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قراءة كتاب The Story of Antony Grace
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was one litter of papers, parchments, and dust, save at the end, which was occupied by a bookcase full of great volumes all bound in leather about the colour of Mr Rowle’s skin.
“Sit down there,” he said shortly, and he pointed to one of the tall stools by the great desk; and as I climbed upon it he picked up the bag I had placed upon the desk, threw it upon the table, and walked out of the place.
“Like a man—take it like a man,” I said to myself as I recalled Mr Rowle’s words; and, pressing my teeth tightly and clenching my fists, I sat there fighting down the depressing feelings that came upon me in a flood, and wondering what I should have to do.
My musings were interrupted by the loud entry at the end of about half an hour of a cross-looking servant-girl, who banged a small tray containing a mug and a plate of bread and butter down before me.
“There’s your tea,” she said roughly; “and look here, I’m not going to wait on you. Bring the mug to the kitchen when you’ve done, and you’ll have to fetch it in future.”
I looked up at her very wistfully as she scowled at me, but I did not speak.
“Sulky, eh?” she said. “You’ll soon get that taken out of you here, I can tell you.”
With these words she whisked herself out of the office, the swing-door creaked dismally and banged behind her, and I was left to enjoy my meal.
At first I felt that I could not touch it, but I was faint and hungry, and after a few mouthfuls a boy’s young healthy appetite asserted itself, and I drank all the mean thin tea and finished the bread and butter.
Then I remembered that I was to take the things back to the kitchen. Where was the kitchen, and dare I leave that stool without Mr Blakeford’s orders?
I felt that I dare not, and therefore sat there patiently gazing about the room, my eyes resting longest on those bills which told of sales of furniture, as I wondered whether those who had belonged to the furniture had died and left a son alone in the world, as I seemed to be just then.
There was a clock, I found, in one corner—an old Dutch clock—that ticked away in a very silent, reserved fashion, giving further every hour a curious running-down noise, as if it were about to strike; but though I watched it patiently as the minute-hand passed on, it never fulfilled the expectations given, but confined itself to its soft subdued tick, tick, tick, tick, hour after hour.
Seven, eight, nine, ten had been marked off by that clock, and still I sat there, waiting, and wondering whether I was to sleep there as well as to have my meals; and then I heard a door bang, the sound of a footstep, and with a great tin candlestick in his hand Mr Blakeford entered the room.
Chapter Four.
I Become a Lawyer’s Clerk.
“This way!” he said abruptly, and there was a curious look in his face that I could not understand. “Here, hold this,” he cried, thrusting the candlestick into my hand; and I held it trembling as he crossed unsteadily to the gas-jet, turned it down, and then strode out of the office.
“There!” he said, opening a door, “up there; and get down in good time. You’ll have to clean the boots and things.”
“Up there” was up a flight of steps which led into a low sloping-ceiled chamber that had been evidently meant for a lumber-room, but had now been fitted up with an old stump bedstead with a coloured counterpane, a little corner washstand with a cracked jug, a strip of carpet, and a three-legged painted chest of drawers, which had gone down at one corner, and left a corresponding leg slightly raised in the air.
The place was cold and miserable, chilling to a degree, but it was clean; and as I looked round I was surprised by seeing on a chair a heap of my clothes and a brush and comb.
I had just finished looking round when I heard a noise below.
“You Antony!” shouted Mr Blakeford; “mind you put that candle out safely, and look sharp into bed.”
I obeyed by hastily undressing and putting out the candle to get quickly into bed. It was not to lie down, but, after once more battling with my weakness, to offer up the simple prayers I had been taught, and then, still upon my knees, but with my head drooping on to the pillow, falling fast asleep.
I awoke terribly depressed at daybreak, to listen to some noisy fowls close by, and then I could hear that the rain was pattering heavily down.
Ought I to get up then, or should I lie a little longer? I could not tell, but I recollected Mr Blakeford’s words, and as I did so the same wretched despondent feeling came over me as I thought of my helplessness, and trembled, feeling sure I should give offence.
There are few people who thoroughly realise the sufferings of a tenderly nurtured, sensitive boy when first called upon to battle with the world amongst unsympathising strangers. He is only a boy in their eyes, and they fail to give him credit for the same feelings as themselves, when too often he is far more finely strung, and suffers acutely from every unkind word and look. The very act of going from home is distressing enough, but when it is supplemented by his finding himself forced to make his first essays in some uncongenial task to which his hands and the brain that should guide are totally unaccustomed, a feeling of despair often takes possession of his young spirit, and is accompanied by a hopeless despondency that is long before it wears away.
I had had painful afflictions enough during the past weeks, so that I was anything but well prepared for my new life. Besides, I had been badly fed, and the natural sinking caused by the want of proper food terribly augmented my sense of misery.
The rain pattered down on the slates and skylight, while the water ran along the gutter and gurgled strangely in a pipe close to the corner where my bed was placed, as I lay wondering what I had better do. The office was below me, with its silent clock, but perhaps I should not be doing right, I thought, if I got up and went down to see the time. Perhaps, too, the place might be locked up.
I lay thinking in this undecided way till all my doubts were set aside, for there was a loud continuous ringing just outside my door, one which was kept up as if some angry person were sawing away at the wire with the full intention of dragging it down.
It agonised me as I jumped out of bed and began hastily to dress, for I felt as if it must be to rouse me up, and as if I had inadvertently been guilty of some lapse.
The bell stopped ringing as suddenly as it had begun, and with a feeling of relief I continued dressing, but only to start nervously as I heard Mr Blakeford’s voice at the foot of the stairs shouting my name.
“Do you hear that bell, sir?” he cried.
“Yes, sir.”
“Then make haste down; don’t be all the morning dressing.”
Then there was the loud banging of a door, and I hastily finished, and went down cautiously, found the office door at the end of the dim passage, and was just going in when the sharp voice of the servant arrested me.
“Here, you—what’s your name?” she said harshly.
“Antony, ma’am.”
“Ho! Then, Mister Antony,