An Australian Lassie Part 8

Even upon that first day when he, a new boy, had been standing in view of the whole school, his mind had chiefly been occupied in running over the boys' obvious fighting qualities--tall, short, fat, thin, all sorts and conditions of them were there.

The girls he had pa.s.sed by with but slight notice; to him they were absolutely valueless and uninteresting. Betty Bruce had certainly caught his attention by her public punishment, and he had been taken aback by that sharp little pinch of hers. Hitherto he had had nothing to do with girls but he supposed immediately that that was their manner of fighting, and he did not admire it.

Not many days later an opportunity occurred for him to defend his newly adopted name. Truth to tell, he had been longing for such an occasion from the day on which old Captain Carew had asked him to fight for his name too.

He was in the playground, round by the school house, just where the babies' end of the school room joined the cloak room, and school was over for the day. Having a piece of chalk in one hand, and nothing particular to do, he occupied a few minutes by writing upon the weather boards of the cloak-room--"J. C. Brown, J. C. Brown, John C. Brown, John C. Brown," and the hinting C. raised a small dispute in a circle of onlooking boys and girls.

It was Peter Bailey who said, "John Clara Brown," and it was silly little Jack Smith who said "John Codfish Brown."

A burst of laughter followed, and Peter Bailey and Jack Smith chased each other down the playground, and in and out among the sapling clump away at the end of it, where some shabby scrub and three gum trees grew.

When they came back, John Brown was still silently writing apparently deaf to all the surmising going on around him.

Nellie Underwood said it was--"Crabby John Brown," and Arthur Smedley, the school bully, said--"John Brown the clown."

Whereupon Brown sought out a clean weather-board a shade or so above his head and wrote in bold letters.

"John Carew-Brown, Dene Hall, Willoughby," which made Bailey say--

"Hullo, he's got hold of Bruce's grandfather."

Cyril, who was one of the little circle of jesters, grew pink to the tips of his pretty pink ears, but feeling the majority and the bully were against Brown, ventured to say--

"He's only running you!"

Nellie Underwood pushed herself into a prominent position in the group and cried--

"I seen him coming out of Dene Hall gates, and old Mr. Carew was with him. So there!"

John Brown chose another weather-board and the group closed round him to read--

"John Carew-Brown, only grandson of Captain Carew, of Dene Hall, Willoughby, Sydney, N.S. Wales, Australia, Southern Hemisphere," which certainly looked imposing and had the effect of silencing every one for almost half a minute.

Then the bully's eyes glared into Cyril's pretty blue ones, and he said angrily--

"You said you were the only grandson."

Cyril did not speak.

"You said," repeated the bully, "you said the Captain was going to adopt you, and give you his collection of guinea pigs."

Cyril hung his crimson face and kicked the ground with the toe of his boot.

John Brown chose another weather-board and wrote--

"Captain Carew has no guinea pigs," which sent most of the blood away from Cyril's face. The bully was eyeing him angrily, and even went as far as doubling up one fist.

"You said he was going to give you five s.h.i.+llings a week pocket-money, and let you buy my white mice," he muttered, and Cyril found himself face to face with the occasion, and with no clever intervening Betty to throw the right word into the right place, and so save his skin and his honour.

"So he is," he said, moving away from Brown as far as he dared--"and so I am the only grandson." He looked over his shoulder and beheld Brown's back, whereupon he felt if Brown could not see he could not hear.

"_He's_ only the gardener's boy," he said; "ask"--his mind made a swift excursion for an authority--"ask my grandfather," he said, "any of you who like, ask my grandfather."

Brown and his chalk advanced to Cyril.

"Who told you I was the gardener's boy?" he asked. Cyril looked from foe to foe, and the wild thought of denying he had said such words entered his mind, only to be followed by a swift remembrance of various daring deeds of the bully's.

So he went over recklessly to Arthur Smedley's side.

"My grandfather!" he said.

"Are you going to be adopted?" asked the bully.

"Yes," said Cyril in desperation.

"Are you going to have five s.h.i.+llings a week?" demanded the bully.

"No--I'm going to have ten," roared Cyril.

A window belonging to Mr. Sharman's private house, which adjoined the school, flew open, and John Brown's name was sharply called. It entered into Arthur Smedley's mind to see what writing remained upon the wall, and he went across to the cloak-room for that purpose.

Whereupon Cyril looked to the right of him, to the left of him, to the back of him, and beheld neither friend nor foe in his vicinity; and he heaved a sigh of great satisfaction, ran to the fence, squeezed himself through a hole in it, and was upon the road towards home in a trice.

But before he had gone more than a hundred yards he heard quick footsteps behind him, and looking over his shoulder he saw John C.

Brown. Then did a sickening sense of terror sweep over him, and his heart leapt into his mouth, for had he not said John Carew-Brown was "only the gardener's boy"?

CHAPTER VIII

THE FIGHT

Betty was in the belt of bush that lay between the wicket-gate of her home and the road. Her idea was to be sufficiently near to home to gather from the sound of the voices that might call her if she were _really_ needed and yet to be so far from sight that the continual "Betty, come here," and "Betty, go there," could not be.

She had come home as soon as school was out, come home leaving Cyril and Nancy behind her, flung herself beneath the shade of one of her favourite old gum trees, and begun to write.

When Mr. Bruce was busy over a story, or an article, or a book, every one in the house knew. Then the study door would be closed and the window only opened at the top; then the children would be banished from the side garden into which the study looked, and from the pa.s.sage outside the study door; then Mrs. Bruce would carry his meals to him upon a tray, and he would have strong black coffee in the early evening.

And then at last a neatly folded missive, gummed and tied with thin string, with a mysterious "_MS. only_" inscribed in one corner, would be carried to the post by either Cyril or Betty.

When Dot wrote a story, as she very frequently did now-a-days, portions of it would be carried into the study for her father to see, and her mother would proudly read page after page of the neat round hand, and wonder where on earth the child got her ideas from.

But when Betty wrote her stories, no one in the house--excepting Cyril, of course--knew anything about it! no one kept the house quiet for Betty, and no one wondered wherever she got her ideas from. And yet she had quite a collection of fairy stories and poems of her own composition. She and an exercise book, or a few sc.r.a.ps of paper and a stumpy bit of pencil were to be seen sometimes in very close companions.h.i.+p.

But for all that no one did see; or seeing, they did not understand.

Still Betty wrote her stories--not necessarily for publication like her father--nor as a guarantee that the scribbling genius was within her, like Dot--but for the love of story writing alone.

Her fairy story to-day had to do with the bold and handsome Waratah which ran mad in the bush behind her home, towards Middle Harbour. Her fertile fancy had suggested many roles for these flowers to take.