"What are you looking at, Master Daniel?" said Jenny.
"Nothing."
"Then what are you looking like that for? You didn't ought to."
Papa had sent Mark and Dank to the nursery in disgrace. Mark leaned
over the back of Jenny's chair and rocked her. His face was red but
tight; and as he rocked he smiled because of his punishment.
Dank lay on the floor on his stomach, his shoulders hunched, raised on
his elbows, his chin supported by his clenched fists. He was a dark
and white boy with dusty eyelashes and rough, doggy hair. He had
puckered up his mouth and made it small; under the scowl of his
twisted eyebrows he was looking at nothing.
"It's no worse for you than it is for Master Mark," said Jenny.
"_Isn't_ it? Tib was my dog. If he hadn't been my dog Papa wouldn't have
teased him, and Mamma wouldn't have sent him back to Aunt Charlotte, and
Aunt Charlotte wouldn't have let him be run over."
"Yes. But what did you say to your Papa?"
"I said I wish Tib _had_ bitten him. So I do. And Mark said it would
have served him jolly well right."
"So it would," said Mark.
Roddy had turned his back on them. Nobody was taking any notice of
him; so he sang aloud to himself the song he was forbidden to sing:
"John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave,
John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave--"
The song seemed to burst out of Roddy's beautiful white face; his pink
lips twirled and tilted; his golden curls bobbed and nodded to the tune.
"John Brown's body lies a-rotting in his grave,
As we go marching on!"
"When I grow up," said Dank, "I'll kill Papa for killing Tibby. I'll
bore holes in his face with Mark's gimlet. I'll cut pieces out of him.
I'll get the matches and set fire to his beard. I'll--I'll _hurt_ him."
"I don't think _I_ shall," said Mark. "But if I do I shan't kick up a
silly row about it first."
"It's all very well for you. You'd kick up a row if Tibby was your dog."
Mary had forgotten Tibby. Now she remembered.
"Where's Tibby? I want him."
"Tibby's dead," said Jenny.
"What's 'dead'?"
"Never you mind."
Roddy was singing:
"'And _from_ his nose and _to_ his chin
The worms crawled out and the worms crawled in'--
"_That's_ dead," said Roddy.