Austin and His Friends

by Frederic Henry Balfour

Austin's first impulse was to laugh; then he remembered the dancing goose, and the rain which followed in due course. "All right, Lubin," he said cheerfully. "I'm not afraid of magpies; I don't think they're very dangerous. But I have heard that they've a fancy for silver spoons, so I'll tell Aunt Charlotte to lock the plate up safely before she goes to bed."

As he had expected, Aunt Charlotte was much pleased at hearing of his encounter with Mr Buskin, who, she thought, must be a most delightful person. It would be so good, too, for Austin to see something of the gay world instead of always mooning about alone; and then he would be sure to meet other young people at the performance, friends from the neighbouring town, with whom he could talk and be sociable. Austin, on his side, was quite willing to go and be amused, though he felt, perhaps, more interested in what promised to be an entirely new experience than excited at the prospect of a treat. He wanted to see and to study, and then he would be able to judge.

"By the way, Austin," said his aunt, as they were separating for the night a few hours later, "I want you to go into the town to-morrow and tell Snewin to send a man up at once to look at the roof. I'm afraid it's been in rather a bad state for some time past, and those heavy rains we had last week seem to have damaged it still more. Be sure you don't forget. It won't do to have a leaky roof over our heads; it might come tumbling down, and cost a mint of money to put right again."

Austin gave the required promise, and thought no more about it. He also forgot entirely to tell his aunt she had better lock up the spoons with particular care that night because Lubin had seen a magpie in suspicious proximity to his window. He went straight up to his room, feeling rather sleepy, and bent on getting between the sheets as soon as possible. But just as he was putting on his nightgown, a light pattering sound attracted his attention, and he immediately became all ears.

"Rain?" he exclaimed. "Why, there wasn't a sign of it an hour ago!"

He drew up the blind and looked out. The sky was perfectly clear, and a brilliant moon was shining.

"That's queer!" he murmured. "I could have sworn I heard it raining. What in the world could it have been?"

He turned away and put out the candle. As he approached the bed a curious disinclination to get into it came over him. Then he heard the same pattering noise again. He stopped short, and listened more attentively. It seemed to come from the walls.

A shower of raps, rather like tiny explosions, now sounded all around him. He leant his head against the wall, and the sound became distincter. This time there was no mistake about it. He had never heard anything like it in his life. He was quite cool, not in the least frightened, and very much on the alert. The raps continued at intervals for about five minutes. Then, seeing that it was impossible to solve the mystery, he suddenly jumped into bed. At that moment the raps ceased.

For nearly an hour he lay awake, wondering. Certainly he had not been the victim of hallucination. He was in perfect health, and in full possession of all his faculties. Indeed his faculties were particularly alive; he had been thinking of something else altogether when the raps first forced themselves upon his consciousness, and afterwards he had listened to them for several minutes with close and critical attention. No explanation of the strange phenomenon suggested itself in spite of endless theories and speculations. Could it be mice? But mice only gnawed and scuttled about; they did not rap. It was more like crackling than anything else; the noise produced by thousands of faint discharges. No, it was inexplicable, and he wondered more and more.