Captain Bayley's Heir: A Tale of the Gold Fields of California

by G. A. Henty

"He is not a bad fellow," Frank replied, "though he does think a good deal of himself. Still, as no one else thinks anything of him, it is just as well he should fancy himself. But never mind that now. No, I don't think there is any chance of our getting to see the fun in Trafalgar Square. I should like to go to one of the halls where those fellows spout, and to get up and say something the other way. Of course one would have to go in a strong body, else there would not be much of us left when we got into the street again. I must have a chat with Perkins about it, he is sure to be up to all that kind of thing."

"Yes, but there would be the trouble of getting in after lock-up."

"Oh, I dare say we might get over that," Harris replied; "the fags would never peach."

"We won't tell them if we can help it," Frank said; "if we go in for any lark of that sort only one of our fags must know it. I can trust young Phillpot to hold his tongue. Well, I will chat it over with Perkins, and see what can be done."

Perkins was a retired prize-fighter who kept a public-house on Bank Side. In a large room attached to the house he gave sparring exhibitions twice a week, with the aid of other fellow-pugilists, and also gave private lessons in the art of self-defence. Bank Side was not out of bounds, but it was strictly against the rules for any boy to enter a public-house; nevertheless, a good many of the Westminster boys had learned boxing from this worthy. There was a private entrance behind the house into what Perkins called his "saloon," and the boys strove to consider that by using this they avoided an infringement of the rule. The fact of their taking lessons was unknown to the master, for indeed at Westminster the boys were at perfect liberty to do as they pleased out of school-time, providing that they did not go out of bounds.

The rules enforcing attendance at fields or water, of abstaining from entering public-houses, and generally of conducting themselves as gentlemen, were left to what may be called their own police, the senior Queen's Scholars and the Sixth Form town boys, and these kept a far more rigorous hand over the younger boys than the masters could possibly have done. A vigorous thrashing was the punishment for shirking fields, or for any action regarded as caddish; and it was therefore only the Upper 'Shells' and Sixth, who, being free from the operation of the law as to fields and water, were able to frequent Perkins's establishment.

Of those who went there, most of them did so for the genuine purpose of learning boxing; but a few used the place for the purpose of smoking and drinking. But these did so at hours when there was no chance of finding Perkins at work with his pupils, for public feeling would not have tolerated, even in an upper form boy, anything that would have been looked upon as such bad form.

The next morning, after breakfast, Frank walked down to "The Black Dog." He was one of Perkins's best pupils, and the latter had more than once been heard to express his regret that Frank had not been born in a lower class of life.

"He's got the making of a champion in him," the ex-pugilist would say regretfully; "in another five years, when he has got his full height and filled out, I warrant he will fight twelve stone; look how quick he is on his pins; and I tell you I have all my work to do now to guard my head, he hits like lightning, and once or twice has fairly knocked me off my pins. I'd back him now for fifty pounds against any novice in England; and as for pluck, I have never seen him wince, hit him as hard as you will he always comes up smiling. Barkley, he is a good boxer too, but he ain't got temper, sir; he gets nasty if he has a sharp counter; and though he keeps cool enough, there is an ugly look about his face which tells its tale. He would never keep his temper, and I doubt if he's real game at bottom. I knows my customers, and have never hit him as I hit Norris; I don't want to lose a pupil as pays fair and square, and I know I should mighty soon lose him if I were to let out at him sharp. No, there is bad blood in that chap somewhere."

"Well, Master Norris, and what do you want at this time of the morning?" he said, as Frank, after entering the saloon, rang a bell which sounded in the bar and summoned him to the saloon. "Not a lesson at this time of the day, surely?"