"Wouldn't that do?" he said.
"No, not at all. It wouldn't be real, and--"
"Hold your tongue. Here's Magglin."
"Morning, young gents," said the man coming up in his nasty, watchful,
furtive way, looking first behind him, and then dodging to right and
left to look behind us, to see if any one was coming.
"Morning.--Hi! look out! Keeper!" cried Mercer.
"Eh? Where? where?" whispered Magglin huskily.
"Down in the woods," cried Mercer laughingly. "Look at him, Burr; he
has been up to some games, or he wouldn't be so frightened."
"Get out!" growled the gipsy-looking fellow sourly. "Doctor don't teach
you to behave like that, I know."
"Nor the gardener don't teach you to try and cheat people with ferrets."
"Well, I like that," cried Magglin in an ill-used tone. "I sells you
for a mate of mine--"
"No, you didn't, it was for yourself, Magg."
"As good a farret as ever run along a hole."
"As bad a one as ever stopped in and wouldn't come out again."
"And you turn like that on a fellow."
"You're a cheat, Magg, and you took us in. That was your old ferret you
sold me, and I wish I'd never paid you a shilling."
"Nay, not you. It's a good farret, and you've only paid me four
shillin' out of them five."
"And I don't think I shall pay you any more."
"Nay, you must. Gents can't break their words."
"But they can break blackguards' heads, Magg."
"I ain't a blackguard, and I sold you the ferret fair and square. It
weren't my fault you let it run down a hole in the loft."
"When it proved directly that it was your old one, for there it stops."
"I shouldn't pay him the other shilling till he got it out, Tom," I
said.
"I don't mean to. How many times have you been to look for it, Magg?"
"How many times? I didn't count. Every morn when I come to work have I
gone down on my chestie in that there loft, watching o' them rat-holes."
"Yes, and you've never caught him. Four shillings did I pay you for
that ferret--"
"And a shillin' more to pay," said Magglin, grinning. "And only once
have I seen his nasty ugly little pink nose since, when he poked it out
of a hole and slipped back again.
"But then see how he must have kept down the rats," said the man.
"Bother the rats. I want my ferret." Mercer turned sharply round to
me.
"I say," he whispered, "he's a blackguard and a cheat. We wanted to
practise. Let's both pitch into him."
I naturally enough laughed at the idea, and, looking round at the under
gardener, I saw that he was watching us with his rat-like eyes.
"I say," he whispered, with an accompaniment of nods and winks, "I was
lying wait for you two."
"We're not rabbits, Magg," I said.
"Who said you was?" he cried, with a sharp look round behind him.
"Nor yet hares, Magg," cried Mercer.
"Now look ye here," said the fellow appealingly, "it's too bad on you
two chuckin' things in a man's face like that now. Ain't I always
getting a honest living? You talk like that, and somebody'll be
thinkin' I go porching."
"So you do," said Mercer.
"What, porch?"
"Yes. I know. Bob Hopley says so too."
"Only hark at him," cried Magglin, "talking like that! Why, Bob
Hopley's a chap as must do something to show for his wage, and he'd take
any man's character away. He hate me, he do."
"Yes, and you hate him, Magg," I said.
The fellow turned on me sharply, but a curiously ugly smile began to
make curves like parentheses at the corners of his lips, and he showed
his teeth directly after.
"Well, I ain't so very fond of him," he said. "But look here, there
ain't no harm in a rabbid, and I was looking out for you two to ast if
you'd like to meet me, just by accident like, somewheers down to this
side o' High Pines, where the sandhills is. There's a wonderful lot o'
rabbids there just now."
"Yes, but when?" cried Mercer. "I want a rabbit or two to skin and
stuff."
"And you'd gie me the rabbids to eat."
"Of course. When do you mean?"
"I thowt as to-night'd do, 'bout seven, when they're beginning to lope
about."
"And you'd shoot some with that little gun of yours?"
"Whisht! Who's got a gun? Nonsense!"
"Ah, we know," cried Mercer.
"But I mean farreting."
"Wouldn't do," said Mercer decisively. "Bob Hopley would be sure to
come."
"Nay, he's going to Hastings to-day, and won't be back till ten
o'clock."
"How do you know?"
"Little birds out in the woods tells me."
"Magpies, eh?" I said. "Oh, I know."
"Then we'll come," cried Mercer. "But, I say, let us each have a shot
with the little gun."
"Nay, I'm a gardener, and ain't got no guns. I meant farreting."
"But you know I've lost the ferret," cried Mercer. "You can't go
ferreting without ferrets."
Magglin was standing before us with a curious, furtive smile on his
face, and his hands deep down in his pockets, and as Mercer finished
speaking, he slowly raised one hand, so that we saw peering out over the
top of his jacket pocket the sharp buff hairy head of a ferret, and we
both uttered a cry of joy.
"Why, you've got one!" said Mercer. "Why--yes--it is. It's my ferret."
"Yes," said Magglin. "I nipped him this morning. He was out running
about the loft, and I got hold of him at once. He's eaten all the rats
he could catch, and he was out smelling about, and trying to get into
that old corn-bin, so as to have a feed on your stuffed things."
"Lucky he didn't," cried Mercer. "Oh, you are a good chap, and I'll
give you the other shilling as soon as I can."
"Ay, do, master, for that chap I knows wants it badly."
"Come along, and let's shut it up safely," said Mercer.
"S'pose you let me take care of him in the tool-shed. I'll put him
where he can't get out, and I shall have him ready when you come."
"Very well then," cried Mercer, "you keep him. At the High Pines, then,
at seven o'clock."
"That's it, sir," said Magglin, securing the ferret in his pocket.
"Ah, good morning," said a voice; and we two turned sharply, to find
that Mr Rebble and Mr Hasnip, who were out early for a constitutional,
had come up behind us quietly.
"Good morning, sir.--Good morning, sir," we said, and Magglin touched
his cap and went off down the garden.
"Very good, Mercer. Very good, Burr junior," said Mr Hasnip blandly,
as he brought his dark spectacles to bear upon us. "I like to see this,
and I wish the other boys would be as industrious, and get up these
lovely mornings. Been making plans with the gardener about your little
gardens, I see. That's right--that's right. But, as I was saying,
Rebble," he continued, turning away, "Galileo's opinion, when combined
with that of Kepler and Copernicus, is all buzz-buzz-buzz--"
So the latter part of his speech sounded to us, as they went on toward
the bottom of the garden.
"All buzz buzz buzz," whispered Mercer; "and that's what lots of others
of those old folks' opinions sound like to me--all buzz buzz buzz in my
poor head. I say, wasn't it lucky they didn't see the ferret?"
"They think we were speaking to him about gardening."
"Yes. What a game! We must go down to our gardens now, and pretend we
got up early to work."
"I shan't," I said shortly. "I hate being so deceptive, and I wish you
wouldn't be, Tom."
"Well, it don't sound nice, does it?" he replied thoughtfully. "But
it's so easy."
"Perhaps we had better not go after the rabbits."
"Oh, but we must now. Don't you sneak back. I shall go, and nobody
will know."