The big boy makes a face. He does not fancy this idea at all; it is like being a nursemaid, and he thinks how silly he will look with two wee children. And all the other boys are grinning; but he cannot refuse. He is like a soldier, and must do just what he is told. So off he goes and asks for the children. But when he finds he can take them up in a cab, and that they are dear, bright, happy little things, full of mischief, he begins to enjoy himself, and they spend a lovely afternoon together; and when he brings them back safely, and the mother gives him half a crown for himself in addition to his fee, he feels he has had a good day.
Some time elapses when he has left the office before smart little No. 3 gets anything to do, and then he is told to go to King's Cross Station to meet two schoolboys and see their luggage is safe, and take them across to Charing Cross. When he gets there he finds both the boys are bigger than himself, but they are country boys going to school for the first time, and are very frightened and bewildered, and little No. 3 cheers them up, so that they part quite good friends.
But these are a few of the odd things the boys have to do, and most of their time is spent in taking notes about. You can see them anywhere in London in their neat dark-blue uniforms with silver decorations. Once a gentleman walked into one of the Messenger Boy offices, and said quietly, as if he were saying nothing extraordinary, 'I want a boy to take a note for me to America.'
The man in charge showed no surprise, but only asked when the boy was to start. The gentleman said he might go the next day, which would give him time to get his clothes together.
The boy who was next on the list was called Jaggers, and he was a bright, intelligent little lad. He ran home eagerly to ask if his parents would let him go, and having got permission, he went off cheerfully the next day across the Atlantic Ocean to New York. He arrived safely and delivered his message, and then went on to Chicago and Philadelphia, as he had been instructed. He returned in eighteen days, having travelled 8,000 miles, and he found he was quite a hero, and the man who had sent him gave him a medal with a clasp or bar of silver for each place he had gone to. I think many a boy might have been frightened when told to go off to the other side of the world so suddenly.