This speech, the first really polite speech I had heard since I entered Low Heath, took me by storm, and captivated me at once to the service of the captain of the school. I galloped off, as proud as a non-commissioned officer who has been sent to fetch his regimental flag on to the field of battle. The chaps behind might cheer and jeer and cry, “Gee-up, Sarah!” and “Mad dog!” as much as they liked. They would have been only too proud to be sent on my errand.
It was a good ten minutes’ run to Bridge Street, and I was fairly out of breath when I rang at the bell of Number 3. It seemed a long time before any one came, and I was beginning to be afraid I should forfeit the reputation I hoped to acquire, when hurried footsteps announced that my ring had been heard.
Mrs Redwood was out, said the servant, and she had been down the garden with the children.
When I delivered my message, she asked me to wait; and with her little charges evidently on her mind, ran upstairs to fetch the belt.
It was a nice house, although a small one. The garden door was open, and gave a beautiful peep over the little sloping lawn to the river and the woods beyond. I was not sure that, after all, a town-boy might not have a good time of it, living in a place like this, instead of in school.
Suddenly my reflections were disturbed by a shrill scream from the garden, followed by a little girl of five or six crying—
“Annie, Annie! Mamie’s tumbled in; Mamie’s tumbled in!”
For a wonder I had my wits about me, and divined the truth at once. With a bound I was down the steps and across the lawn, half knocking down the panic-stricken little messenger on the way, and at the river’s edge, floundering piteously in about two feet of water, found the unfortunate little Mamie—evidently a twin-sister—more frightened than hurt, but perilously near to getting into deep water.
Her yells redoubled when she found herself grabbed by the sash by a stranger, and lugged most unceremoniously on to terra firma.
Scarcely had I achieved this gallant rescue, without even wetting my own shoes, when Annie, as white as a sheet, came flying on to the scene.