“Strange!” cried Nicholas, “can this be some lingering creation of the visions that have scarcely left me?  It cannot be real—­and yet I—­I am awake!  Smike!”

The form moved, rose, advanced, and dropped upon its knees at his feet.  It was Smike indeed.

“Why do you kneel to me?” said Nicholas, hastily raising him.

“To go with you—­anywhere—­everywhere—­to the world’s end—­to the churchyard grave,” replied Smike, clinging to his hand.  “Let me, oh, do let me.  You are my home—­my kind friend—­take me with you, pray.”

I am a friend who can do “little for you,” said Nicholas, kindly.  “How came you here?”

He had followed him, it seemed; had never lost sight of him all the way; had watched while he slept, and when he halted for refreshment; and had feared to appear before, lest he should be sent back.  He had not intended to appear now, but Nicholas had awakened more suddenly than he looked for, and he had had no time to conceal himself.

“Poor fellow!” said Nicholas, “your hard fate denies you any friend but one, and he is nearly as poor and helpless as yourself.”

“May I—­may I go with you?” asked Smike timidly.  “I will be your faithful hard-working servant, I will, indeed.  I want no clothes,” added the poor creature, drawing his rags together; “these will do very well.  I only want to be near you.”

“And you shall!” cried Nicholas.  “The world shall deal by you as it does by me, till one or both of us shall quit it for a better.  Come!”

With these words, he strapped his burden on his shoulders, and, taking his stick in one hand, extended the other to his delighted charge; and so they passed out of the old barn together, out from the nightmare of life at Dotheboys Hall, into the busy world outside.

* * * * *

Some years later, when Mr. Squeers was making one of his customary semi-annual visits to London, he was arrested and sent to jail by persons who had discovered his system of fraud and cruelty, as well as the fact that he had in his possession a stolen will.  Upon John Browdie, a burly Scotchman, devolved the duty of carrying the painful news to Mrs. Squeers, and of dismissing the school.

So, arriving at Dotheboys Hall, he tied his horse to a gate, and made his way to the schoolroom door, which he found locked on the inside.  A tremendous noise and riot arose from within, and, applying his eye to a convenient crevice in the wall, he did not remain long in ignorance of its meaning.

The news of Mr. Squeers’s downfall had reached Dotheboys; that was quite clear.  To all appearance, it had very recently become known to the young gentlemen; for rebellion had just broken out.