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He was saying something about "not wanting to shield me," and "locking-up," the drift of which I afterwards slowly gathered, when the village policeman we only had one at Brownstroke addressing my uncle as "your honour," said he would look in in the morning for further orders.
You never saw such fun as he is in a high wind, when he can't steer himself home, and gets carried right past the trees, and has to bear up again and again before he can perch." The locking-up bell began to toll, and the two boys were silent, and listened to it.
It was no use grumbling so many fewer tartlets and apples were eaten and fives balls bought on that Saturday; and after locking-up, when the money would otherwise have been spent, consolation was carried to many a small boy by the sound of the night-fags shouting along the passages, "Gentlemen sportsmen of the School-house; the lottery's going to be drawn in the hall."
As the evening fell, Gabriel took leave of his disciple; his fellow-watchman was waiting for him in the cloister ready for locking-up time. "Probably we shall never meet again," said the chaplain sadly. "You will end your days here, in the house of a God in whom you do not believe." "Yes, I shall die here," said Gabriel, smiling.
What his offence had been I could not quite gather, though I believe it consisted in his insisting on using the ledger he was at work on till the actual hour for ceasing work arrived, while Harris, who was responsible for the locking-up of the books, and who wanted this evening to go half an hour earlier, was demanding that he should give it up now.
His keys, and the elaborate locking-up of the place even while it was still under his eye, struck me as peculiar. I followed him, and found myself in a small apartment, plainly but not uncomfortably furnished and with its inner door, which was slightly ajar, opening into a paved courtyard. This inner door Montgomery at once closed.
By dint of preaching about the danger in certain reading for young girls, Mademoiselle de Corandeuil had caused this system of locking-up, especially designed to preserve Aline from the temptation of opening certain novels which the old lady rejected en masse. "Young girls did not read novels in 1780," she would say.
The carts and gigs rolled away; the clatter of hoofs on the road ceased; there was then a dumb dull sound as of locking-up, and low, humming voices below, and footsteps mounting the stairs to bed, with now and then a drunken hiccough or maudlin laugh, as some conquered votary of Bacchus was fairly carried up to his domicile.
Here the governor of the enchanted castle interrupted them, and, entering the room without any ceremony, acquainted the lady and gentleman that it was locking-up time; and, addressing Booth by the name of captain, asked him if he would not please to have a bed; adding, that he might have one in the next room to the lady, but that it would come dear; for that he never let a bed in that room under a guinea, nor could he afford it cheaper to his father.
Then the others hailed the old scarecrow of a coachman, who pulled up and agreed to take them in for a shilling; so there they sat on the back seat, drubbing with their heels, and their teeth chattering with cold, and jogged into Rugby some forty minutes after locking-up. He stops and examines their condition with a grim smile. "Ah! East, Hall, and Brown, late for locking-up.
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