"DO YOU WANT A BOY TO GO TO SEA?"
His father is very angry with him, not only for this last scrape, but about pretty well everything that's happened since he's been here; for of course it all came out in talking to the governor and the boys, and that watch affair he is mad about, and thinks it began all the mischief. But I think the beginning of it was when he let Chandos into that scrape about the farm-yard—that was the first mean thing I ever knew Tom to do; and now if it wasn't actual stealing it was next to it, for he put Chandos minor up to taking his brother's studs and a locket that was with them. The police found that out; I don't know what those London fellows could not find out if they tried. Nobody had missed the things until we heard they had been found, and then Chandos went to the drawer where he had put them and found they were gone, and some money too; but he won't say a word about the money, it seems. He is dreadfully upset, I know, although he is very quiet about it; but I have come in rather suddenly once or twice in the middle of the day, and found him kneeling down, and though he has tried to hide it, I know he was crying too. He need not be afraid of me now, though, for I'd—well I'd rather kick up a row and laugh in church than tell the other fellows of it. I'm in the secret a little. I know he feels it awfully about Frank, and I suppose it helps him a bit to go and tell God all about it. That's just what it is, I know. He prays as though God was as much his friend as I am and just as ready to help him as I should be if I could; and I know if I'd only got the chance I'd do it.
October 24th.—Frank Chandos is back in his place once more, but Tom has gone home with his father. I don't think anybody is likely to try running away again in a hurry, for to see Tom and Chandos minor when the policeman brought them in was enough to make anybody think twice before they tried that game. That poor little muff Chandos cried like a girl, but Tom tried to brave it out until he saw his father. He gave it up then, and I almost wished for his sake that we were all on the alder pond again, for a more miserable look I never saw on any face than that on Tom's. His head drooped, and he never raised his eyes from the floor again while we were there.
Poor old Tom! if he could only have been brave enough to speak out the truth last year about that farm-yard business, all the rest might not have followed.
But this fuss about him and Chandos minor has put everything else out of my head, and I have forgotten all about the prize and the grind too. What a bother prizes are! I'm afraid I shall stand a poor chance of getting this one now, for the other fellows who mean to go in for it have been working like galley slaves all the time this row was going on, but I couldn't, and Chandos seemed to forget everything but that little muff, and so I am all behind, I know.
Chandos says I shall be able to make up for lost time now if I only work steadily every day, but there's the rub. How can I be sure that I can work steadily for more than a month? Fancy grinding without a lazy spell for a whole month! I'm sure I couldn't do it, and so I may as well give up at once. I think I will, for what is the use of trying now? It will be so much grind thrown away. And we are having such splendid weather now, that won't last much longer, that it seems a pity to be boring over a book a single minute longer than I am obliged. I shall tell Chandos to-morrow that I mean to give up the whole thing, for I can't do it.
November 1st.—I am grinding still, for Chandos won't hear of my giving up. He says the things I learn—the grind—will be more useful than the prize by-and-by; and then he reminded me of my mother, and how very pleased she would be if I gained this prize. I know that, and I should like to please her for once, independent of the sea scheme. This is the prize to me, for I don't care much about the watch for itself; it will remind me too much of poor Tom and his watch. As to the grind, what do I care about Julius Cæsar and Hannibal and Rome and Carthage? If it was about Nelson and Howe, and Abercrombie and Cook, and a few more like them, I'd grind away, never fear. Why can't they let us know what the questions are going to be—a few of them at least? and then we might manage; but to be expected to know all about everything, and the fellows that lived hundreds of years ago, is rather too stiff, and if it wasn't for Chandos I should give it up, I know, much as I want to please my mother.
November 7th.—I've had a letter from Tom. Fancy Tom writing a letter! He says everything is just as miserable at home as it was here, and he has to do no end of grind shut up in his father's room. He saw my mother last week, and his father told her she need not be afraid I should run away to sea now, for I had learned a few things at school I was not likely to forget in a hurry. Well, that's true enough; but I don't think Tom's father knows what it is I have learned that prevented me going with Tom, and I am not sure myself that I have learned all the secret that makes such a difference between Chandos and two or three others and the rest of us at school, that makes everybody take their word for anything, and be sure they would not do a mean, sneakish trick. I feel as though I was stopping just outside this secret, for God is not my friend—at least I cannot feel that He is, as Chandos does. Sometimes I wish I could, for I know this is more to him a great deal than being Sir Eustace Chandos; but somehow I don't seem able to get hold of it, although I do believe it's true—all that Chandos says about God being his friend.