Page:Ballantyne--The Battery and the Boiler.djvu/55

 He was perched on the top of a three-legged stool, and, from the slow and intensely earnest manner in which his head turned from side to side as he wrote, it was quite evident that he dotted all his is, and stroked all his ts with conscientious care. As he sat there—a sturdy little broad-shouldered fellow, so deeply engrossed with his work that he was oblivious of all around—he seemed the very beau-idéal of a painstaking, hard-working clerk. So deeply was he engrossed in his subject—the copying of an invoice—that he failed to hear the voice of his fellow-clerk, although the end of the speaking-tube was not far from where he sat. After listening a few seconds at the other end of the tube, Bob Sime repeated the summons with such vigour that Robin leaped from his stool as though he had received one of his favourite electric shocks. A minute later he stood in the presence of the Head of the House.

"Robert Wright," said the Head, pushing his spectacles up on his brow, "I shall be sorry to lose your services, but—"

He paused and turned over the papers before him, as if searching for something, and Robin's heart sank. Was he going to be dismissed? Had he done anything wrong, or had he unwittingly neglected some duty?

"Ah! here it is," resumed Mr. Lowstoft, "a letter