James Greenwood - The True History of a Little Ragamuffin

Likewise it was too much for Mouldy. True to his word, that if I set up a snivelling he would give me another, he once more flung up his open hand and caught me a harder spank even than the first one. Ripston immediately fired up with a degree of pluck that did him honour.

“The gallus brute!” he exclaimed, meaning Mouldy, who, as I before have said, was a bigger and a stronger boy than either of us—”the gallus brute! to punch a poor cove wot’s littler than he is, and ill too! Don’t lay there, Smiffield, old boy! get up and help us; well jolly soon give him wot he wants.”

And without waiting for my assistance, Ripston turned back his cuffs and began dancing round Mouldy with a determination that seemed fairly to stagger him. But I was in no mind for fighting, and tried to make matters up between them, assuring them that I was not crying because of the slap on the face; that it had not hurt me at all. I was crying because I felt so ill. I was glad that I did take this course, for as soon as poor Mouldy was sufficiently awake to understand the true condition of affairs, he expressed himself as penitently as a boy could. He owned that he was a precious coward, and offered me the satisfaction of hitting him on the nose as hard as I chose, while he held both his hands behind him—an offer which Ripston urged me to accept. Finding that I would not, however, he was determined to make it up somehow, so he insisted on my having his cap to lay my head on, and his jacket to cover me. Ripston’s heart was good to do as much; but only the day before, while running away from the beadle, he had lost his cap, and the blue guernsey which served him for shirt as well as jacket, was, except his trousers, the whole of his wardrobe, and I could hardly expect him to oblige me to the extent of stripping himself.

But although the boys did their best to make me comfortable; letting me have all the straw to myself, and tucking me up as nicely as the bedclothes would permit, I did not feel any better. That is to say, I was hot and cold as before, and my eyelids pressed heavy and burning on my eyes, and my tongue was parched, and my breath came short and laboured. I did feel better though, somehow, since I had got over my crying fit; I felt lighter, and more inclined, If I may so express it, to go easy with my illness—to lie still, and let it do just as it pleased with me.

It was easy to see that each minute Mouldy and Ripston grew more and more alarmed at my condition. After they had spread the jacket over me and made me comfortable, they did not lie down again, but went and sat in the comer of the van that was farthest from me, talking in whispers.

“P’r’aps it’s on’y a cold,” whispered Ripston.

“When a cold does reg’lar ketch hold on you, it do make you feel precious bad; don’t it, Mouldy?”

“Umph!” was all the answer that Mouldy made.

“It is a cold; don’t you think it is, Mouldy?”

“It’s summat, I s’pose,” replied Mouldy, vaguely, and in so low a whisper that I could scarcely hear it.

“If he don’t get better in the mornin’, we’ll have to get him some physic, Mouldy.”

“Yes.”

“Mustard plasters is good for wheezin’s at the chest; ain’t they, Mouldy?”

“Werry likely.”

“I recollects havin’ one on when I was a kid. I wonder how much mustard he’d take, Mouldy? A pen’orth ’ud do, I should think; he ain’t got a werry big chest.”

Mouldy was strangely inattentive to his companion’s conversation. To Ripston’s last observation he made no reply at all. After a pause of a minute or two’s duration, said Ripston—

“He seems to get wheezin’s wuss and wuss; don’t you think he do, Mouldy? Think it ’ud be any good tryin’ it on to beg that mustard tonight, Mouldy?”

“Not a bit; the shops is all shut up, ’cept the doctors’—they keeps open on Sundays, don’t you know?”

“They on’y sells pills. P’r’aps pills ’ud do him more good than mustard—eh, Mouldy? The wust of pills, they’ve got such precious rum names that a cove don’t know what to arks for.”

“Pen’orth of pills—that’s what I should ask for.”

“And s’pose the cove behind the counter said, ‘What sort of pills, my man?’”

“Then I should say, openin’ uns,” replied Mouldy, after a little consideration.

“I never thought of that. I s’pose they all are openin’ uns?”

“I never heard of a sort that different was expected on,” replied Mouldy, with the same sort of indifference in his tone as had distinguished his manner from the first. He seemed all the while to be thinking of something else.

“Then that’s agreed on,” continued Ripston; “the fust penny we ketches hold on in the mornin’ goes for pills for Smiffield. “What say, Mouldy?”

But Mouldy said nothing; and both boys were quiet for full a minute. I, too, remained quite quiet, for the purpose of hearing the whispered conversation going on between them. Not that I felt anxious about it. I didn’t feel anxious about anything. I didn’t care what they talked about, only I liked to hear them. It appeared as though Mouldy’s reserved manner of speech presently roused Ripston’s suspicions.

“Mouldy!” said he, suddenly, “if it ain’t a cold, what is the matter with Smiffield?”

“Who said it warn’t a cold? How should I know what’s the matter with him mor’n you?” snapped Mouldy.

“Well, you know, Mouldy, you’ve been in the ’orspital, and you might have seen what the matter was with a good many coves,” explained Ripston. “Don’t you recollect anybody’s case as was like his’n?”

“You hold your jaw!” replied he, in an impatient whisper. “How do yer know as he’s asleep?”

“Sure he is. Don’t you hear how reg’lar his wheezin’s is?”

“Yes; and I hears summat else, too,” said Mouldy, moodily.

“What else?”

“I hears the straw as he’s a-layin’ on raspin’ together. If he is asleep, he’s got that precious shiverin’ on him.” And then, in a still lower whisper, he continued, “I wish I hadn’t lent him my jacket, Rip. Jigger the cap wot he’s got his head on; but I do wish I hadn’t lent him my jacket.”

“There you are agin!” replied Ripston, reproachfully. “I never see such a feller as you are. Greedy beggar! He’d ha’ lent you his jacket, I’d bet a shillin’, if you wanted it”

“Lent it be jiggered! It’s as good as givin’ it; that’s wot I’m a-lookin’ at”

“What d’yer mean? You can have it back in the mornin’ can’t yer?” demanded Ripston.

“’Course I can,” answered Mouldy. “Oh, yes! I can have it back, Rip, and I can have summat with it, Rip, which I don’t pertickler want, thanky.”

“Can’t you open your mouth, and tell a feller what you mean?”

“Hush! Here, put your head over the side, ’cos he mightn’t be asleep arter all, you know, and it might frighten him.”

So they both rose softly, and leaned their heads over the side of the van. Somehow, however, my hearing was particularly sharp that night, and I could make out all that they said as plainly almost as though they had stooped down to whisper it

“Was you ever waxinated, Rip?”

“I was so, and got the places to prove it. But wot’s that got to do with Smiffield?”

“Well, you see, Rip, I never was waxinated, so I shall stay up at this end of the wan till the mornin’. You’re all right, old boy, and may sleep along with him if you likes; bein’ waxinated, you won’t catch it”