“Contemptible creature!” I exclaimed; “you may think you’ve a fine voice, but, like a simpering schoolgirl, you can’t sing till you’re pressed!” I had him there, surely!
“Better that than having no voice at all, like some people, or using it when no one wants to hear it, like others.” I suppose he thought he had me there, the puppy!
He went on chiming at intervals during the night, and of course my master had very little rest in consequence.
The next day Charlie and Jim had a solemn confabulation as to the disposal of me.
“It’s no use wasting it, you know,” said Jim. “Pity you haven’t got a young brother to pass it on to.”
“Suppose you take it,” said the generous Charlie.
“No, old man, I don’t want it. I’m not so mad about tickers as you. But, I tell you what, Charlie, you might like Tom to have it. He’s leaving, you know, and it would be a nice reminder of Randlebury.”
“Just what I thought directly the new one came,” exclaimed Charlie, “only then I remembered we had a row about this very watch three years ago, and I’m afraid he wouldn’t like it.”
“Try. Old Tom would be quite set up with a watch.”
Charlie proceeded that same day in quest of Tom, whom he found packing up his books and chemicals in a large trunk.