All doubt, however, about the matter was quickly removed by Mr Sanford saying—“I have sent for you, Mr Tugman, to beg that you will take charge of this new boy, Digby Heathcote. Examine him to-morrow, and place him as you judge best. I hope that he will be in the highest of your classes, as he has been lately under a clever man, an old college friend of mine, his uncle, for whom I have a great regard.”
The usher was listening, with a look of impatience, to all this.
“Oh, I know; he’s the son of Squire Heathcote, of Bloxholme,” he observed, with a laugh, which Digby understood, for he spoke exactly with the expression of the boys who had heard him announced.
“I will take him with me, and introduce the young gentleman to his future playmates. I hope that he may get on well with them.”
“Do, Mr Tugman, do,” said Mr Sanford, languidly. “I wish that my health would allow me to afford greater support to my assistants, efficient as I am bound to say that they all are.”
Mr Tugman did not seem to listen to the compliment, but, with a slight good evening, taking Digby by the shoulder, walked him off to the schoolroom.
Digby felt somewhat like a fly in the grasp of a spider, for there was very little of the suaviter in modo, however much there might have been of the fortiter in re, in Mr Tugman’s proceedings. They passed a large glass door, guarded on both sides by wire-work.
“These are your future companions,” he said, opening it, and pointing to a wide-extending gravel space at the back of the house, which Digby guessed was the playground. Though it was growing dark, the boys were still there; but all he could see was a confused mass of fellows rushing about, hallooing, and shouting: some with hoops, against which their sticks went clattering away incessantly; others driving, with whips cracking and horns tootooing; some were running races; others playing leap-frog, or high cock-o’-lorum; indeed, nearly every game which could make the blood circulate on a cold winter’s evening, had its advocates. From the darkness, and from the state of constant movement in which they all were, there appeared to be double the number of boys Mrs Pike had mentioned.
“Well, what do you think of them?” asked Mr Tugman.
Digby said, “That he could form no opinion from the slight view he had of them.”