"Please, we want to go to the station. We're to meet the others to go by the half-past six train," said Walter desperately.
"You must look sharp, then—it's just off. There, be off down those steps as hard as you can split."
Walter obeyed. In his anxiety he forgot all about Chris; and not even when he reached the bottom of the steps, and caught sight of Mr. Richardson's troubled countenance looking for the truants from one of the carriage windows, did he recollect his friend.
The platform was crowded with people, and though Walter could see the rector, the latter could not distinguish him. If he had but worn the red badge upon his shoulder, matters might even yet have gone well; but, as it was, all Walter's efforts to shoulder his way through the masses of people only brought him to the front of the platform as the train steamed off!
At the last moment of all, Mr. Richardson's eye fell upon him, and he called out something, but Walter could not hear what it was.
A feeling of despair came over him as he turned back towards the steps. He had just remembered Chris.
"What shall we do?" he thought. "I haven't a penny, and Chris can't have much left either. Oh, there he is!" as he caught sight of the other lad's ill-tempered, flushed face at the foot of the steps.
"You sneak!" cried Chris angrily; "what d'ye mean by leaving me in the lurch like this?"
"But you wouldn't hurry, Chris; and as it is, we've lost the train—that was ours that's just gone. What are we to do now? Have you got any money?"
"No; you know I ain't, else I shouldn't ha' left the 'public' so quick. It's all your fault," answered Chris savagely, the beer mounting to his head more and more every minute, and he as usual growing more unpleasant and ill-tempered as his power of self-restraint grew weaker.