第21章

A DISCOVERY.

The friendship of Robert had gained Shargar the favourable notice of others of the school-public.These were chiefly of those who came from the country, ready to follow an example set them by a town boy.

When his desertion was known, moved both by their compassion for him, and their respect for Robert, they began to give him some portion of the dinner they brought with them; and never in his life had Shargar fared so well as for the first week after he had been cast upon the world.But in proportion as their interest faded with the novelty, so their appetites reasserted former claims of use and wont, and Shargar began once more to feel the pangs of hunger.For all that Robert could manage to procure for him without attracting the attention he was so anxious to avoid, was little more than sufficient to keep his hunger alive, Shargar being gifted with a great appetite, and Robert having no allowance of pocket-money from his grandmother.The threepence he had been able to spend on him were what remained of sixpence Mr.Innes had given him for an exercise which he wrote in blank verse instead of in prose--an achievement of which the school-master was proud, both from his reverence for Milton, and from his inability to compose a metrical line himself.And how and when he should ever possess another penny was even unimaginable.Shargar's shilling was likewise spent.So Robert could but go on pocketing instead of eating all that he dared, watching anxiously for opportunity of evading the eyes of his grandmother.On her dimness of sight, however, he depended too confidently after all; for either she was not so blind as he thought she was, or she made up for the defect of her vision by the keenness of her observation.She saw enough to cause her considerable annoyance, though it suggested nothing inconsistent with rectitude on the part of the boy, further than that there was something underhand going on.One supposition after another arose in the old lady's brain, and one after another was dismissed as improbable.

First, she tried to persuade herself that he wanted to take the provisions to school with him, and eat them there--a proceeding of which she certainly did not approve, but for the reproof of which she was unwilling to betray the loopholes of her eyes.Next she concluded, for half a day, that he must have a pair of rabbits hidden away in some nook or other--possibly in the little strip of garden belonging to the house.And so conjecture followed conjecture for a whole week, during which, strange to say, not even Betty knew that Shargar slept in the house.For so careful and watchful were the two boys, that although she could not help suspecting something from the expression and behaviour of Robert, what that something might be she could not imagine; nor had she and her mistress as yet exchanged confidences on the subject.Her observation coincided with that of her mistress as to the disappearance of odds and ends of eatables--potatoes, cold porridge, bits of oat-cake; and even, on one occasion, when Shargar happened to be especially ravenous, a yellow, or cured and half-dried, haddock, which the lad devoured raw, vanished from her domain.He went to school in the morning smelling so strong in consequence, that they told him he must have been passing the night in Scroggie's cart, and not on his horse's back this time.

The boys kept their secret well.

One evening, towards the end of the week, Robert, after seeing Shargar disposed of for the night, proceeded to carry out a project which had grown in his brain within the last two days in consequence of an occurrence with which his relation to Shargar had had something to do.It was this:

The housing of Shargar in the garret had led Robert to make a close acquaintance with the place.He was familiar with all the outs and ins of the little room which he considered his own, for that was a civilized, being a plastered, ceiled, and comparatively well-lighted little room, but not with the other, which was three times its size, very badly lighted, and showing the naked couples from roof-tree to floor.Besides, it contained no end of dark corners, with which his childish imagination had associated undefined horrors, assuming now one shape, now another.Also there were several closets in it, constructed in the angles of the place, and several chests--two of which he had ventured to peep into.But although he had found them filled, not with bones, as he had expected, but one with papers, and one with garments, he had yet dared to carry his researches no further.One evening, however, when Betty was out, and he had got hold of her candle, and gone up to keep Shargar company for a few minutes, a sudden impulse seized him to have a peep into all the closets.One of them he knew a little about, as containing, amongst other things, his father's coat with the gilt buttons, and his great-grandfather's kilt, as well as other garments useful to Shargar: now he would see what was in the rest.He did not find anything very interesting, however, till he arrived at the last.

Out of it he drew a long queer-shaped box into the light of Betty's dip.

'Luik here, Shargar!' he said under his breath, for they never dared to speak aloud in these precincts--'luik here! What can there be in this box? Is't a bairnie's coffin, duv ye think? Luik at it.'

In this case Shargar, having roamed the country a good deal more than Robert, and having been present at some merry-makings with his mother, of which there were comparatively few in that country-side, was better informed than his friend.

'Eh! Bob, duvna ye ken what that is? I thocht ye kent a' thing.

That's a fiddle.'

'That's buff an' styte (stuff and nonsense), Shargar.Do ye think Idinna ken a fiddle whan I see ane, wi' its guts ootside o' 'ts wame, an' the thoomacks to screw them up wi' an' gar't skirl?'

'Buff an' styte yersel'!' cried Shargar, in indignation, from the bed.'Gie's a haud o' 't.'