It was with a view to this profit that I found myself looking out of Mr Argent’s window, in the High Street of Muggerbridge, with a ticket round my neck, conveying the (to me) very gratifying information that “this superb watch was to be disposed of for the moderate amount of £4 10 shillings only,” and a parenthesis below further indulged my vanity by volunteering the information that I was worth £6. It did occur to me to wonder why, if I was worth £6, Mr Argent should be such a donkey as to sell me for only three-quarters of that sum. Either he was a very benevolent man, or he was in immediate want of £4 10 shillings, or he had his doubts as to my alleged value. I somehow fancied the last was the true reason, and was half afraid he was right too.
Well, I looked out of Mr Argent’s windows for two months, and by that time became acquainted with nearly all the inhabitants of Muggerbridge.
On my first arrival I was an object of a good deal of curiosity and admiration, for any change in a country shop window is an excitement, and when that change takes the form of a £6 “superb” watch offered for £4 10 shillings, it was no wonder the honest Muggerbridgians gaped in at me and read my label.
But in a very little time familiarity had bred contempt, and I lay almost unheeded by the outside world. The grocer opposite, with his triumphal arch of jam-pots monopolised all the wonder, and most of the admiration, and I had the mortification of seeing passers turn their backs on me, and step over the way to contemplate that vulgar structure.
I had, however, one or two constant admirers. One of these was a youth, scarcely more than a boy, with a very pale, thoughtful face. He was poorly dressed, but respectable. A book was generally tucked under his arm, and very often I could see his lips moving, as if repeating something to himself.
He paid me more attention than anybody. Every time he passed the shop he halted and looked at me, as I thought, wistfully, and usually appeared relieved to find me still in my place.
“George Reader’s took a fancy to the new watch, I can see,” I heard Mr Argent say one day to his wife.
He spoke, let me observe, in a very broad country dialect, which I do not feel equal to reproducing here.
“Poor lad!” said Mrs Argent; “I dare say he’d like to have it in his pocket when he goes to college.”
“He is going, then?”