CHRIS AND HIS UNCLE.
If ever there was a case of hero-worship it was the worship by Chris of
his uncle. To the little beggar, Uncle Godfrey was the ideal of all that
was most manly, most noble, most heroic. To emulate him in every way was
his most ardent desire, and with this end in view he imitated him
whenever possible, to the smallest details.
When Uncle Godfrey was at home in the autumn, Chris's diminutive toy-gun
was, without fail, brought down to the gun-case in the hall, where it
lay in company with the more imposing weapons of his uncle. And when
these were cleaned, it was an understood thing that the toy-gun must be
cleaned likewise. To have omitted to do this would have drawn down upon
the offender the little beggar's deepest indignation.
I believe, too, that it was a real grief of heart to him that he was not
allowed to go out with his uncle in the autumn, and try the effect of
that same toy-gun upon the pheasants. He had often pleaded hard to be
permitted do so, having, I imagine, glorious visions of the bags they
would make between them; and the refusal of his request had been the
cause of many tears in the nursery. Not before his uncle! No, if there
was one thing more than another that troubled him, it was the fear of
looking like a baby in his uncle's presence. Uncle Godfrey might tease
him as much as he pleased,--and he was undeniably talented in this
respect,--but, close as were the tears to his eyes at other times,
before his hero Chris would never let them fall if he could help it.
Sometimes, when in the swing of a game, his uncle Godfrey was
unintentionally a little rough in word or deed, the little beggar, it is
true, would flush--crimsoning up to the roots of his fair hair. His
voice would falter, too, as if the tears were not far off, but he would
struggle manfully with them, and, as soon as he had recovered, return
again to the attack with fresh vigour. Indeed, so great was his
devotion to him, that he was never so happy as when by his side, and
with Chris in his vicinity, Uncle Godfrey found it a matter of no little
difficulty to give his attention elsewhere. This was observable one
morning when he was endeavouring to write his letters and enjoy a smoke
in peace--a state of affairs by no means to the little beggar's mind.
Drawing near, Chris took up his position straight in front of him, and
stared steadily at him without speaking. Presently Uncle Godfrey looked
up, and, meeting Chris's stedfast gaze, stared back in silence.
"I'm a policeman," at last remarked Chris, with a strenuous effort to
assume the manly tones of his uncle; his usual habit when talking to
him.
"Are you?" replied Uncle Godfrey, leaning back in his chair and giving
him a little kick. "Then be off, it's time you were on your beat."
"But you're a bad, wicked robber, and I've come to take you to prison,"
persisted Chris.
"Get along," said the writer laconically, blowing the smoke of his
cigarette into the face of the policeman, and returning to his letters.
Chris looked at him admiringly.
"I'm going to be a soldier like you, and smoke pipes and cigarettes, and
everything like you, Uncle Godfrey," he remarked. "When may I be a
soldier?"
"Not yet," was the reply. "We take them young, but they have to be out
of the nursery, my boy."
"When shall I be out of the nursery?" asked Chris, discontentedly.
"When you're in the army," his uncle said to tease him.
"But a man, a real soldier, said if I came to him, he would make me a
soldier," announced the little beggar.
"What man?" asked Uncle Godfrey.
"A man what is staying in Marston, with his father and his mother and
his brothers and his sisters," explained Chris. "A very tall, big
man--as tall as you; and he finds soldiers for the Queen, he told me."
"Oh, a recruiting-sergeant!" Uncle Godfrey said. "How did you come to
speak to him?"
"I saw him when I was standing outside the shop when Briggs was buying
some buns for tea, and when I asked him if he knowed you," said Chris,
all in a breath. "He had on such loverly clothes! Do you think if I go
to him he will make me a soldier for the Queen?" he asked.
"Of course," his uncle replied. "But I'll tell you what, you had better
learn to hold your gun properly, and not as you did the other day. If
you don't, you'll end by shooting the sergeant, and being put in
'chokee'."
"What is 'chokee'?" asked Chris, with wide-open eyes.
"Oh, prison! You'll be put into a cell, and have nothing to eat but
bread and cold water."
"How drefful!"
"Then go and get that little gun I bought you, and I'll show you how to
hold it as you should."
"Just like a real soldier?"
"Well, how else?
"Now, look here," said Uncle Godfrey, when Chris returned with the gun,
"didn't I tell you that it was very dangerous to hold a gun like that?
It's not sportsmanlike either. Do you hear?"
He spoke with some severity, for he was a young man who was very
thorough in all he did, whether work or play, and would tolerate no
carelessness.
"Not sports-man-like!" echoed Chris slowly, trying hard with his child's
voice to imitate Uncle Godfrey's manly tone.
"Then, as you hear, remember," his uncle said, authoritatively. "Now,
rest the gun against your right shoulder--you young duffer, that's your
left shoulder; I said your right. Shut your left eye, and aim at my
hand."
"Yes," said the little beggar, very proud of himself.
"Let's see; that's right," his uncle continued.
"Now, fire!... Not bad, only you should keep your arm steadier. It
wobbled about too much."
"It's very tired," Chris remarked.
Then he inquired: "Uncle Godfrey, may I shoot some wicked men?"
"Certainly, when you find them--and with that gun," he answered.
"Only in the legs," added Chris, "'cause it would be unkind to kill them
really, wouldn't it? But I may shoot their legs, so that they can be
caught, and can't run away; mayn't I?"
"As much as you like, I say, with that gun," his uncle replied, as he
resumed his neglected correspondence.
"I shall shoot a lot," Chris said, with satisfaction.
"Granny," he went on eagerly as he entered the hall, "I'm going to shoot
some wicked men. Uncle Godfrey says I may."
"With that gun," cried his uncle, without looking up from his writing.
"My darling!" Granny exclaimed, somewhat dismayed at this bloodthirsty
ambition. "But you should not wish to hurt anyone; no, no one at all."
"Only wicked men, and only in the legs, so they couldn't run away from
the people who catched them," he said comfortingly. "And I'm going to do
it with this gun Uncle Godfrey gave me. Isn't it a beufferfull gun?" he
went on proudly.
"Yes, yes, I saw it," she answered, taking it out of his hands. "A very
nice little gun indeed, my pet."
"Oh, my Granny, take care!" he cried suddenly, in a loud, warning voice.
"Why what is the matter?" asked the old lady starting, and in her alarm
almost dropping the gun as she spoke. "What is it?" she repeated in a
flurried manner, turning round vaguely as she spoke.
"You mustn't hold the gun like that, my Granny," Chris said more calmly,
but still gravely; "it's very dan-ger-rus, and it's not sport-man-like."
"Thank you, my darling," she said simply. "Granny will remember another
time."
"Shut up, Chris," said Uncle Godfrey laughing, "and don't talk
nonsense."
"Well, I want somebody to play with me," he said inconsequently, as he
returned to his Uncle's side. "I want someone to play with me very
badly."
"I can't," said Uncle Godfrey, in his usual decided manner. "I have to
finish my letters."
"Then, Miss Beggarley," he asked, with the air of one making the best of
an unpromising state of affairs, "will you tell me a story?"
"Not now, dear," I answered. "I am just turning the heel of this sock,
and I can't think of that and a story too."
"Not even Miss Beggarley can tell me a story!" said Chris, sitting down,
with a disconsolate expression, beside Jacky on the hearth-rug.
"Not even Miss Beggarley," I repeated laughing.
Chris, looking disappointed and injured, gave Jacky an irritable push,
which resulted in an angry growl.
There was a deep sigh from the little beggar. "No one plays with me
now," he said mournfully, "and Jacky growls. Naughty Jacky; I don't love
you."
"Naughty Chris; it's time for you to go back to the nursery," remarked
Uncle Godfrey half-smiling.
"Yes, my Chris; a few lessons, or a nice walk," Granny said,
persuasively. "Now, go, like my little pet."
In spite, however, of her gentle persuasions, Chris looked as if he
would like to protest, had he not lacked the courage to do so in the
presence of Uncle Godfrey. It was, therefore, slowly and unwillingly
that he went up the first flight of stairs, then sat on the landing and
looked at the back of Uncle Godfrey's head as he bent over his writing.
In a moment or two Briggs' voice was heard in the distance.
"Master Chris, where are you?"
"Here I am," he called back; "just here."
"What, not gone yet?" Uncle Godfrey said a little sharply, turning
round.
"Yes, I'm gone," answered the little beggar half-defiantly,
half-nervously, as he rose hastily from the landing and continued his
upward progress.
"What do you want, Briggs?" he called out.
"I want to know," she said, the sound of her voice coming nearer; "I
want to know if you can tell me where your hats are? It's time for you
to go out, and I've hunted for them everywhere, but not one can I find."
"Why, they're down there," Chris was heard to say in an aggrieved voice,
and as if she were asking a most unnecessary question. "They're all down
there."
"And where might down there be?" she asked, with some irritation.
"Why, on the table near the door, with Uncle Godfrey's hats," he
answered. "I'm always going to keep my hats there now," he added. "It's
only babies what has their hats in the nursery."
"Well, if this doesn't pass everything!" she was heard to exclaim
angrily. "And to think of me hunting for those very same hats for the
last quarter of an hour till I'm that tired. Your tricks, Master Chris,
are beyond bearing. You'll please come down with me this minute and
fetch those very same hats."
"I shall put them all back when we come home," Chris remarked
rebelliously, as he began to walk downstairs in company with the irate
Briggs.
"We'll see what we'll see,--and _you'll_ see. That's all I say," she
answered with some loftiness. "I have no mind to have things put out of
their proper place, and me have all this trouble given me."
After which oracular speech, and because she was approaching the last
flight of stairs leading into the hall, she reserved all further
expressions of indignation till she and Chris were once more on the
familiar ground of the nursery.
As for the little beggar, it was with many a furtive glance at Uncle
Godfrey, who was still writing, that he crossed the hall. He hoped to
escape without notice, and, looking mysteriously at Granny and myself,
walked by Briggs' side on tiptoe. But his pains were wasted.
"Yes, I know you're there," Uncle Godfrey said, without turning his
head, and relaxing into a smile. "What mischief have you been up to this
time?"
"I put my hats with your hats, 'cause I liked them to be with yours,
and I didn't want to be a baby and have my hats in the nursery,"
explained Chris, encouraged by something in his uncle's voice to run to
his side and lay his cheek affectionately on his coat-sleeve.
"Then, in future, just you keep your hats where you are told to," Uncle
Godfrey said, laughing. "Don't you be such an independent little
beggar."
"No," replied Chris obediently, relieved at receiving no severer
reprimand.
"And come and kiss your Granny," Granny said gently and caressingly, as
he passed her. "Do you love her very much?"
"Oh, yes, my Granny!" he answered somewhat thoughtlessly, as he obeyed
her directions. Then continued without pause: "I wanted to ask you--why
does Cook always make rice-puddings, and tapioca-puddings, and
sago-puddings for my dinner?"
"Because, my pet, I tell her to," she replied. "They are so wholesome,
so good for little boys; they make them grow big."
"But I don't mind about growing big," he answered. "I would rather have
roly-poly puddings for my dinner; roly-poly puddings what have lots of
jam inside."
"Now, how do you think I am to get on with my writing whilst you chatter
like this?" interrupted Uncle Godfrey. "Go upstairs, and don't keep
Briggs waiting like this."
By the little beggar's expression, it was evident that he did not
consider the merits of roly-poly pudding, as compared with those of its
less enticing rivals, had been by any means sufficiently discussed, and
that much yet remained to be said upon the subject. Nevertheless, his
uncle's order had the effect of restoring, for a time at least, peace
and quiet to the hall; for, as I have before intimated, the one person
whose word Chris never thought of disputing was Uncle Godfrey's.
I said that peace and quiet was restored _for a time only_, and I said
it advisedly. With the little beggar in the neighbourhood it was useless
to count on such a state of affairs continuing for more than a short
period. So it proved upon the present occasion.
Before a quarter of an hour had passed, his voice--unmistakably defiant,
not to say impertinent--fell upon our ears, as he and Briggs walked
along the gallery, that ran above, round the hall. It was Briggs whom we
heard first.
"Master Chris," she remarked severely, "I will not stand it."
Then the little beggar repeated in an irritating and rebellious-sounding
treble:
"I have a little nursie,
She is a little dear,
She runs about all day
Without a thought of fear.
I love my little nursie,
An' she loves me.
So my little nursie an' me
Both a-gree."
A pause followed, evidently intended by Briggs to convey her sense of
deep displeasure, and to overawe the offender. Without effect. In a
moment Chris's voice began again, from time to time choked with
laughter, and giving a little variety to his poetical effort by varying
the accent on different words:
"I _have_ a little nursie,
She _is_ a little dear,
She runs about all day
Without a _thought_ of fear.
I _love_ my little nursie,
An' she loves _me_.
_So_ my little nursie an' me
Both a-gree."
At this repetition of the offence Briggs could contain her wrath no
longer.
"If I'm to be ridiculed like this," she exclaimed angrily, yet without
altogether losing her habitual impressiveness of manner; "If I'm to be
ridiculed like this, I shall give warning and go. I cannot, and I will
not stand it."
A second pause, by which time they had reached the top of the stairs
leading into the hall, when Chris, forgetful that Uncle Godfrey was
within hearing, and unaware of the judgment about to descend on him,
started once more:
"I have a _little_ nur--"
"Wait a moment, young man," called out his uncle from the writing-table.
"What do you mean by being so disobedient? Come here."
"He has been going on like that for the last ten minutes," said Briggs
complainingly, when she and Chris reached the hall. "He's been that
aggravating."
"What nonsense are you talking?" Uncle Godfrey asked him severely,
beckoning Chris to come to him.
The little beggar looked at his uncle half-frightened, and did not at
once answer.
"What was it, my pet?" Granny said, gently and encouragingly.
"It was a piece of poetry I made up all by myself, all about Briggs," he
faltered out.
"A piece of impertinence, it strikes me," remarked Uncle Godfrey.
"Well, as you are so fond of poetry, as you call it, I'll make up a
piece about you," he said, whilst Granny glanced at the judge
pleadingly, as if to ask mercy for the offender.
"Wait a moment ... yes, I have it," Uncle Godfrey said presently. And
holding Chris at arm's-length, he repeated, imitating as he did so, his
childish voice and accents:
"I know a little beggar,
He is a little goose,
He runs about all day
Rampaging on the loose.
I think that little beggar,
Would be better for a slap;
If he isn't pretty sharp,
He'll get a nasty rap.
"How do you like that?" he asked, when he had finished.
He was smiling all the while in spite of his severe tone,--very often
the way with Uncle Godfrey. But Chris did not see that, and with his
little face scarlet, he stood still, struggling with his tears, unable
to reply.
His uncle looked at him and relented.
"There, go along with you," he said, laughing and rumpling the boy's
golden curls; "and don't you make yourself such a little nuisance."
The little beggar brightened up as he noted the altered tone, and Granny
appeared perceptibly relieved.
"Uncle Godfrey, do you know what?" he asked with a loud sniff and half a
sob. "What do you think?"
"What?" asked his uncle with some amusement.
"I'm going to be a soldier like you very soon," he said, nodding his
head.
"Well, you'll have to learn to be a little more obedient," his uncle
remarked with a laugh. "I'd soon find myself in a pretty position if I
disobeyed orders as you do. Be off, you young rascal, and look smart.
There is Briggs waiting for you by the door.
"What made him think of that jingle?" he continued, still laughing, to
Granny when Chris had gone. "It was a funny thing for a little chap of
his age."
"The darling has quite a turn for poetry; he has indeed," explained
Granny with pride. "He takes the greatest delight in repeating his
little poems, such as: 'I love little Pussy, her coat is so warm,' and
'Mary had a little lamb'. And the child says them so sweetly, so
prettily too!"