Quicksilver: The Boy With No Skid to His Wheel

by George Manville Fenn

Pulling himself together he determined not to give way again, but to try and guide the boat.

To properly effect this he still sat fast with the boat-hook across his knees, and in an instant he was back at the doctor’s house in Coleby, looking on while Helen was busy reading the letter which had been brought down from the bedroom.

Dexter could see her perfectly plainly. It seemed a thoroughly realistic proceeding, and she was wiping her eyes as she read, while, at the same moment, the doctor entered the room with the willow pollard from the bottom of the garden; and lifting it up he called him an ungrateful boy, and struck him a severe blow on the forehead which sent him back on to the carpet.

But it was not on to the carpet, but back into the bottom of the boat, and certainly it was a willow branch which had done the mischief, though not in the doctor’s hand.

Dexter got up again, feeling rather sore and confused, for the boat had drifted under a projecting bough, just on a level with the boy’s head, but his cap had saved him from much harm.

Dexter’s first thought was that Bob would jump up and begin to bully him for going to sleep. But Bob was sleeping heavily, and the bump, the fall, and the rocking of the boat only acted as a lullaby to his pleasant dreams.

And then it seemed that a tree on the bank—a tall poplar—was very much plainer than he had seen any tree before that night. So was another on the other bank, and directly after came a sound with which he was perfectly familiar at the doctor’s—a sound that came beneath his window among the laurustinus bushes.

Chink—chink—chink—chink.

A blackbird—answered by another. And then all at once it seemed to be so cold that it was impossible to help shivering; and to ward off the chilling sensation Dexter began to use the boat-hook as a pole, thrusting it down first on one side of the boat and then on the other as silently as he could, so as not to wake Bob. Sometimes he touched bottom, and was able to give the boat a good impetus, but as often as not he could not reach the river-bed. Still the exercise made his blood circulate, and drove away the dull sense of misery that had been coming on.

As he toiled on with the pole, the trees grew plainer and plainer, and a soft pearly dawn seemed to be floating over the river. The birds uttered their calls, and then, all at once, in a loud burst of melody, up rose a lark from one of the dewy meadows on his right. Then further off there was another, and right away high up in the east one tiny speck of dull red.