us open the window, Dudley. Old Selby won't mind for once; it's like an oven in here."

The window was opened with some difficulty, and the fresh air blowing in seemed delicious to the boys. Roy clambered up on the old window-seat, slate in hand, but his eyes commanded the view of the village street, and the sum made slow progress in consequence.

"I say! Tom White's pig has broken loose, and that stupid Johnnie Dent is driving it straight into old Principle's! I expect he'll come out in an awful rage. No—the door must be shut, he can't get in. There seems quite a crowd round old Principle's. He's giving them a lecture, I expect. Here comes old Mother Selby tearing up the street, her bonnet strings are flying and she's awfully excited!"

A minute after the door was thrown open.

"John, it's the most extraordinary thing—oh, you are not here!—Where is Mr. Selby? I always knew something would happen to that old man roaming over the hills half the night, and digging holes big enough to bury himself! John! Where are you?"

She disappeared as quickly as she had come, banging the door violently behind her; but Roy sprang down from his seat instantly.

"Dudley, it's old Principle! Something must have happened to him, do let us go and see."

Dudley dashed down his pen, and was vaulting out of the window, when he suddenly stopped.

"Roy get your great coat, quick. Aunt Judy made me promise to look after you. I'll wait while you get it."

Roy dashed out into the hall. He heard the rector's voice in the distance, but was too excited to wait to see him, and after impatiently tugging on his objectionable coat, he limped off as quickly as he could, joining Dudley at the garden gate. They heard the news on the way to old Principle's. It appeared that the old man had gone out the afternoon before, and had never come home. His shop was shut up exactly as he had left it, and the woman who went in every day to do his cleaning and cooking for him, was the first one to notice his absence. The group of idle women round his door were busily discussing the question when the boys arrived.

"I shouldn't be a bit surprised if as how he has made away with hisself," suggested one, knowingly. "I always did say as he were queer in the head, a makin' out of a pack o' stones such amazin' stories! And a mutterin' to hisself like no ordinary creetur, and a walkin' through the woods and fields as if he seed nothin' but what other folks couldn't see at all!"

"Ah, now! To think of it! And Bill is a goin' down the river to find his body; for him and Walter Hitchcock have searched the whole place since seven o'clock this mornin'!"

"May be there's a murder in it," said a young woman, cheerfully. "He were an old man to wander off alone, and there's allays evil-doers round about for the unprotected."

The boys listened to these and similar conjectures with frightened eyes; then Dudley whispered,

"I believe he is in his cave, Roy; we'll go and look for him. Only don't tell these women about it, because he hasn't told anybody but us where it is."

They left the shop and started for the hills, but Roy's lameness made progress very slow.

At last he stopped, and struggling to hide his disappointment said, "You'll have to go on without me, Dudley. I only keep you back. This old leg of mine always comes in the way."

Dudley stopped to consider. "It's a very long way, but we must get there somehow. Hulloo, here's just the thing."

They had stopped at a small inn at the outskirts of the village; and tied to the drinking trough outside, was a rough pony and cart whose owner was enjoying himself in the tap room with his friends.

"Jump in, Roy. It's to save old Principle, and anybody would be glad to lend his cart for that."

Roy was not long in acting upon this advice. The pony trotted forward briskly, and the boys would have thoroughly enjoyed this escapade, except for the fears of their friend's safety.

"If anything has happened to him, the village will go to the dogs!" Roy asserted, emphatically; "old Hal said the other day he was worth a couple of parsons. When I grow up, I think I shall try and be like him. I shall give good advice to everybody without ever scolding them, that is what he does."

"Do you think he is dead?" asked Dudley, "I don't think he can be. Why it was only the day before yesterday we saw him, and he was as well as we are."

It seemed a long time before they reached the cave; the hills were steep and the pony rather old, and more than once Dudley felt inclined to run forward on his own two legs. Roy at last suggested this.

"I can drive up after you as fast as I can; and if you find him you holloa to me."

So Dudley jumped out and was soon lost to sight behind the bushes and hollows that fringed the hills.

Roy drove on busily thinking, and wondering if they had done wisely to take the matter into their own hands, and come off alone as they had done.

When he at length reached the cave Dudley came to meet him with a puzzled face.

"Something has happened, Roy. I can't get into it very far; there's a lot of earth tumbled down and I can't move it."

"Then old Principle is buried alive!" cried Roy in terror. "Quick, Dudley, let us dig him out."

Dudley seemed quite helpless.

"I've no spade, and there's no place near to get one. I wish we hadn't come alone."

This was a dilemma, but Roy would not be overcome by it.

"Let us look about for his tools; he always brings them up with him. Isn't there enough room for me to get in, Dudley?"

Dudley shook his head, and both boys approached the entrance. There had indeed been a serious landslip, and it was impossible to remove the great blocks of stone and earth that had fallen without proper tools; and though they searched for some traces of old Principle, not a thing belonging to him could they find.

"Perhaps he may not be here."

"I believe he is," maintained Roy; "and we must be as quick as ever we can. Dudley you go back in the cart and get some men to come and help. I will stay here. How I wish we hadn't come alone!"

Left by himself, Roy did not sit down and do nothing. Clambering all amongst the fallen earth and stone, he eagerly searched for some crevice or opening; and at last high up in the ravine he found one. Then lying down flat on the ground he put his mouth to the hole. "Old Principle! Hi! Old Principle! Are you there?"

It was not fancy that a muffled voice came up to him—

"Help! I'm here!"

That gave Roy fresh strength. Eagerly he tore aside brambles and stones with small thought of his scratched, bruised hands, and at last had the satisfaction of viewing a hole big enough to drop his slim little body through. Then he called again,

"Old Principle, I'm coming down from the top. Are you hurt? Can you tell me if it is far to fall?"

And this time old Principle's voice sounded clearer:

"God help you, laddie! For I can't help you or myself. No it is not a very big drop from where you are."

For one moment Roy looked at the dark chasm below him with hesitation, then he murmured to himself, "If I break my other leg, I must get to him—poor old Principle."

And then carefully and cautiously he let himself down, clinging with his hands to a stout twig of mountain ash that bent and swayed across the crevice with his weight.

Another moment and leaving go of the friendly branch, he dropped on damp fresh soil, and found himself in almost total darkness. Then as his eyes got more accustomed to it, he saw the prostrate form of old Principle only a yard or two away from him. The old man was breathing heavily, and his legs were completely buried under fallen earth.

"Is it Master Roy?" he said, as Roy came over and took hold of his hand; "ay, you shouldn't have imprisoned yourself with me, laddie—I didn't rightly think of what you were doing—I'm—I'm in such pain!"

"Are you very hurt? Oh, dear, what can I do? I can't lift you. Are your legs broken?"

"I don't rightly know. If you could shift a little of the earth off, may be it would ease me!"

Roy looked round and then delightedly seized hold of a small shovel.

"Your shovel is here. I'll do it," he said, cheerfully, and then to work he went. The soil was fortunately not heavy to remove, but there was a great quantity of it before poor old Principle's legs were liberated. Roy toiled on, hot and breathless, longing that help should come, his own fatigue forgotten in his pity for the helpless old man.

"Can you lift yourself up, old Principle? I really think I've got the earth off your legs—at least most of it!"

There was a struggle, then a groan.

"I'm afraid not, laddie. 'Tis the power that has quite gone out of them. I'm fearing that old Principle will be never roaming the hills again, but there 'tis the Lord's will, and He never do make mistakes."

"Do you think your legs are broken like mine were?"

"I can't rightly say. It has seemed a weary time since I lay here. Many days and nights I suppose—and I'm longing for a drink, but thank the Lord, He has sent you to me."

"It is only since yesterday that you have been lost. And Dudley has gone back to get some men to come. I wish I could get you some water, but there's none here, is there?"

"I am afraid not."

Silence fell on the pair, which was broken at last by,—

"'Tis a good principle to think of your mercies when trouble overtakes you. It has whiled away the time here, and I can thank the Lord with all my heart, that my head and hands are uninjured!"

"How did it happen?" asked Roy.

"I'm afraid I excavated too far and was in the midst of unearthing a large boulder of stone when I remembered no more—it took me so sudden, and when I came to life again I thought I was in my bed at home with a ton's weight on my feet. 'Twas good of the Lord to give me air—that crevice you came through has saved me."

"You said a long time ago you could mend anything but broken hearts, but you can't mend broken legs, can you? Or you would have mended mine."

"Ay, ay, so I would, surely. No—the mender has turned into a breaker this time, 'tis a good thing it's only himself that he has broken up."

A slight groan escaped him, and Roy softly stroked his face, a broken sob escaping him.

"Oh, old Principle, how I wish I was strong, how I wish I could move you! You aren't broken up! Don't say you are. Couldn't I help you to roll over on your back, wouldn't that be better?"

After great effort this was partly accomplished, and then to Roy's intense relief he heard voices above.

Running to the opening he shouted:

"Here we are! Help us out, or old Principle will die!"

But it was some time before the rescue could be accomplished. The opening was small enough to let Roy through, but not old Principle, and the boy refused to leave the old man. Pickaxes and shovels were set heartily to work, and after half an hour's hard toil, the old man was gently raised out of his dangerous position, and placed in the cart. Roy was put in with him, and Dudley walked by the side in silence until they reached the village. There was a great stir and excitement over their return. Mrs. Selby and their aunt met the boys at the entrance of the village, and Miss Bertram looked anxiously at Roy's little white set face.

He could not be torn away from his old friend till he heard the doctor's verdict, and it was a far more hopeful one than anybody had anticipated.

"It is a marvellous escape. Not a bone broken, but of course he is terribly bruised and shaken, and very stiff."

"I'll sit with him till we can get a proper nurse," said good-natured Mrs. Selby; "he seems to have no kith or kin belonging to him. It will be a lesson to him, for life, I hope, and will put a stop to all this delving and digging and unearthing what is best left alone. It only fosters scepticism in the minds of the ignorant, and teaches them to disbelieve their Bibles!"

Old Principle looked up with a smile after the doctor's visit.

"Is little Master Roy there?"

Roy pressed forward eagerly.

"I'm thinking, laddie, that you and Master Dudley have had a rare good opportunity of saving a poor old man's life, and he is duly grateful to you."

But Roy was very near tears.

"I'm so glad—so glad your legs aren't broken," he said, in a quivering voice, "anything is better than being suddenly turned into a cripple!"

And then bending over him he kissed the furrowed brow, and crept out of the room.



XIV

HEROES

Old Principle's accident was a great event in the village. The boys got their fair share of praise in his rescue, but their grandmother did not see it in such a favorable light.

"You ought never to have left your lessons without leave, or taken a cart belonging to a stranger all unknown to him, or gone off alone without telling any one about it. And you were shown the folly and uselessness of such a proceeding by arriving on the scene and being utterly unable to extricate him from his position. If children would realize their weakness and foolishness more in these days, they would develop into better men and women, but self-sufficiency and self-conceit are signs of the times!"

Every day the boys went to see their friend, and even Mrs. Selby allowed that they could be quiet and well-behaved in a sick room. It was a long time before old Principle regained his health, and he seemed to have grown much older and feebler since his accident; but his serenity of spirit was undisturbed, and some of the neighbors who had before voted him close and cranky, now offered to come and sit with him, and learned many a lesson from his sickbed. When he was at last able to take his place in the shop again, Roy's mind was at ease about him.

"I was so afraid he was going to die as long as he stayed in bed," he confided to Dudley: "I hope no one will ever die that I like, it must be such a dreadful thing to have them gone. I think I would rather die first, wouldn't you?"

"We can't all die first," said matter-of-fact Dudley; "somebody must be last."

"Well, I don't think I shall be," returned Roy, "that's the best of being weak like I am."

But this assurance brought no comfort to Dudley.

A few more labored letters came from Rob, and then one that stirred the boys' hearts after he had been about three months away from them. It was to say that he was going out to India in a draft, and had been allowed three days to come and say good-bye to his friends.

Roy was almost beside himself with excitement at the prospect of seeing him again; and when the day came, he insisted upon going to the station by himself to meet him. Dudley perched on the garden wall awaited their coming.

Rob was certainly improved in appearance. He held himself up bravely, but a softened light came into his eyes, as Roy, looking whiter and more fragile than ever, flung himself into his arms, utterly regardless of all onlookers.

"I'm right glad to see you, Master Roy," said Rob, in a husky voice.

"Oh, Rob, you look so splendid! And you've got to be quite a man! Come on, I'm going to drive you home, and we shall be all by ourselves. Now tell me, are you really and truly happy?"

Rob did not answer this question till he was in the trap being driven homeward; then he said, slowly, "Yes, I'm thinking I like it first-rate, but 'tis hard in many ways. 'Tis hard to keep straight and do the right, when most seems to live the other way."

"But most of the soldiers aren't bad, are they?" questioned Roy with startled eyes.

"They aren't out and out bad—just careless, I reckon, but old Principle would say they're lacking in principle."

"And is it hard being a soldier? I suppose it must be a little. I came across a text I thought would just fit you, Rob, the other day. 'Endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.'"

Rob's eyes brightened. He seemed strangely older and graver in his ways, yet when they drove up in sight of Dudley who slipped down over the wall, and tumbled himself into the trap with them, he made the boys roar with laughter with his funny incidents of barrack-room life.

The three days passed only too soon. Innumerable were the questions put to the young soldier, and Roy's curiosity about a military life was insatiable.

"Well," he said at last, "I don't think I should be strong enough to be a soldier, but I'm awfully glad you're one, Rob. And now you've got your chance in India of doing something grand and getting the Victoria Cross. The opportunity has come to you, and Dudley and I can't get it, though we've tried hard. But we have helped to send you out to India to do it, Rob, so you won't fail us, will you? And then when you come back covered with medals, you shall live with me and always dress in your uniform, so we'll look forward and think of that!"

When Rob departed, he had quite a little party of friends to see him off at the station. Old Hal, the gardener, Ted, the stable-boy, and old Principle were there, and Miss Bertram and her nephews were with him to the last.

"He's begun right, and he'll go on like it," announced old Principle, with emphasis, as the train steamed out of the station, and Rob leaned out of the window to wave a last farewell to his friends. "'Tis the beginnin' of life that boys make such a mess of, as a rule!"

Roy's eyes were tearful as he watched the train disappear.

"I've given him to the Queen," he said, gravely, to his aunt; "and no one can say I'm selfish, for I'd much rather have had him stay with me. But as I can't do anything grand, he must do it for me!"

The day after Rob left them, the boys had an invitation to spend the day with Roy's guardian, General Newton. He did not often ask them over to see him, so it was considered a great treat, and they set off in high spirits. The groom drove them over, and they were shown into the general's study at once upon their arrival. He was not by himself; another grey-haired gentleman was seated there smoking, and the boys wondered at first who he was, but General Newton soon enlightened them.

"This is a very old chum of mine, boys, who was in my regiment with me when I first enlisted; he has been a hero in his time, so if you make up to him he will tell you some wonderful stories. Now, Manning, these boys are smitten with the 'scarlet fever' at present, as a young friend of theirs has just enlisted. Tell them something about the Crimea; you had plenty of ghastly experiences there."

Colonel Manning laughed as he met the boys' admiring gaze, and before long he was enchanting them by his reminiscences.

"Now will you tell us the very bravest thing that you ever saw any soldier do?" demanded Roy, with flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes.

Colonel Manning looked at his little auditor rather thoughtfully.

"I've seen a good many brave deeds done," he said, slowly; "but one stands out in my memory above and beyond them all."

"Oh, do tell us."

"It was quite a young lad, a recruit that came to join our regiment when we were in Malta. He was a fair, curly-headed boy, and seemed quite frightened at the rough life and ways of his comrades. I happened to be orderly officer one evening, and was going my rounds, when I passed one of the barrack-rooms just before lights were out. It was in a low building and the windows were open. The men were noisy, and the first thing I heard was a volley of oaths from one of the oldest soldiers there. The corporal in charge instead of reproving him, was joining in, and there was a great dispute between a lot of them about some small matter, when this young chap stood up with a flush on his cheeks. 'Comrades,' he cried; 'would any of you allow your mother to be called evil names in the barrack-room?' His voice rang put so clearly that there was a hush at once, and they turned to him in wonder. 'You know you wouldn't,' he went on; 'and you are ill-treating the name of One who is dearer and nearer to me than any mother—the best Friend I've got. I tell you, I won't allow you to do it while I am in the room!' I remember as I stood there and heard him, and saw the men utterly abashed before the boy, I felt he had a courage that none of us could equal."

"Is that all?" asked Dudley, with disappointment in his tone.

"Did the men stop swearing?" asked Roy.

"As far as I can remember, they did. The corporal rebuked them, and lights were put out, but that boy was braver than many a hero on the battlefield."

The boys' faces fell.

"But that was not what we call a brave deed," said Roy, at length. "Of course it was splendid of him, but it wouldn't get him the Victoria Cross."

"No, only a crown of everlasting life, and a word of commendation from the King of Kings," said the colonel, in a strangely quiet voice; but Roy's expressive little face kindled at once, and he said no more. They went into the dining-room to lunch soon, and the boys were too busy enjoying the good things before them to talk much to their elders. After it was over General Newton sent them out for a run in the garden. And then when they came in, he asked them if they would like to come upstairs to his old picture gallery.

"I am going to take my friend up, and you can come, too."

The boys were delighted; they had often heard of this gallery, but had never been in it as General Newton kept it locked up, and very rarely opened it.

"I have some gems amongst the portraits," he said to Colonel Manning as he unlocked a door in the passage, and led them into a long dusky corridor; "I will pull up the blinds and then we shall see. They are mostly ancestors, but one or two are by master hands, and two or three royal personages are amongst them."

The boys listened eagerly whilst their host pointed out one and another, with now and then an anecdote connected with them.

"Look," said Roy, delightedly, "there's a fine soldier. He is quite young, and yet what a lot of medals! and oh, General Newton, isn't that the Victoria Cross on his coat?"

"Yes, my boy, he served his country well for such a youngster, he fought in eight battles, and came home without a scratch, though he had many hair-breadth escapes. In one battle he had two horses shot under him, and he saved the colors on foot, though he was leading a cavalry charge."

"He was a regular hero!" murmured the admiring boys.

"I don't think he was," said the general, drily. "He had plenty of dash and go, but no moral courage. He came home after the wars were over, and broke his mother's heart by becoming a drunkard and a gambler; and he died an early death from drink and dissipation."

Roy looked very puzzled.

"I thought a brave man must be a good one, and brave and good to the end of his life."

"A man can face the cannon's mouth better than a friend's ridicule," said General Newton; "the young soldier we were hearing about before dinner had a nobler courage than this poor fellow here."

Roy said no more, but though he listened and looked, the rest of the time they were in the gallery, his thoughts were with the hero of the Victoria Cross. He ran back to have one more look at him before they went downstairs, and gazed up at the bold, frank bearing, and the laughing mouth of the soldier, with wistful pity in his brown eyes.

"You served your Queen and country, but I expect you left out God," he said, in a whisper; then he ran on to overtake the others.

After an early tea the boys were packed up in the trap to come home.

"Drive home as quickly as you can," said the general to the groom, "for rain is not far off, and it will not do to let Master Fitz Roy get a soaking; he looks as if a breath of wind will blow him away."

"I do hate people talking about me like that," Roy confided to Dudley as they set off at a brisk rate; "I might just as well be a girl. I often wonder I wasn't born one for all the good that I shall do in the world."

"That's all stuff," said Dudley, indignantly; "you'll be an awfully strong man I expect when you grow up, you see if you aren't!"

Roy shook his head, and was unusually silent for some time. They were driving through the outskirts of a village when down came the rain. The groom wrapped the boys up as well as he could, and was urging the horse on, when it suddenly shied and came to a standstill. Looking down, the groom saw a small child seated in the middle of the road, almost miraculously preserved from the horse's hoofs.

"Well, here's a go," he muttered; "where on earth does it come from, we don't want no delay in such a storm as this!"

The boys had sprung down at once from the trap, and were endeavoring to drag the child away when it burst into roars of fright and anger.

"I want mummy—oh, mummy!"

It was a little girl between three and four. She had been placidly nursing a doll in the middle of the road, and seemed perfectly oblivious of wind and rain.

"Where do you live?" asked Roy, but the child only continued to wail for its mother.

"Here, Master Roy, you'll be wet through. Come back, and let Master Dudley hoist her up to me. We can't stop all day trying to find out where she lives. We'll take her back with us for the time."

But this did not please Roy.

"No, we must find her mother; she must come from the village we have passed. You wait there with the horse, Sanders, and we'll take her back."

"Let Master Dudley do it, then," said Sanders, crossly, "and you get into the trap again."

This also Roy refused to do.

"It's an opportunity, isn't it, Dudley? And look she has taken hold of my hand; you run on in front and ask about her at the first cottage you come to, and I'll bring her after you."

Sanders grumbled and growled, but the boys did not heed him. Happily the mother of the child soon appeared, thanked them profusely, and Roy and Dudley clambered up into the trap again, both wet through.

"You're a heedless, disobedient pair," said the wrathful Sanders, "and if I'm blamed for your taking to your beds and gettin' rheumaticky fever and inflammation of the lungs, it won't be my fault, and I shall tell the missus so!"



XV

AN UNWELCOME PROPOSAL

Roy was not well for some time after this episode. He had a bad bronchial attack, and was in the hands of his old nurse again.

"It do seem as if everything conspires to make you a delicate lad," she said one day; "it beats me how you come through it as well as you do! But 'tis mostly your thoughtless ways that leads you into trouble."

"I'm sorry," Roy said, cheerfully; "but I expect I'm stronger than I look. I never shall be much of a fellow, I know; but even with my cork leg I can do a good deal, can't I?"

"You're worth two of Master Dudley!" ejaculated the fond nurse, but this assertion was of course questioned.

"I shall never be like Dudley, never! Not in looks, or strength, or goodness. He is better than I am all round!"

Miss Bertram came into the room at this moment.

"Ah, nurse," she said, in her bright, brisk way; "he is like a cat, isn't he? Has nine lives, I'm sure. There never was such a boy for getting into scrapes. I'm in fear whenever he is out of our sight now that he may never come back again."

"Now, Aunt Judy, you wouldn't have liked me not to have got out to that baby?"

"I should like some one else to have done it."

"Yes, I suppose Dudley would have done it," and Roy's tone was a little sad; "but you see I wanted to help. As he was saying to me this morning, he will have many more chances than I when he gets bigger and goes out to India to do good to people. I shall have to stop at home now, for I shall never be able to ride, he will have all the big opportunities, and I must be content with the little ones."

"You talk like a little old grandfather, sometimes," said Miss Bertram, laughing, as she sat down beside him. "You must make the most of David while he is with you, for I have heard from his stepfather this morning, and he wishes him sent to school at once."

Roy's eyes opened wide.

"But I shall go too, shan't I, Aunt Judy?"

"I am afraid not just yet. You are not fit to rough it; besides we couldn't lose both our boys!"

"But I must go if Dudley goes, I must!" and Roy's tone was passionate now. "I won't have him go away from me—I've lost Rob, and that is bad enough—You wouldn't take Dudley away from me, too, Aunt Judy!"

"Hush, hush, we will not talk any more about it now. He will not go till after Easter, and that won't be here yet."

Miss Bertram was sorry she had broached the subject, when she saw Roy's distress, and going downstairs sent Dudley up to play with him.

Later on when she was sitting with her mother in the drawing-room a small head appeared. "May I come in, granny?"

It was Dudley, and his round and rosy face was unusually solemn. Marching in he took up his position on the hearth-rug, his back to the fire, and with his hands deep in his pockets, he turned his face rather defiantly toward his grandmother.

"Granny, I'm not going to school without Roy."

"Hoighty-toity! What next, I wonder. Is that the way for little boys to speak to their elders. You will do what you are told as long as you are in my house, as your father did before you."

"It is your stepfather's wish," put in Miss Bertram; "you ought to be willing to obey him."

"Not if he tells me to do something wrong. And I'm sure it would be quite a wrong thing for me to go away from Roy. We have promised never to leave each other till we grow up, and we don't mean to break our promise. And, granny, I'm sure you don't like broken promises. Father doesn't know about Roy, and he can't understand like I do, and it would be very wrong of him if he took me away from Roy!"

Mrs. Bertram put on her glasses and inspected her little grandson with searching eyes.

"That is a most disrespectful speech, Dudley. I shall of course uphold your father's wishes."

"But, granny, I can't leave Roy. It will break his heart. You don't know how he frets about his leg. He doesn't say much and is always so cheerful, but he misses me most awfully even if I'm away for a day. If he was well and strong, he could get on first-rate, but he wouldn't get about half so much if I didn't take him. I think he would mope and mope all by himself. And I don't think we could live without each other. You won't send me away, will you?"