Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished - Robert Michael Ballantyne (best ebook reader txt) 📗

of hearing, but took it as good on credit, for she immediately turned to her son, put her hand to her right ear, and asked what Susy said.

In thunderous tones the joke was repeated, and the old lady almost went into fits over it, insomuch that Bob and Tim regarded her with a spice of anxiety mingled with their amusement, while little Martha looked at her in solemn wonder.

Twelve months' experience had done much to increase Martha's love for the old lady, but it had done nothing to reduce her surprise; for Martha, as yet, did not understand a joke. This, of itself, formed a subject of intense amusement to old Mrs Merryboy, who certainly made the most of circumstances, if ever woman did.

"Have some more fish, Bob," said Mrs Merryboy, junior.

Bob accepted more, gratefully. So did Tim, with alacrity.

"What sort of a home had you in London, Tim?" asked Mrs Merryboy.

"Well, ma'am, I hadn't no home at all."

"No home at all, boy; what do you mean? You must have lived somewhere."

"Oh yes, ma'am, I always lived somewheres, but it wasn't nowheres in partikler. You see I'd neither father nor mother, an' though a good old 'ooman did take me in, she couldn't purvide a bed or blankets, an' her 'ome was stuffy, so I preferred to live in the streets, an' sleep of a night w'en I couldn't pay for a lodgin', in empty casks and under wegitable carts in Covent Garden Market, or in empty sugar 'ogsheads. I liked the 'ogsheads best w'en I was 'ungry, an' that was most always, 'cause I could sometimes pick a little sugar that was left in the cracks an' 'oles, w'en they 'adn't bin cleaned out a'ready. Also I slep' under railway-arches, and on door-steps. But sometimes I 'ad raither disturbed nights, 'cause the coppers wouldn't let a feller sleep in sitch places if they could 'elp it."

"Who are the `coppers?'" asked the good lady of the house, who listened in wonder to Tim's narration.

"The coppers, ma'am, the--the--pl'eece."

"Oh! the police?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Where in the world did they expect you to sleep?" asked Mrs Merryboy with some indignation.

"That's best known to themselves, ma'am," returned Tim; "p'raps we might 'ave bin allowed to sleep on the Thames, if we'd 'ad a mind to, or on the hatmosphere, but never 'avin' tried it on, I can't say."

"Did you lead the same sort of life, Bob?" asked the farmer, who had by that time appeased his appetite.

"Pretty much so, sir," replied Bobby, "though I wasn't quite so 'ard up as Tim, havin' both a father and mother as well as a 'ome. But they was costly possessions, so I was forced to give 'em up."

"What! you don't mean that you forsook them?" said Mr Merryboy with a touch of severity.

"No, sir, but father forsook me and the rest of us, by gettin' into the Stone Jug--wery much agin' my earnest advice,--an' mother an' sister both thought it was best for me to come out here."

The two waifs, being thus encouraged, came out with their experiences pretty freely, and made such a number of surprising revelations, that the worthy backwoodsman and his wife were lost in astonishment, to the obvious advantage of old Mrs Merryboy, who, regarding the varying expressions of face around her as the result of a series of excellent jokes, went into a state of chronic laughter of a mild type.

"Have some more bread and butter, and tea, Bob and some more sausage," said Mrs Merryboy, under a sudden impulse.

Bob declined. Yes, that London street-arab absolutely declined food! So did Tim Lumpy!

"Now, my lads, are you quite sure," said Mr Merryboy, "that you've had enough to eat?"

They both protested, with some regret, that they had.

"You couldn't eat another bite if you was to try, could you?"

"Vell, sir," said Bob, with a spice of the `old country' insolence strong upon him, "there's no sayin' what might be accomplished with a heffort, but the consikences, you know, might be serious."

The farmer received this with a thunderous guffaw, and, bidding the boys follow him, went out.

He took them round the farm buildings, commenting on and explaining everything, showed them cattle and horses, pigs and poultry, barns and stables, and then asked them how they thought they'd like to work there.

"Uncommon!" was Bobby Frog's prompt reply, delivered with emphasis.

"Fust rate!" was Tim Lumpy's sympathetic sentiment.

"Well, then, the sooner we begin the better. D'you see that lot of cord-wood lying tumbled about in the yard, Bob?"

"Yes, sir."

"You go to work on it, then, and pile it up against that fence, same as you see this one done. An' let's see how neatly you'll do it. Don't hurry. What we want in Canada is not so much to see work done quickly as done well."

Taking Tim to another part of the farm, he set him to remove a huge heap of stones with a barrow and shovel, and, leaving them, returned to the house.

Both boys set to work with a will. It was to them the beginning of life; they felt that, and were the more anxious to do well in consequence. Remembering the farmer's caution, they did not hurry, but Tim built a cone of stones with the care and artistic exactitude of an architect, while Bobby piled his billets of wood with as much regard to symmetrical proportion as was possible in the circumstances.

About noon they became hungry, but hunger was an old foe whom they had been well trained to defy, so they worked on utterly regardless of him.

Thereafter a welcome sound was heard--the dinner-bell!

Having been told to come in on hearing it, they left work at once, ran to the pump, washed themselves, and appeared in the dining-room looking hot, but bright and jovial, for nothing brightens the human countenance so much, (by gladdening the heart), as the consciousness of having performed duty well.

From the first this worthy couple, who were childless, received the boys into their home as sons, and on all occasions treated them as such. Martha Mild, (her surname was derived from her character), had been similarly received and treated.

"Well, lads," said the farmer as they commenced the meal--which was a second edition of breakfast, tea included, but with more meat and vegetables--"how did you find the work? pretty hard--eh?"

"Oh! no, sir, nothink of the kind," said Bobby, who was resolved to show a disposition to work like a man and think nothing of it.

"Ah, good. I'll find you some harder work after dinner."

Bobby blamed himself for having been so prompt in reply.

"The end of this month, too, I'll have you both sent to school," continued the farmer with a look of hearty good-will, that Tim thought would have harmonised better with a promise to give them jam-tart and cream. "It's vacation time just now, and the schoolmaster's away for a holiday. When he comes back you'll have to cultivate mind as well as soil, my boys, for I've come under an obligation to look after your education, and even if I hadn't, I'd do it to satisfy my own conscience."

The _couleur-de-rose_ with which Bob and Tim had begun to invest their future faded perceptibly on hearing this. The viands, however, were so good that it did not disturb them very much. They ate away heartily, and in silence. Little Martha was not less diligent, for she had been busy all the morning in the dairy and kitchen, playing, rather than working, at domestic concerns, yet in her play doing much real work, and acquiring useful knowledge, as well as an appetite.

After dinner the farmer rose at once. He was one of those who find it unnecessary either to drink or smoke after meals. Indeed, strong drink and tobacco were unknown in his house, and, curiously enough, nobody seemed to be a whit the worse for their absence. There were some people, indeed, who even went the length of asserting that they were all the better for their absence!

"Now for the hard work I promised you, boys; come along."


CHAPTER TWENTY.


OCCUPATIONS AT BRANKLY FARM.

The farmer led our two boys through a deliciously scented pine-wood at the rear of his house, to a valley which seemed to extend and widen out into a multitude of lesser valleys and clumps of woodland, where lakelets and rivulets and waterfalls glittered in the afternoon sun like shields and bands of burnished silver.

Taking a ball of twine from one of his capacious pockets, he gave it to Bobby along with a small pocket-book.

"Have you got clasp-knives?" he asked.

"Yes, sir," said both boys, at once producing instruments which were very much the worse for wear.

"Very well, now, here is the work I want you to do for me this afternoon. D'you see the creek down in the hollow yonder--about half a mile off?"

"Yes, yes, sir."

"Well, go down there and cut two sticks about ten feet long each; tie strings to the small ends of them; fix hooks that you'll find in that pocket-book to the lines. The creek below the fall is swarming with fish; you'll find grasshoppers and worms enough for bait if you choose to look for 'em. Go, and see what you can do."

A reminiscence of ancient times induced Bobby Frog to say "Walke-e-r!" to himself, but he had too much wisdom to say it aloud. He did, however, venture modestly to remark--

"I knows nothink about fishin', sir. Never cotched so much as a eel in--"

"When I give you orders, _obey_ them!" interrupted the farmer, in a tone and with a look that sent Bobby and Tim to the right-about double-quick. They did not even venture to look back until they reached the pool pointed out, and when they did look back Mr Merryboy had disappeared.

"Vell, I say," began Bobby, but Tim interrupted him with, "Now, Bob, you _must_ git off that 'abit you've got o' puttin' v's for double-u's. Wasn't we told by the genl'm'n that gave us a partin' had-dress that we'd never git on in the noo world if we didn't mind our p's and q's? An' here you are as regardless of your v's as if they'd no connection wi' the alphabet."

"Pretty cove _you_ are, to find fault wi' _me_," retorted Bob, "w'en you're far wuss wi' your haitches--a-droppin' of 'em w'en you shouldn't ought to, an' stickin' of 'em in where you oughtn't should to. Go along an' cut your stick, as master told you."

The sticks were cut, pieces of string were measured off, and hooks attached thereto. Then grasshoppers were caught, impaled, and dropped into a pool. The immediate result was almost electrifying to lads who had never caught even a minnow before. Bobby's hook had barely sunk when it was seized and run away with so forcibly as to draw a tremendous "Hi! hallo!! ho!!! I've got 'im!!!" from the fisher.

"Hoy! hurroo!!" responded Tim, "so've I!!!"

Both boys, blazing with excitement, held on.

The fish, bursting, apparently, with even greater excitement, rushed off.

"He'll smash my stick!" cried Bob.

"The twine's sure to go!" cried