The troubles and disappointments of youth are bitter while they last, but they soon pass, and the sun shines again. By the time Miss Ware, who was a kind-hearted, sensible, pleasant woman, came to tell Fellowes how sorry she was for him and his disappointment, the worst had gone by, and the boy was resigned to what could not be helped.
“Well, after all, one man’s meat is another man’s poison,” she said, smiling down on the two boys; “poor Tom has been looking forward to spending his holidays all alone with us, and now he will have a friend with him. Try to look on the bright side, Bertie, and to remember how much worse it would have been if there had been no boy to stay with you.”
“I can’t help being disappointed, Miss Ware,” said Bertie, his eyes filling afresh and his lips quivering.
“No, dear boy; you would be anything but a nice boy if you were not. But I want you to try and think of your poor Mother, who is full of trouble and anxiety, and to write to her as brightly as you can, and tell her not to worry about you more than she can help.”
“Yes,” said Bertie; but he turned his head away, and it was evident to the school-mistress that his heart was too full to let him say more.
Still, he was a good boy, Bertie Fellowes, and when he wrote home to his Mother it was quite a bright every-day letter, telling her how sorry he was about Aggie, and detailing a few of the ways in which he and Shivers meant to spend their holidays. His letter ended thus:—
“Shivers got a letter from his Mother yesterday with three pounds in it: if you happen to see Uncle Dick, will you tell him I want a ‘Waterbury’ dreadfully?”
The last day of the term came, and one by one, or two by two, the various boys went away, until at last only Bertie Fellowes and Shivers were left in the great house. It had never appeared so large to either of them before. The schoolroom seemed to have grown to about the size of a church; the dining-room, set now with only one table, instead of three, was not like the same; while the dormitory, which had never before had any room to spare, was like a wilderness. To Bertie Fellowes it was all dreary and wretched—to the boy from India, who knew no other house in England, no other thought came than that it was a blessing that he had one companion left.
“It is miserable,” groaned poor Bertie, as they strolled into the great echoing schoolroom after a lonely tea, set at one corner of the smallest of the three dining-tables; “just think if we had been on our way home now—how different!”
“Just think if I had been left here by myself,” said Shivers, and he gave a shudder which fully justified his name.