Tom Reade

“ Newnham, watching the cub’s athletic figure as Tom walked through the centre of the camp. “I never knew a man of any age who was more resourceful or sure to win than this same cub, Tom Reade, whose very name was unknown to me a few weeks ago. Yet I shiver! I can’t help it. Men just as resourceful as Tom Reade are sometimes beaten to a finish!” ”

“ Yes, full a hundredweight; half the mass was quartz, but four-fifths of the weight they knew must be gold. Then they jumped up and each put a foot on it, and shook hands over it.
“Oh, you beauty!” cried George, and he went on his knees and kissed it; “that is not because you are gold, but because you take me to Susan. Now, Tom, let us thank Heaven for its goodness to us, and back to camp this very day.”
“Ay! but stop, we must wrap it in our wipes or we shall never get back alive. The very honest ones would turn villains at sight of it. It is the wonder of the world.” ”

“ Tom declared, promptly. "I am as certain of what I state as ever an engineer can be of anything."
"If we were alone," thought Don Luis Montez, exultantly, "I would take off my hat to this young Gringo, Reade. He is a far more accomplished liar than I can ever hope to be. And these Americanos are becoming convinced all ready."
"Do you agree with your associate, Hazelton?" inquired Mr. Ellsworth.
"Absolutely," Harry proposed. "I have been watching Tom Reade to see if he was making the statement emphatic enough to suit my ideas. ”

“ While Tom Reade spoke Foreman Mendoza had marshaled his Mexicans and was translating the young engineer's words into Spanish.
Nor was it long ere Tom's fine presentation of the matter caught the men in the nobler part of their feelings.
“Don't blame Duff so much,” Tom finally went on. “He may be a parasite, a vulture, a feeder on blood, but you and men just like you have helped to make the Duffs. You're not going to do so after this, are you, my friends? You're not going to keep the breath of life in monsters who drain you dry of life and manhood?” ”

“ Down by the checker's hut the crowd of curious workmen gasped as they saw Tom Reade jogging along with this great load over one shoulder. Reaching the line, Tom gave another heave. Bellas rolled on the ground. He was conscious and could have gotten up, but he chose to lay where he had fallen and think matters over.
“Don't think I'm peevish, men,” Tom called pleasantly. “I wouldn't have done that if Bellas hadn't attacked me. I had to defend myself. Now, while I'm here, does any man wish to make a claim for justice? Does any man feel that he has been discharged unfairly?” ”

“ For answer Tom Reade climbed up into his bunk, though he kept his shirt and trousers on.
"I'll tell you what," offered Dick. "We'll take turns staying up on guard, just in case something real should happen. The fellow who stays up will walk back and forth, to be sure of remaining awake. He'll also see to it that the fire is kept up."
"Who'll take the first watch?" Harry wanted to know.
"Let Hen do it!" came, in the same breath, from Dave, Tom and Greg. ”

“ We’re too near the camp. I want to talk with you where we’re not so likely to be interfered with by people who have too much curiosity.”
“If that means me,” quoth Tom Reade inwardly, “the shoe fits to a nicety.”
Tom followed the pair for a little way, with a stealth that was born in him for the present need. Then the plotters stepped into a rocky, open gully, where the cub engineer could not have followed without being seen.
“Oh, dear! I never wanted to follow anyone as much in my life!” groaned Reade in his disappointment. ”

“ Bill had had his fellows three times in the water, and was proud of them.
Just ten minutes before the time for calling the contestants Dave Darrin led his squad from the boathouse. Out along the pier they ran and dived in.
"The water's just fine for swimming to-day," ecstatically remarked Tom Reade, as he came up, blew the water from his mouth and took a few strokes. "In fact, the water's too fine."
"Too fine?" queried Dave. "How so?"
"Why, it makes a fellow feel so fine," retorted Tom, "that I'm afraid it will make us all winners, and then there won't be any glory for either school." ”

“ Yes; the two young men were our friends of old, the young engineers. Our readers are wholly familiar with Tom and Harry as far back as their grammar school days in the good old town of Gridley. Tom and Harry were members of that famous sextet of schoolboy athletes known at home as Dick & Co. The exploits of Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton, as of Dick Prescott, Dave Darrin, Greg Holmes and Dan Dalzell, have been fully told, first in the “Grammar School Boys Series,” and then in the “High School Boys Series.” ”

“ Ay! come,” cried he, shouting wildly at the top of his voice, “there is plenty for all. GOLD! GOLD! GOLD! I have found it. I, Tom Robinson, I've found it, and I grudge it to no man. I, a thief that was, make a present of it to its rightful owner, and that is all the world. Here GOLD! GOLD! GOLD!”
Though George hardly understood his companion's words, he was carried away by the torrent of his enthusiasm, and even as Robinson spoke his cheeks in turn flushed and his eyes flashed, and he grasped his friend's hands warmly, and cried, “GOLD! GOLD! blessings on it if it takes me to Susan; GOLD! ”

“ See what a web life is! Tom and I often talk of this. But Tom says it is Parson Eden I have to thank for it, and the lessons he learned in the prison; but I tell him if he goes so far back as that, he should go farther, and thank Farmer Meadows, for he it was that sent Tom to the prison, where he was converted, and became as honest a fellow as any in the world, and a friend to your George as true as steel.”
The letter concluded as it began, with thanks to Heaven, and bidding Susan expect his happy return in six months after this letter. In short, the letter was one “Hurrah!” ”

“ Drunkenness precedes and follows it, and perjury rushes to its defense.”
“Well, Tom, you are a beautiful speaker.”
“I haven't done yet. What wonder it degrades a man when a dog loses his dignity under it. Behold the dog who has stolen; look at Carlo yesterday when he demeaned himself to prig Jem's dinner (the sly brute won't look at ours) . How mean he cut with his tail under his belly, instead of turning out to meet folk all jolly and waggle-um-tail-um as on other occasions—Hallo, you, sir! what are you doing so near our tent?” ”

“ Are you mad, Tom? Why, there goes five pounds. What a sin!”
“Did you never hear of the man that flung away a sprat to catch a whale? Now turn back to our hole. Stop, leave your pickax, then they will think we are coming back to work.”
In little more than half an hour they were in their little gully working like mad. They ate their dinner working. At five o'clock George pointed out to Robinson no less than seven distinct columns of smoke rising about a mile apart all down the valley.
“Ay!” said Robinson, “those six smokes are hunting the smoke that is hunting us! ”

“ Tom isn't dead yet.”
This was the moment Mr. Fountain and Mr. Talboys chose for coming into the drawing-room, of course. Mr. Fountain, with a shade of hesitation and awkwardness, introduced the Dodds to Mr. Talboys: he bowed a little stiffly, and there was a pause. Eve could not repress a little movement of nervous impatience. “David is telling us one of his nonsensical stories, sir,” said she to Mr. Fountain, “and it is so interesting; go on, David.”
“Well, but,” said David, modestly, “it isn't everybody that likes these sea-yarns as you do, Eve. ”

“ Timmy vanished in the darkness. Tom Reade waited until he judged
that the youngster must be in position near the back door. Now
Tom gripped the bottle in his left hand, crouching over the brick.
With his felt hat in his right hand, Tom reached up, hitting a window pane smartly with the hat. At the same instant he brought the bottle crashing down over the brick.
As the bottle smashed against the brick Mr. Finbrink, in the dining room of the house, jumped up so quickly that he dropped his pipe.
"Some young rascal has smashed a front window!" he gasped, as he bolted into the parlor. ”

“ He looked up, and there stood Tom, the stable-boy, with both hands in his pockets. Tom was not there by his own proper movement, but was agent of Betsy, the under-housemaid.
Female servants scan the male guests pretty closely too, without seeming to do it, and judge them upon lamentably broad principles—youth, health, size, beauty, and good temper. Oh, the coarse-minded critics! Hence it befell that in their eyes, especially after the fiddle business, David was a king compared with his rivals. ”

“ Richard Bassett hesitated a moment; but Wheeler, who had drawn near at the sound of the raised voices, made him a signal to assent.
“By all means,” said he, adroitly. “Mr. Markham, your father often shot with mine over the Bassett estates. You are welcome to poor little 'Splatchett's.' Keep your men off, Sir Charles; they are noisy bunglers, and do more harm than good. Here, Tom! Bill! beat for the gentlemen. They shall have the sport. I only want the birds.” ”

“ Oh, dear! oh, dear!” and George pushed his scarce-tasted dinner from him, and left the tent hurriedly, his eyes thick with tears.
Thus ended this human day so happily begun; and thus the poor dog paid the price of fidelity this Sunday afternoon.
Siste viator iter—and part with poor Carlo—for whom there are now no more little passing troubles—no more little simple joys. His duty is performed, his race is run. Peace be to him, and to all simple and devoted hearts. Ah me! how rare they are among men!
“What are you doing, Tom, if you please?” ”

“ Beautiful specimens of all the woods have been placed and kept before him, and for a month he has been forced to imitate nature with his eye never off her. His competitors in the world imitate nature from memory, from convention, or from tradition. By such processes truth and beauty are lost at each step down the ladder of routine. Mr. Eden gave clever Tom at first starting the right end of the stick, instead of letting him take the wrong. ”

“ Wait till the coast is clear—then strike tent and away.”
At midnight they stole out of the camp. By peep of day they were in a little dell with a brook running at the bottom of it.
“Now, George, listen to me. Here is ten thousand pounds if we could keep this gully and the creek a fortnight to ourselves.”
“Oh, Tom! and we will. Nobody will find us here, it is like a box.”
Robinson smiled sadly. The men drove their spades in close to the little hole which Robinson had made prospecting yesterday, and the very first cradleful yielded an ounce of gold-dust extremely small and pure. ”

“ Levi.”
“Thank you, Jem. Tom, will you be so kind as read it me while I work?”
“Yes, give it me. Work? Why, what are we going to work at in the bush?”
“I should think you might guess,” replied George quietly, while putting down his pickax and taking off his coat. “Well, I am astonished at both of you. You ought to know what I am going to do. Humph! Under this tree will be as good a place as any.”
“Jem, as I am a sinner, he is going to bury him.”
“Bury what? The nugget?”
“No, Jem, the Christian.” *
* In Berkshire, among a certain class, this word means “a human being.” ”

“ Tom looked first at one, and then at the other of the pair.
"So," guessed Reade shrewdly, "Evarts has been at the head of this game of unlawful liquor selling in this camp. There are other vendors here, too, are there?"
"You lie!" yelled the discharged foreman.
"You may prove that, at your convenience," Reade replied, without even a heightening of his color. "For the present, though, you're going to get out of camp and stay out."
"I called you a liar," sneered Evarts, "and you haven't the sand to fight about it."
"Fighting with one of your stripe isn't worth the while," Tom retorted, shortly. ”

“ George assented with joy; but, when Robinson suggested that Jacky would be very useful to pilot them through the bush, his countenance fell.
“Don't think of it,” said he. “I know he is here, Tom, and I shan't go after him. But don't let him come near me, the nasty little, creeping, murdering varmint. Poor Abner will never get over his tomahawk—not if he lives fifty years.”
In short, it was agreed they should go alone at peep of day.
“I have talked it over with Jem already, and he will take charge of our tent till we come back.” ”

“ Jenny stood transfixed with the tray in her hand. “Since when?” asked she of her master, but looking at Robinson.
“This moment. The faithful creature greeted my return with that proposal.”
“Well, sir, a servant isn't a slave and suppose he has a reason?”
“Oh! they have always got a reason, such as it is. Wants to go and squat at Bathurst. Well, Tom, you are a fool for leaving us, but of course we shan't pay you the compliment of keeping you against your will, shall we?” looking at Jane. ”

“ Hinman is, Tom?"
"He'll never have a seventieth birthday again," replied Reade thoughtfully. "My! A man at that age ought not to have to bother with working. It's pitiful. It's a shame!"
"Maybe he finds his only happiness in work," Darrin suggested.
"I have known old people like that."
By this time Dan had taken one of the lanterns into the tent, and was undressing. Dave soon followed, then Greg and Hazelton.
"Do you want to take a little walk down to the road, where we can get a better look at the sky?" Dick proposed to Reade. "We ought to take a squint at the weather." ”