Читать книгу Wrecked in Port. A Novel онлайн

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It was a sad blow to Walter Joyce, and almost as sharp a one to James Ashurst. The two men--Walter was a man now--grieved together over the overturned hopes and the extinguished ambition. It was impossible for Walter to attempt to go to college just then. There was no scholarship vacant, and if there had been, the amount to be won might probably have been insufficient even for this modest youth. There was no help for it; he must give up the idea. What, then, was he to do? Mr. Ashurst answered that in his usual impulsive way. Walter should become under master in the school. The number of boys had increased immensely. There was more work than he and Dr. Breitmann could manage; oh yes, he was sure of it--he had thought so a long time; and Walter should become third classical master, with a salary of sixty pounds a year, and board and lodging in Mr. Ashurst's house. It was a rash and wild suggestion, just likely to emanate from such a man as James Ashurst. The number of boys had increased, and Mr. Ashurst's energy had decreased; but there was Dr. Breitmann, a kindly, well-read, well-educated doctor of philosophy, from Leipzig; a fine classical scholar, though he pronounced "amo" as "ahmo," and "Dido" as "Taito," a gentleman, though his clothes were threadbare, and he only ate meat once a week, and sometimes not then unless he were asked out, and a disciplinarian, though he smoked like a limekiln; a habit which in the Helmingham schoolboys' eyes proclaimed the confirmed debauchee of the Giovanni or man-about-town type. Welter Joyce had been a favourite pupil of the doctor's, and was welcomed as a colleague by his old tutor with the utmost warmth. It was understood that his engagement was only temporary; he would soon have enough money to enable him, with a scholarship, to astonish the University, and then---- Meanwhile Mr. Ashurst and all around repeated that his talents were marvellous, and his future success indisputable.