By Sheer Pluck: A Tale of the Ashanti War

Frank had indeed found the journey easier than that which he had before undertaken with the others. He had scarcely tried to progress, but had, after getting sufficiently far out to allow the tide to take him round the point, drifted quietly.

“I owe my life to you, Frank. I shall never forget it, old fellow.”

“It’s been a close thing,” Frank answered; “but you owe your life as much to your own coolness as to me, and above all, Ruthven, don’t let us forget that we both owe our lives to God.”

“I sha’n’t forget it,” Ruthven said quietly, and they stood for a few minutes without speaking. “Now, what had we better do? Shall we start to run home?”

“I can’t,” Frank laughed, for he had nothing on but his trousers. These he had slipped on after the return from his first trip, pushing the rest of his things into a crevice in the rocks as high up as he could reach.

“You had better take off your things, Ruthven, and lay them out to dry in the sun. The boat will be here in half an hour. I wonder how Childers is getting on!”

“I think he will be safe,” Ruthven said. “The tide will not rise high enough for there to be much danger of his being washed off.”

“I don’t think so either,” Frank agreed, “or I would try and swim back again; but I really don’t think I could get round the point against the tide again.”

In half an hour a boat rowing four oars was seen approaching.

“They are laying out well,” Ruthven said. “They couldn’t row harder if they were rowing a race. But had it not been for you, old fellow, they would have been too late, as far as I am concerned.”

As the boat approached, the coxswain waved his hat to the boys. Frank motioned with his arm for them to row on round the point. The boat swept along at a short distance from the shore. The boys watched them breathlessly. Presently as it reached the point they saw the coxswain stand up and say something to the men, who glanced over their shoulders as they rowed. Then the coxswain gave a loud shout. “Hold on! We’ll be with you directly.”

“Thank God!” Frank exclaimed, “Childers is all right.”

It was well, however, that the boat arrived when it did, for Childers was utterly exhausted when it reached him. The sea had risen so high that the waves broke against his feet, throwing the spray far above his head, and often nearly washing him from the ledge on which he stood. Had it not been, indeed, for the hold which he obtained of the cliff, it would several times have swept him away. About eighteen inches above his head he had found a ledge sufficiently wide to give a grip for his hands, and hanging by these he managed to retain his place when three times his feet were swept off the rock by the rush of water. The tide was just on the turn when the boat arrived, and so exhausted was he that he certainly would not have been able to hold out for the half hour’s buffeting to which he would have been exposed before the water fell sufficiently to leave him. After helping him into the boat the men gathered the clothes jammed in fissures of the cliffs. These were, of course, drenched with water, but had for the most part remained firm in their places. They now pulled round to the spot where Frank and Ruthven were awaiting them.

“Childers must have been pretty nearly done,” Frank said. “He must be lying in the bottom of the boat.”

Childers gave a smile of pleasure as his schoolfellows jumped on board. He had, glancing over his shoulder, seen them drift out of sight round the point, and had felt certain that they had reached shore. It was, however, a great pleasure to be assured of the fact.

“You have made quite a stir upon the beach, young gentlemen,” the coxswain of the boat said. “When they two came running up without their shoes or coats and said there were three of you cut off in the bay under the Foreland, there didn’t seem much chance for you. It didn’t take us two minutes to launch the boat, for there were a score of hands helping to run her down; and my mates bent to it well, I can tell you, though we didn’t think it would be of any use. We were glad when we made you two out on this side of the point. Look, there’s half Deal and Walmer coming along the shore.”

It was as the boatman said. Numbers of persons were streaming along the beach, and loud were the cheers which rose as the coxswain stood up and shouted in a stentorian voice, “All saved!”

Frank put on his things as they approached Walmer. His shoes were lost, as were those of Ruthven, and he had difficulty in getting his arms into his wet and shrunken jacket. Quite a crowd were gathered near the castle as the boat rowed to shore, and a hearty cheer arose as it was run up on the shingle and the boys were helped out. Frank and Ruthven, indeed, required no assistance. They were in no way the worse for the adventure, but Childers was so weak that he was unable to stand. He was carried up and laid on a fly, the others sitting opposite, the driver having first taken the precaution of removing the cushions.

There were among the crowd most of the boys from Dr. Parker’s. Goodall and Jackson had arrived nearly an hour and a half before, and the news had spread like wildfire. Bats and balls had been thrown down and every one had hurried to the beach. Goodall and his companion had already related the circumstance of their being cut off by the water and taken round the point by Frank; and as Ruthven on jumping out had explained to his comrades who flocked round to shake his hand, “I owe my life to Hargate,” the enthusiasm reached boiling point, and Frank had difficulty in taking his place in the fly, so anxious were all to shake his hand and pat him on the shoulder. Had it not been for his anxiety to get home as soon as possible, and his urgent entreaties, they would have carried him on their shoulders in triumph through the town. They drove first to the school, where Childers was at once carried up to a bed, which had been prepared with warm blankets in readiness; Ruthven needed only to change his clothes.

The moment they had left the fly Frank drove straight home, and was delighted at finding, from his mother’s exclamation of surprise as he alighted from the cab, that she had not been suffering any anxiety, no one, in the general excitement, having thought of taking the news to her. In answer to her anxious inquiries he made light of the affair, saying only that they had stupidly allowed themselves to be cut off by the sea and had got a ducking. It was not, indeed, till the next morning, when the other four boys came around to tell Mrs. Hargate that they were indebted to Frank for their lives, that she had any notion that he had been in danger.

Frank was quite oppressed by what he called the fuss which was made over the affair. A thrilling description of it appeared in the local papers. A subscription was got up in the school, and a gold watch with an inscription was presented to him; and he received letters of heart felt thanks from the parents of his four schoolfellows, for Childers maintained that it was entirely to Frank’s coolness and thoughtfulness that his preservation was also due.

On the following Wednesday the school broke up. Frank had several invitations from the boys to spend his holidays with them; but he knew how lonely his mother would feel in his absence, and he declined all the invitations. Mrs. Hargate was far from strong, and had had several fits of fainting. These, however, had taken place at times when Frank was at school, and she had strictly charged her little servant to say nothing about it.

One day on returning from a long walk he saw the doctor’s carriage standing at the door. Just as he arrived the door opened and the doctor came out. Upon seeing Frank he turned.

“Come in here, my boy,” he said.

Frank followed him, and seeing that the blinds were down, went to draw them up. The doctor laid his hand on his arm.

“Never mind that,” he said gently.

“My boy,” he said, “do you know that your mother has been for some time ailing?”

“No, indeed,” Frank said with a gasp of pain and surprise.

“It is so, my boy. I have been attending her for some time. She has been suffering from fainting fits brought on by weakness of the heart’s action. Two hours since I was sent for and found her unconscious. My poor boy, you must compose yourself. God is good and merciful, though his decrees are hard to bear. Your mother passed away quietly half an hour since, without recovering consciousness.”

Frank gave a short cry, and then sat stunned by the suddenness of the blow. The doctor drew out a small case from his pocket and poured a few drops from the phial into a glass, added some water, and held it to Frank’s lips.

“Drink this, my boy,” he said.

Frank turned his head from the offered glass. He could not speak.

“Drink this, my boy,” the doctor said again; “it will do you good. Try and be strong for the sake of your little sister, who has only you in the world now.”

The thought of Lucy touched the right chord in the boy’s heart, and he burst into a passionate fit of crying. The doctor allowed his tears to flow unchecked.

“You will be better now,” he said presently. “Now drink this, then lie down on the sofa. We must not be having you ill, you know.”

Frank gulped down the contents of the glass, and, passive as a child, allowed the doctor to place him upon the sofa.

“God help and strengthen you, my poor boy,” he said; “ask help from Him.”

For an hour Frank lay sobbing on the sofa, and then, remembering the doctor’s last words, he knelt beside it and prayed for strength.

A week had passed. The blinds were up again. Mrs. Hargate had been laid in her last home, and Frank was sitting alone again in the little parlor thinking over what had best be done. The outlook was a dark one, enough to shake the courage of one much older than Frank. His mother’s pension, he knew, died with her. He had, on the doctor’s advice, written to the War Office on the day following his mother’s death, to inform the authorities of the circumstances, and to ask if any pension could be granted to his sister. The reply had arrived that morning and had relieved him of the greatest of his cares. It stated that as he was now just fifteen years old he was not eligible for a pension, but that twenty-five pounds a year would be paid to his sister until she married or attained the age of twenty-one.

He had spoken to the doctor that morning, and the latter said that he knew a lady who kept a small school, and who would, he doubted not, be willing to receive Lucy and to board and clothe her for that sum. She was a very kind and motherly person, and he was sure that Lucy would be most kindly treated and cared for by her. It was then of his own future only that Frank had to think. There were but a few pounds in the house, but the letter from the War Office inclosed a check for twenty pounds, as his mother’s quarterly pension was just due. The furniture of the little house would fetch but a small sum, not more, Frank thought, than thirty or forty pounds. There were a few debts to pay, and after all was settled up there would remain about fifty pounds. Of this he determined to place half in the doctor’s hands for the use of Lucy.

“She will want,” he said to himself, “a little pocket money. It is hard on a girl having no money to spend of her own. Then, as she gets on, she may need lessons in something or other. Besides, half the money rightly belongs to her, The question is, What am I to do?”

CHAPTER V: ALONE IN THE WORLD

“What am I to do?”

A difficult question indeed, for a boy of fifteen, with but twenty-five pounds, and without a friend in the world. Was he, indeed, without a friend? he asked himself. There was Dr. Parker. Should he apply to him? But the doctor had started for a trip on the Continent the day after the school had broken up, and would not return for six weeks. It was possible that, had he been at home, he might have offered to keep Frank for a while; but the boys seldom stayed at his school past the age of fifteen, going elsewhere to have their education completed. What possible claim had he to quarter himself upon the doctor for the next four years, even were the offer made? No, Frank felt; he could not live upon the doctor’s charity. Then there were the parents of the boys he had saved from drowning. But even as he sat alone Frank’s face flushed at the thought of trading upon services so rendered. The boy’s chief fault was pride. It was no petty feeling, and he had felt no shame at being poorer than the rest of his schoolfellows. It was rather a pride which led him unduly to rely upon himself, and to shrink from accepting favors from any one. Frank might well, without any derogation, have written to his friends, telling them of the loss he had suffered and the necessity there was for him to earn his living, and asking them to beg their fathers to use their interest to procure him a situation as a boy clerk, or any other position in which he could earn his livelihood.

Frank, however, shrunk from making any such appeal, and determined to fight his battle without asking for help. He knew nothing of his parents’ relations. His father was an only son, who had been left early an orphan. His mother, too, had, he was aware, lost both her parents, and he had never heard her speak of other relations. There was no one, therefore, so far as he knew, to whom he could appeal on the ground of ties of blood. It must be said for him that he had no idea how hard was the task which he was undertaking. It seemed to him that it must be easy for a strong, active lad to find employment of some sort in London. What the employment might be he cared little for. He had no pride of that kind, and so that he could earn his bread he cared not much in what capacity he might do it.

Already preparations had been made for the sale of the furniture, which was to take place next day. Everything was to be sold except the scientific books which had belonged to his father. These had been packed in a great box until the time when he might place them in a library of his own, and the doctor kindly offered to keep it for him until such time should arrive. Frank wrote a long letter to Ruthven, telling him of his loss, and his reasons for leaving Deal, and promising to write some day and tell him how he was getting on in London. This letter he did not intend to post until the last thing before leaving Deal. Lucy had already gone to her new home, and Frank felt confident that she would be happy there. His friend, the doctor, who had tried strongly, but without avail, to dissuade Frank from going up to London to seek his fortune there, had promised that if the lad referred any inquiries to him he would answer for his character.

He went down to the beach the last evening and said goodbye to his friends among the fishermen, and he walked over in the afternoon and took his last meal with Farmer Gregson.

“Look ye here, my lad,” the farmer said as they parted. “I tell ye, from what I’ve heerd, this London be a hard nut to crack. There be plenty of kernel, no doubt, when you can get at it, but it be hard work to open the shell. Now, if so be as at any time you run short of money, just drop me a line, and there’s ten pound at your service whenever you like. Don’t you think it’s an obligation. Quite the other way. It would be a real pleasure to me to lend you a helping hand.”

Two days after the sale Frank started for London. On getting out of the train he felt strange and lonely amid the bustle and confusion which was going on on the platform. The doctor had advised him to ask one of the porters, or a policeman, if he could recommend him to a quiet and respectable lodging, as expenses at an hotel would soon make a deep hole in his money. He, therefore, as soon as the crowd cleared away, addressed himself to one of the porters.

“What sort of lodgings do you want, sir?” the man said, looking at him rather suspiciously, with, as Frank saw, a strong idea in his mind that he was a runaway schoolboy.

“I only want one room,” he said, “and I don’t care how small it is, so that it is clean and quiet. I shall be out all day, and should not give much trouble.”

The porter went away and spoke to some of his mates, and presently returned with one of them.

“You’re wanting a room I hear, sir,” the man said. “I have a little house down the Old Kent Road, and my missus lets a room or two. It’s quiet and clean, I’ll warrant you. We have one room vacant at present.”

“I’m sure that would suit me very well,” Frank said. “How much do you charge a week?”

“Three and sixpence, sir, if you don’t want any cooking done.”

Frank took the address, and leaving his portmanteau in charge of the porter, who promised, unless he heard to the contrary, that he would bring it home with him when he had done his work, he set off from the station.

Deal is one of the quietest and most dreary places on the coast of England, and Frank was perfectly astounded at the crowd and bustle which filled the street, when he issued from the railway approach, at the foot of London Bridge. The porter had told him that he was to turn to his left, and keep straight along until he reached the “Elephant and Castle.” He had, therefore, no trouble about his road, and was able to give his whole attention to the sights which met his eye. For a time the stream of omnibuses, cabs, heavy wagons, and light carts, completely bewildered him, as did the throng of people who hastened along the footway. He was depressed rather than exhilarated at the sight of this busy multitude. He seemed such a solitary atom in the midst of this great moving crowd. Presently, however, the thought that where so many millions gained their living there must be room for one boy more, somewhat cheered him. He was a long time making his way to his place of destination, for he stared into every shop window, and being, although he was perfectly ignorant of the fact, on the wrong side of the pavement, he was bumped and bustled continually, and was not long in arriving at the conclusion that the people of London must be the roughest and rudest in the world. It was not until he ran against a gentleman, and was greeted with the angry, “now then, boy. Where are you going? Why the deuce don’t you keep on your own side of the pavement?” that he perceived that the moving throng was divided into two currents, that on the inside meeting him, while the outside stream was proceeding in the same direction as himself. After this he got on better, and arrived without adventure at the house of the porter, in the Old Kent Road.

It was a small house, but was clean and respectable, and Frank found that the room would suit him well.

“I do not wait upon the lodgers,” the landlady said, “except to make the beds and tidy the rooms in the morning. So if you want breakfast and tea at home you will have to get them yourself. There is a separate place downstairs for your coals. There are some tea things, plates and dishes, in this cupboard. You will want to buy a small tea kettle, and a gridiron, and a frying pan, in case you want a chop or a rasher. Do you think you can cook them yourself?”

“Frank, amused at the thought of cooking and catering for himself, said boldly that he should soon learn.

“You are a very young gentleman,” the landlady said, eyeing him doubtfully, “to be setting up on your own hook. I mean,” she said, seeing Frank look puzzled, “setting up housekeeping on your own account. You will have to be particular careful with the frying pan, because if you were to upset the fat in the fire you might have the house in a blaze in a jiffey.”

Frank said that he would certainly be careful with the frying pan.

“Well,” she went on, “as you’re a stranger to the place I don’t know as you could do better than get your tea, and sugar, and things at the grocer’s at the next corner. I deals there myself, and he gives every satisfaction. My baker will be round in a few minutes, and, if you likes, I can take in your bread for you. The same with milk.”

These matters being arranged, and Frank agreeing at once to the proposition that as he was a stranger it would make things more comfortable were he to pay his rent in advance, found himself alone in his new apartment. It was a room about ten feet square. The bed occupied one corner, with the washstand at its foot. There was a small table in front of the fireplace, and two chairs; a piece of carpet half covered the floor, and these with the addition of the articles in the cupboard constituted the furniture of the room. Feeling hungry after his journey Frank resolved to go out at once and get something to eat, and then to lay in a stock of provisions. After some hesitation regarding the character of the meal he decided upon two Bath buns, determining to make a substantial tea. He laid in a supply of tea, sugar, butter, and salt, bought a little kettle, a frying pan, and a gridiron. Then he hesitated as to whether he should venture upon a mutton chop or some bacon, deciding finally in favor of the latter, upon the reflection that any fellow could see whether bacon were properly frizzled up, while as to a chop there was no seeing anything about it till one cut it. He, therefore, invested in a pound of prime streaky Wiltshire bacon, the very best, as the shopman informed him, that could be bought. He returned carrying all his purchases, with the exception of the hardware. Then he inquired of his landlady where he could get coal.

“The green grocer’s round the corner,” the landlady said. “Tell him to send in a hundredweight of the best, that’s a shilling, and you’ll want some firewood too.”

The coal arrived in the course of the afternoon, and at half past six the porter came in with Frank’s trunk. He had by this time lit a fire, and while the water was boiling got some of his things out of the box, and by hanging some clothes on the pegs on the back of the door, and by putting the two or three favorite books he had brought with him on to the mantelpiece, he gave the room a more homelike appearance. He enjoyed his tea all the more from the novelty of having to prepare it himself, and succeeded very fairly for a first attempt with his bacon.

When tea was over he first washed up the things and then started for a ramble. He followed the broad straight road to Waterloo Bridge, stood for a long time looking at the river, and then crossed into the Strand. The lamps were now alight and the brightness and bustle of the scene greatly interested him. At nine o’clock he returned to his lodgings, but was again obliged to sally out, as he found he had forgotten candles.

After breakfast next morning he went out and bought a newspaper, and set himself to work to study the advertisements. He was dismayed to find how many more applicants there were for places than places requiring to be filled. All the persons advertising were older than himself, and seemed to possess various accomplishments in the way of languages; many too could be strongly recommended from their last situation. The prospect did not look hopeful. In the first place he had looked to see if any required boy clerks, but this species of assistant appeared little in demand; and then, although he hoped that it would not come to that, he ran his eye down the columns to see if any required errand boys or lads in manufacturing businesses. He found, however, no such advertisements. However, as he said to himself, it could not be expected that he should find a place waiting for him on the very day after his arrival, and that he ought to be able to live for a year on his five and twenty pounds; at this reflection his spirits rose and he went out again for a walk.

For the first week, indeed, of his arrival in London Frank did not set himself very earnestly to work to look for a situation. In his walks about the streets he several times observed cards in the window indicating that an errand boy was wanted. He resolved, however, that this should be the last resource which he would adopt, as he would much prefer to go to work as a common lad in a factory to serving in a shop. After the first week he answered many advertisements, but in no case received a reply. In one case, in which it was stated that a lad who could write a good fast hand was required in an office, wages to begin with eight shillings a week, he called two days after writing. It was a small office with a solitary clerk sitting in it. The latter, upon learning Frank’s business, replied with some exasperation that his mind was being worried out by boys.

“We have had four hundred and thirty letters,” he said; “and I should think that a hundred boys must have called. We took the first who applied, and all the other letters were chucked into the fire as soon as we saw what they were about.”