"I don't care if he never comes into the house again," protested Mr. Topover.
"You don't mean that, Richard," mildly interposed his wife. "I wish the boy could be taken care of, but I don't want him to come to any harm."
The principal took a paper like that he had read at the Widow Sankland's, adapted to the case of Tom Topover. He read it, after he had proposed that the vagrant boy should be admitted to the Beech-Hill Industrial School. He explained its meaning fully.
"We shall make him obey orders, but we shall use him as well as he will allow us to do," continued Captain Gildrock. "If both of you will sign this paper, I will keep him at the institution until the term begins. He will be fed, clothed, and instructed, and taught to work at some trade. I think we should make a machinist of him, for he seems to have a taste for working with tools upon iron."
"But Tom won't agree to it," replied Mr. Topover.
"I haven't asked him to agree to it, and I don't intend to do any thing of the sort. You are his father, and his legal guardian: you can do any thing you please with him, so long as you don't abuse him," continued Captain Gildrock, sharply; for he did not like the disposition to temporize with a serious case.
"I should be very glad to have him go to your school, Captain Gildrock," added the father.
"So should I, and I should be easy about him all the time if he were only there," said Mrs. Topover.
"Then all you have to do is to sign this paper. His father's name would be enough to stand the law, but I prefer to have his mother's also."