Part 61

"Drat the boy!" said the old lady angrily. "Do you think the world's to give way for you? Such impidence! Mind your manners, little boy, can't you? You've made me drop a threepenny bit with your scrouging!"

"First single, five shillings," said the clerk, jerking out the precious ticket.

"Right!" cried the guard at the same instant. "Stand back there, will you!"

Paul dashed towards the door of the booking-office which led to the platform; but just as he reached it a gate slammed in his face with a sharp click, through the bars of it he saw, with hot eyes, the tall, heavy carriages which had shelter and safety in them jolt heavily past, till even the red lamp on the last van was quenched in the darkness.

That miserable old woman had shattered his hopes at the very moment of their fulfilment. It was fate again!

As he stood, fiercely gripping the bars of the gate, he heard Coggs' hateful voice again.

"Hallo! so you haven't got the Globe and the other thing after all, then; they've shut you out?"

"Yes," said Mr. Bultitude in a hollow voice; "they've shut me out!"

16. Hard Pressed

"Mark the poor wretch, to overshoot his troubles, How he outruns the wind, and with what care He cranks and crosses with a thousand doubles: The many musets through the which he goes Are like a labyrinth to amaze his foes."

As soon as the gate was opened, Paul went through mechanically with the others on to the platform, and waited at the bookstall while they changed the paper. He knew well enough that what had seemed at the time a stroke of supreme cunning would now only land him in fresh difficulties, if indeed it did not lead to the detection of his scheme. But he dared not interfere and prevent them from making the unlucky exchange. Something seemed to tie his tongue, and in sullen leaden apathy he resigned himself to whatever might be in store for him.

They passed out again by the booking-office. There was the old lady still at the pigeon-hole, trying to persuade the much-enduring clerk to restore a lucky sixpence she had given him by mistake, and was quite unable to describe. Mr. Bultitude would have given much just then to go up and shake her into hysterics, or curse her bitterly for the mischief she had done; but he refrained, either from an innate chivalry, or from a feeling that such an outburst would be ill-judged.

So, silent and miserable, with slow step and hanging head, he set out with his gaolers to render himself up once more at his house of bondage--a sort of involuntary Regulus, without the oath.

"Dickie, you were very anxious to run just now," observed Chawner, after they had gone some distance on their homeward way.

"We were late for tea--late for tea," explained Paul hastily.

"If you think the tea worth racing like that for, I don't," said Coggs viciously; "it's muck."

"You don't catch me racing, except for something worth having," said Coker.

One more flash of distinct inspiration came to Paul's aid in the very depths of his gloom. It was, in fact, a hazy recollection from English history of the ruse by which Edward I., when a prince, contrived to escape from his captors at Hereford Castle.

"Why--why," he said excitedly, "would you race if you had something worth racing for, hey? would you now?"

"Try us!" said Coker emphatically.

"What do you call 'something'?" inquired Chawner suspiciously.

"Well," said Mr. Bultitude; "what do you say to a shilling?"

"You haven't got a shilling," objected Coggs.

"Here's a shilling, see," said Paul, producing one. "Now then, I'll give this to any boy I see get into tea first!"

"Bultitude thinks he can run," said Coker, with an amiable unbelief in any disinterestedness. "He means to get in first and keep the shilling himself, I know."

"I'll back myself to run him any day," put in Coggs.

"So will I," added Chawner.

"Well, is it agreed?" Paul asked anxiously. "Will you try?"