He disdainfully rejected an offer from his aunt to help him
in the French and arithmetic which had become imminent, while of the
first he knew much less than Babie, and of the latter only as much as
would serve to prevent his being daily "kept in."
One chilly autumn afternoon, Armine was seen, even by the unobservant
under-master, to be shivering violently, and his teeth chattering so
that he could not speak plainly.
"You ought to be at home," said Mr. Perkins. "Here, you, Brownlow
maximus, just see him home, and tell his mother that he should be
seen to."
"I can go alone," Armine tried to say; but Mr. Perkins thought the
head-master could not say he neglected one who was felt to be a
favoured scholar if he sent his cousin with him.
So presently Armine was pushed in at the back door, with these words
from Rob to the cook—-"Look here, he's been and got cold, or
something."
Rob then disappeared, and Armine struggled in to the kitchen fire,
white, sobbing and panting, and, as the compassionate maids
discovered, drenched from head to foot, his hair soaked, his boots
squishing with water. His mother and sisters were out, and as cook
administered the hottest draught she could compound, and Emma tugged
at his jacket, they indignantly demanded what he had been doing to
himself.
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