The Old Curiosity Shop

by Dickens, Charles

  took off his spectacles to wipe them, as though they had grown dim.

  'I hope there is nothing the matter,sir,' said Nell anxiously.

  'Not much, my dear,' returned the schoolmaster. 'I hoped to have

  seen him on the green to-night. He was always foremost among them.

  But he'll be there to-morrow.'

  'Has he been ill?' asked the child, with a child's quick sympathy.

  'Not very. They said he was wandering in his head yesterday, dear

  boy, and so they said the day before. But that's a part of that

  kind of disorder; it's not a bad sign--not at all a bad sign.'

  The child was silent. He walked to the door, and looked wistfully

  out. The shadows of night were gathering, and all was still.

  'If he could lean upon anybody's arm, he would come to me, I know,'

  he said, returning into the room. 'He always came into the garden

  to say good night. But perhaps his illness has only just taken a

  favourable turn, and it's too late for him to come out, for it's

  very damp and there's a heavy dew. it's much better he shouldn't

  come to-night.'

  The schoolmaster lighted a candle, fastened the window-shutter,

  and closed the door. But after he had done this, and sat silent a

  little time, he took down his hat, and said he would go and satisfy

  himself, if Nell would sit up till he returned. The child readily

  complied, and he went out.

  She sat there half-an-hour or more, feeling the place very strange

  and lonely, for she had prevailed upon the old man to go to bed,

  and there was nothing to be heard but the ticking of an old clock,

  and the whistling of the wind among the trees. When he returned, he

  took his seat in the chimney corner, but remained silent for a long

  time. At length he turned to her, and speaking very gently, hoped

  she would say a prayer that night for a sick child.

  'My favourite scholar!' said the poor schoolmaster, smoking a pipe

  he had forgotten to light, and looking mournfully round upon the

  walls. 'It is a little hand to have done all that, and waste away

  with sickness. It is a very, very little hand!'

  CHAPTER 25

  After a sound night's rest in a chamber in the thatched roof, in

  which it seemed the sexton had for some years been a lodger, but

  which he had lately deserted for a wife and a cottage of his own,

  the child rose early in the morning and descended to the room where

  she had supped last night. As the schoolmaster had already left his

  bed and gone out, she bestirred herself to make it neat and

  comfortable, and had just finished its arrangement when the kind

  host returned.

  He thanked her many times, and said that the old dame who usually

  did such offices for him had gone to nurse the little scholar whom

  he had told her of. The child asked how he was, and hoped he was

  better.

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  'No,' rejoined the schoolmaster shaking his head sorrowfully, 'no

  better. They even say he is worse.'

  'I am very sorry for that, Sir,' said the child.

  The poor schoolmaster appeared to be gratified by her earnest

  manner, but yet rendered more uneasy by it, for he added hastily

  that anxious people often magnified an evil and thought it greater

  than it was; 'for my part,' he said, in his quiet, patient way, 'I

  hope it's not so. I don't think he can be worse.'

  The child asked his leave to prepare breakfast, and her grandfather

  coming down stairs, they all three partook of it together. While

  the meal was in progress, their host remarked that the old man

  seemed much fatigued, and evidently stood in need of rest.

  'If the journey you have before you is a long one,' he said, 'and

  don't press you for one day, you're very welcome to pass another

  night here. I should really be glad if you would, friend.'

  He saw that the old man looked at Nell, uncertain whether to accept

  or decline his offer; and added,

  'I shall be glad to have your young companion with me for one day.

  If you can do a charity to a lone man, and rest yourself at the

  same time, do so. If you must proceed upon your journey, I wish you

  well through it, and will walk a little way with you before school

  begins.'

  'What are we to do, Nell?' said the old man irresolutely, 'say what

  we're to do, dear.'

  It required no great persuasion to induce the child to answer that

  they had better accept the invitation and remain. She was happy to

  show her gratitude to the kind schoolmaster by busying herself in

  the performance of such household duties as his little cottage

  stood in need of. When these were done, she took some needle-work

  from her basket, and sat herself down upon a stool beside the

  lattice, where the honeysuckle and woodbine entwined their tender

  stems, and stealing into the room filled it with their delicious

  breath. Her grandfather was basking in the sun outside, breathing

  the perfume of the flowers, and idly watching the clouds as they

  floated on before the light summer wind.

  As the schoolmaster, after arranging the two forms in due order,

  took his seat behind his desk and made other preparations for

  school, the child was apprehensive that she might be in the way,

  and offered to withdraw to her little bedroom. But this he would

  not allow, and as he seemed pleased to have her there, she

  remained, busying herself with her work.

  'Have you many scholars, sir?' she asked.

  The poor schoolmaster shook his head, and said that they barely

  filled the two forms.

  'Are the others clever, sir?' asked the child, glancing at the

  trophies on the wall.

  'Good boys,' returned the schoolmaster, 'good boys enough, my dear,

  but they'll never do like that.'

  A small white-headed boy with a sunburnt face appeared at the door

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  while he was speaking, and stopping there to make a rustic bow,

  came in and took his seat upon one of the forms. The white-headed

  boy then put an open book, astonishingly dog's-eared upon his

  knees, and thrusting his hands into his pockets began counting the

  marbles with which they were filled; displaying in the expression

  of his face a remarkable capacity of totally abstracting his mind

  from the spelling on which his eyes were fixed. Soon afterwards

  another white-headed little boy came straggling in, and after him

  a red-headed lad, and after him two more with white heads, and then

  one with a flaxen poll, and so on until the forms were occupied by

  a dozen boys or thereabouts, with heads of every colour but grey,

  and ranging in their ages from four years old to fourteen years or

  more; for the legs of the youngest were a long way from the floor

  when he sat upon the form, and the eldest was a heavy good-tempered

  foolish fellow, about half a head taller than the schoolmaster.

  At the top of the first form--the post of honour in the school--

  was the vacant place of the little sick scholar, and at the head of

  the row of pegs on which those who came in hat
s or caps were wont

  to hang them up, one was left empty. No boy attempted to violate

  the sanctity of seat or peg, but many a one looked from the empty

  spaces to the schoolmaster, and whispered his idle neighbour behind

  his hand.

  Then began the hum of conning over lessons and getting them by

  heart, the whispered jest and stealthy game, and all the noise and

  drawl of school; and in the midst of the din sat the poor

  schoolmaster, the very image of meekness and simplicity, vainly

  attempting to fix his mind upon the duties of the day, and to

  forget his little friend. But the tedium of his office reminded him

  more strongly of the willing scholar, and his thoughts were

  rambling from his pupils--it was plain.

  None knew this better than the idlest boys, who, growing bolder

  with impunity, waxed louder and more daring; playing odd-or-even

  under the master's eye, eating apples openly and without rebuke,

  pinching each other in sport or malice without the least reserve,

  and cutting their autographs in the very legs of his desk. The

  puzzled dunce, who stood beside it to say his lesson out of book,

  looked no longer at the ceiling for forgotten words, but drew

  closer to the master's elbow and boldly cast his eye upon the page;

  the wag of the little troop squinted and made grimaces (at the

  smallest boy of course), holding no book before his face, and his

  approving audience knew no constraint in their delight. If the

  master did chance to rouse himself and seem alive to what was going

  on, the noise subsided for a moment and no eyes met his but wore a

  studious and a deeply humble look; but the instant he relapsed

  again, it broke out afresh, and ten times louder than before.

  Oh! how some of those idle fellows longed to be outside, and how

  they looked at the open door and window, as if they half

  meditated rushing violently out, plunging into the woods, and being

  wild boys and savages from that time forth. What rebellious

  thoughts of the cool river, and some shady bathing-place beneath

  willow trees with branches dipping in the water, kept tempting and

  urging that sturdy boy, who, with his shirt-collar unbuttoned and

  flung back as far as it could go, sat fanning his flushed face with

  a spelling-book, wishing himself a whale, or a tittlebat, or a fly,

  or anything but a boy at school on that hot, broiling day! Heat!

  ask that other boy, whose seat being nearest to the door gave him

  opportunities of gliding out into the garden and driving his

  companions to madness by dipping his face into the bucket of the

  well and then rolling on the grass--ask him if there were ever

  such a day as that, when even the bees were diving deep down into

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  the cups of flowers and stopping there, as if they had made up

  their minds to retire from business and be manufacturers of honey

  no more. The day was made for laziness, and lying on one's back in

  green places, and staring at the sky till its brightness forced one

  to shut one's eyes and go to sleep; and was this a time to be

  poring over musty books in a dark room, slighted by the very sun

  itself? Monstrous!

  Nell sat by the window occupied with her work, but attentive still

  to all that passed, though sometimes rather timid of the boisterous

  boys. The lessons over, writing time began; and there being but one

  desk and that the master's, each boy sat at it in turn and laboured

  at his crooked copy, while the master walked about. This was a

  quieter time; for he would come and look over the writer's

  shoulder, and tell him mildly to observe how such a letter was

  turned in such a copy on the wall, praise such an up-stroke here

  and such a down-stroke there, and bid him take it for his model.

  Then he would stop and tell them what the sick child had said last

  night, and how he had longed to be among them once again; and such

  was the poor schoolmaster's gentle and affectionate manner, that

  the boys seemed quite remorseful that they had worried him so much,

  and were absolutely quiet; eating no apples, cutting no names,

  inflicting no pinches, and making no grimaces, for full two minutes

  afterwards.

  'I think, boys,' said the schoolmaster when the clock struck

  twelve, 'that I shall give an extra half-holiday this afternoon.'

  At this intelligence, the boys, led on and headed by the tall boy,

  raised a great shout, in the midst of which the master was seen to

  speak, but could not be heard. As he held up his hand, however, in

  token of his wish that they should be silent, they were considerate

  enough to leave off, as soon as the longest-winded among them were

  quite out of breath.

  'You must promise me first,' said the schoolmaster, 'that you'll

  not be noisy, or at least, if you are, that you'll go away and be

  so--away out of the village I mean. I'm sure you wouldn't disturb

  your old playmate and companion.'

  There was a general murmur (and perhaps a very sincere one, for

  they were but boys) in the negative; and the tall boy, perhaps as

  sincerely as any of them, called those about him to witness that he

  had only shouted in a whisper.

  'Then pray don't forget, there's my dear scholars,' said the

  schoolmaster, 'what I have asked you, and do it as a favour to me.

  Be as happy as you can, and don't be unmindful that you are blessed

  with health. Good-bye all!'

  'Thank'ee, Sir,' and 'good-bye, Sir,' were said a good many times

  in a variety of voices, and the boys went out very slowly and

  softly. But there was the sun shining and there were the birds

  singing, as the sun only shines and the birds only sing on holidays

  and half-holidays; there were the trees waving to all free boys to

  climb and nestle among their leafy branches; the hay, entreating

  them to come and scatter it to the pure air; the green corn, gently

  beckoning towards wood and stream; the smooth ground, rendered

  smoother still by blending lights and shadows, inviting to runs and

  leaps, and long walks God knows whither. It was more than boy could

  bear, and with a joyous whoop the whole cluster took to their heels

  and spread themselves about, shouting and laughing as they went.

  'It's natural, thank Heaven!' said the poor schoolmaster, looking

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  after them. 'I'm very glad they didn't mind me!'

  It is difficult, however, to please everybody, as most of us would

  have discovered, even without the fable which bears that moral, and

  in the course of the afternoon several mothers and aunts of pupils

  looked in to express their entire disapproval of the schoolmaster's

  proceeding. A few confined themselves to hints, such as politely

  inquiring what red-letter day or saint's day the almanack said it

  was; a few (these were the profound village politicians) argued

  that it was a slight to the throne and an affront to church and

  state, and savoured of revolutionary principles, to grant a

  half-holiday upon any lighter
occasion than the birthday of the

  Monarch; but the majority expressed their displeasure on private

  grounds and in plain terms, arguing that to put the pupils on this

  short allowance of learning was nothing but an act of downright

  robbery and fraud: and one old lady, finding that she could not

  inflame or irritate the peaceable schoolmaster by talking to him,

  bounced out of his house and talked at him for half-an-hour outside

  his own window, to another old lady, saying that of course he would

  deduct this half-holiday from his weekly charge, or of course he

  would naturally expect to have an opposition started against him;

  there was no want of idle chaps in that neighbourhood (here the old

  lady raised her voice), and some chaps who were too idle even to be

  schoolmasters, might soon find that there were other chaps put over

  their heads, and so she would have them take care, and look pretty

  sharp about them. But all these taunts and vexations failed to

  elicit one word from the meek schoolmaster, who sat with the child

  by his side--a little more dejected perhaps, but quite silent and

  uncomplaining.

  Towards night an old woman came tottering up the garden as speedily

  as she could, and meeting the schoolmaster at the door, said he was

  to go to Dame West's directly, and had best run on before her. He

  and the child were on the point of going out together for a walk,

  and without relinquishing her hand, the schoolmaster hurried away,

  leaving the messenger to follow as she might.

  They stopped at a cottage-door, and the schoolmaster knocked softly

  at it with his hand. It was opened without loss of time. They

  entered a room where a little group of women were gathered about

  one, older than the rest, who was crying very bitterly, and sat

  wringing her hands and rocking herself to and fro.

  'Oh, dame!' said the schoolmaster, drawing near her chair, 'is it

  so bad as this?'

  'He's going fast,' cried the old woman; 'my grandson's dying. It's

  all along of you. You shouldn't see him now, but for his being so

  earnest on it. This is what his learning has brought him to. Oh

  dear, dear, dear, what can I do!'

  'Do not say that I am in any fault,' urged the gentle schoolmaster.

  'I am not hurt, dame. No, no. You are in great distress of

  mind, and don't mean what you say. I am sure you don't.'