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Updated: May 19, 2025
Mr Rebble and Mr Hasnip both relieved him, and we boys did our best to help; but the afternoon glided on, no doctor arrived, and we felt chilled and hopeless, till all at once, after a rest, Lomax had begun again apparently as fresh as ever, and to our horror he suddenly began to whistle a merry tune. "Lomax!" cried Mr Hasnip. "What's the matter, sir?"
Mr Rebble and Mr Hasnip both coughed, the Doctor sighed, glanced at me, and then went on. "Burr major, you have already told me that you had a presentation silver watch from your father." I had been hoping that I was in error, and that we were called in for reproof about some trivial matter, but now my spirits sank. "Yes, sir."
At last uttering a sound that was almost a groan, I muttered, "Oh, Tom, Tom, how could you do such a thing as this?" The feeling of confusion came back like a thick mist floating over me, and I turned the watch over in my hand two or three times, asking myself what I should do. Should I take it to Burr major, and say I had picked it up? Should I go and confide in Mr Hasnip?
"I am Doctor Browne's assistant master, Sir Hawkhurst," replied Mr Rebble, with dignity, "and I cannot answer for his reasons." "Humph! You can't, eh? You there in the dark barnacles," cried the General, turning upon Mr Hasnip, "what have you to say?" "That the boys must be severely punished, sir," said Mr Hasnip, who looked quite startled. "Punished! I should think so indeed.
I shall go and ask Mr Hasnip if we boys are to be kept always at work, while you and Tom Mercer are idling about and enjoying yourselves."
Scold, find fault, grumble, Mr Hasnip was just as if his breakfast had not agreed with him because he got up too early; and at last I was back in my seat, with my face burning, my head aching, and a general feeling of misery troubling me, which was made the worse by the keen enjoyment Burr major and his parasites found in triumphing over me, and coming by my place every now and then to whisper "Poor fellow, then! turned back going to be caned," and the like, till I ground my teeth, clenched my fists, and sat there bent over the exercises before me, seeing nothing but the interior of Lomax's cottage, and listening to his instructions how to stop that blow and retort with another, till in imagination I could fancy myself thrashing my enemies, and making for myself a lasting peace.
"Well," said the Doctor, as Mr Hasnip coughed to take my attention, "why are you waiting?" "For Mercer, sir." "But I have not excused him. He is not a new boy; and besides, I am sure you would like him to be punished." "No, no!" I said eagerly; "and I don't want to be let off if he is not." "Hum! Hah!" ejaculated the Doctor, looking at me benevolently through his spectacles.
"That," continued the Doctor, "many of the boys had been going back in minor subjects." I breathed more freely at this. Mr Hasnip, whom he now publicly presented to us, was an Oxford gentleman, who would take our weak points in hand, strengthen them, and help him, the Doctor, to maintain the high position his establishment had held for so many years.
"I haven't been to the scorers' table, sir," said Mercer, who had just come back from a spot near the tent, where he could get a better view of the field than from where I lay under the big oak tree. "Run and ask, my lad," said Mr Rebble, and he and Mr Hasnip sat down near me, and chatted so pleasantly that I forgot all about the way in which they tortured me sometimes with questions.
"Well er er yes I like that. Mercer, you are excused too. That will do." "Thank you, sir; thank you, sir," cried Mercer joyfully; and we both bowed and hurried away to the loft, Mr Rebble shaking his head at us as we passed his desk, and Mr Hasnip, as I thought, looking sadly disappointed as far as I could judge, though I could not see his eyes.
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