Then he let it subside. His mother knocked over a cup of coffee, and his father cut himself with the bread knife. Ethel, his elder sister, indulged in a mild form of nervous breakdown. William sat with a face of startled innocence. But nothing enraged his family so much as William"s expression of innocence. They fell upon him, and he defended himself as well as he could. Yes, he was holding the balloon under the table. Well, he"d blown it up some time ago. He couldn"t keep it blown up for ever.
He had to let the air out some time. He couldn"t help it making a noise when the air went out. It was the way it was made. He hadn"t made it. He set off to school with an air of injured innocence--and the balloon.
Observing an elderly and irascible-looking gentleman in front of him, he went a few steps down a back street, blew up his balloon and held it tightly under his coat. Then, when abreast of the old gentleman, he let it off. The old gentleman gave a leap into the air and glared fiercely around. He glanced at the small virtuous-looking schoolboy with obviously no instrument of torture at his lips, and then concentrated his glare of fury and suspicion on the upper windows. William hastened on to the next pedestrian. He had quite a happy walk to school.
School was at first equally successful. William opened his desk, hastily inflated his balloon, closed his desk, then gazed round with his practised expression of horrified astonishment at what followed. He drove the French master to distraction.
"Step out "oo makes the noise," he screamed.
No one stepped out, and the noise continued at intervals.
The mathematics master finally discovered and confiscated the balloon.
"I hope," said the father at lunch, "that they"ve taken away that infernal machine of yours."
William replied sadly that they had. He added that some people didn"t seem to think it was stealing to take other people"s things.
"Then we may look forward to a little peace this evening?" said the father politely. "Not that it matters to me, as I"m going out to dinner.
The only thing that relieves the tedium of going out to dinner is the fact that for a short time one has a rest from William."
William acknowledged the compliment by a scowl and a mysterious muttered remark to the effect that some people were always at him.
During preparation in afternoon school he read a story-book kindly lent him by his next-door neighbour. It was not because he had no work to do that William read a story-book in preparation. It was a mark of defiance to the world in general. It was also a very interesting story-book. It opened with the hero as a small boy misunderstood and ill-treated by everyone around him. Then he ran away. He went to sea, and in a few years made an immense fortune in the goldfields. He returned in the last chapter and forgave his family and presented them with a n.o.ble mansion and several shiploads of gold. The idea impressed William--all except the end part. He thought he"d prefer to have the n.o.ble mansion himself and pay rare visits to his family, during which he would listen to their humble apologies, and perhaps give them a nugget or two, but not very much--certainly not much to Ethel. He wasn"t sure whether he"d ever really forgive them. He"d have rooms full of squeaky balloons and trumpets in his house anyway, and he"d keep caterpillars and white rats all over the place too--things they made such a fuss about in their old house--and he"d always go about in dirty boots, and he"d never brush his hair or wash, and he"d keep dozens of motor-cars, and he wouldn"t let Ethel go out in any of them. He was roused from this enthralling day-dream by the discovery and confiscation of his story-book by the master in charge, and the subsequent fury of its owner. In order adequately to express his annoyance, he dropped a little ball of blotting-paper soaked in ink down William"s back. William, on attempting retaliation, was sentenced to stay in half an hour after school. He returned gloomily to his history book (upside down) and his misanthropic view of life. He compared himself bitterly with the hero of the story-book and decided not to waste another moment of his life in uncongenial surroundings. He made a firm determination to run away as soon as he was released from school.
He walked briskly down the road away from the village. In his pocket reposed the balloon. He had made the cheering discovery that the mathematics master had left it on his desk, so he had joyfully taken it again into his possession. He thought he might reach the coast before night, and get to the goldfields before next week. He didn"t suppose it took long to make a fortune there. He might be back before next Christmas and--crumbs! he"d jolly well make people sit up. He wouldn"t go to school, for one thing, and he"d be jolly careful who he gave nuggets to for another. He"d give nuggets to the butcher"s boy and the postman, and the man who came to tune the piano, and the chimney-sweep.
He wouldn"t give any to any of his family, or any of the masters at the school. He"d just serve people out the way they served him. He just would. The road to the coast seemed rather long, and he was growing rather tired. He walked in a ditch for a change, and then sc.r.a.ped through a hedge and took a short cut across a ploughed field. Dusk was falling fast, and even William"s buoyant spirits began to flag. The fortune part was all very well, but in the meantime he was cold and tired and hungry. He hadn"t yet reached the coast, much less the goldfields. Something must be done. He remembered that the boy in the story had "begged his way" to the coast. William determined to beg his.
But at present there seemed nothing to beg it from, except a hawthorn hedge and a scarecrow in the field behind it. He wandered on disconsolately deciding to begin his career as a beggar at the first sign of human habitation.
At last he discovered a pair of iron gates through the dusk and, a.s.suming an expression of patient suffering calculated to melt a heart of stone, walked up the drive. At the front door he smoothed down his hair (he had lost his cap on the way), pulled up his stockings, and rang the bell. After an interval a stout gentleman in the garb of a butler opened the door and glared ferociously up and down William.
"Please----" began William plaintively.
The stout gentleman interrupted.
"If you"re the new Boots," he said majestically, "go round to the back door. If you"re not, go away."
[Ill.u.s.tration: "IF YOU"RE THE NEW BOOTS," HE SAID MAJESTICALLY, "GO ROUND TO THE BACK DOOR."]
He then shut the door in William"s face. William, on the top step, considered the question for a few minutes. It was dark and cold, with every prospect of becoming darker and colder. He decided to be the new Boots. He found his way round to the back door and knocked firmly. It was opened by a large woman in a print dress and ap.r.o.n.
"What y" want?" she said aggressively.
"He said," said William firmly, "to come round if I was the new Boots."
The woman surveyed him in grim disapproval.
"You bin round to the front?" she said. "Nerve!"
Her disapproval increased to suspicion.
"Where"s your things?" she said.
"Comin"," said William without a moment"s hesitation.
"Too tired to bring "em with you?" she said sarcastically. "All right.
Come in!"
William came in gratefully. It was a large, warm, clean kitchen. A small kitchen-maid was peeling potatoes at a sink, and a housemaid in black, with a frilled cap and ap.r.o.n, was powdering her nose before a gla.s.s on the wall. They both turned to stare at William.
""Ere"s the new Boots," announced Cook, ""is valet"s bringin" "is things later."
The housemaid looked up William from his muddy boots to his untidy hair, then down William from his untidy hair to his muddy boots.
"Imperdent-lookin" child," she commented haughtily, returning to her task.
William decided inwardly that she was to have no share at all in the nuggets.
The kitchen-maid giggled and winked at William, with obviously friendly intent. William mentally promised her half a ship-load of nuggets.
"Now, then, s.m.u.tty," said the house-maid with out turning round, "none of your sauce!"
""Ad your tea?" said the cook to William. William"s spirits rose.
"No," he said plaintively.
"All right. Sit down at the table."
William"s spirits soared sky high.
He sat at the table and the cook put a large plate of bread and b.u.t.ter before him.
William set to work at once. The house-maid regarded him scornfully.
"Learnt "is way of eatin" at the Zoo," she said pityingly.
The kitchen-maid giggled again and gave William another wink. William had given himself up to whole-hearted epicurean enjoying of his bread and b.u.t.ter and took no notice of them. At this moment the butler entered.
He subjected the quite unmoved William to another long survey.
"When next you come a-hentering of this "ouse, my boy," he said, "kindly remember that the front door is reserved for gentry an" the back for brats."
William merely looked at him coldly over a hunk of bread and b.u.t.ter.
Mentally he knocked him off the list of nugget-receivers.
The butler looked sadly round the room.
"They"re all the same," he lamented. "Eat, eat, eat. Nothin" but eat.
Eat all day an" eat all night. "E"s not bin in the "ouse two minutes an"
"e"s at it. Eat! eat! eat! "E"ll "ave all the b.u.t.tons bust off his uniform in a week like wot the larst one "ad. Like eatin" better than workin", don"t you?" he said sarcastically to William.