"I say, stand a gallon o' beer afore you go."
"There's nobody cares for me but poor Mrs Dodley," I said to myself in
a choking voice, and then my pride gave me strength.
"Very well," I exclaimed aloud; "if they don't care, I don't, and I'm
glad I'm going, and I shall be very glad when I'm gone."
That was not true, for, as I went on, I saw this tree whose pears I had
picked, and that apple-tree whose beautiful rosy fruit I had put so
carefully into baskets. There were the plum-trees I had learned how to
prune and nail, and whose violet and golden fruit I had so often watched
ripening. That was where George Day had scrambled over, and I had hung
on to his legs, and there--No; I turned away from that path, for there
were the two brothers slowly walking along with the cats, looking at the
different crops, and I did not want to be seen then by one who was so
ready to throw me over, and by the other, who seemed so cold and hard,
and was, I felt, going to be a regular tyrant.
"And I'm all alone, and not even a cat to care about me," I said to
myself; and, weak and miserable, the tears came into my eyes as I
stopped in one of the cross paths.
I started, and dashed away a tear or two that made me feel like a girl,
for just then there was a rustle, and looking round, there was one of
Old Brownsmith's cats coming along the path with curved back, and tail
drooped sidewise, and every hair upon it erect till it looked like a
drooping plume.
The cat suddenly rushed at me, stopped short, tore round me, and then
ran a little way, and crouched, as if about to make a spring upon me,
ending by walking up in a very stately way to rub himself against my
leg.
"Why, Ginger, old fellow," I said, "are you come to say good-bye?"
I don't think the cat understood me, but he looked up, blinked, and
uttered a pathetic kind of _mew_ that went to my heart, as I stooped
down and lifted him up in my arms to hug him to my breast, where he
nestled, purring loudly, and inserting his claws gently into my jacket,
and tearing them out, as if the act was satisfactory.
He was an ugly great sandy Tom, with stripes down his sides, but he
seemed to me just then to be the handsomest cat I had ever seen, and the
best friend I had in the world, and I made a vow that I would ask Old
Brownsmith to let me have him to take with me, if his brother would
allow me to include him in my belongings.
"Will you come with me, Ginger?" I said, stroking him. The cat purred
and went on, climbing up to my shoulder, where there was not much room
for him, but he set his fore-paws on my shoulder, drove them into my
jacket, and let his hind-legs go well down my back before he hooked on
there, crouching close to me, and seeming perfectly happy as I walked on
wondering where Ike was at work.
I found him at last, busy trenching some ground at the back of Shock's
kitchen, as I called the shed where he cooked his potatoes and snails.
As I came up to the old fellow he glanced at me surlily, stopped
digging, and began to scrape his big shining spade.
"Hullo!" he said gruffly; and the faint hope that he would be sorry died
away.
"Ike," I said, "I'm going away."
"What?" he shouted.
"I'm going to leave here," I said.
"Get out, you discontented warmint!" he cried savagely, "you don't know
when you're well off."
"Yes, I do," I said; "but Mr Brownsmith's going to send me away."
"What!" he roared, driving in his spade, and beginning to dig with all
his might.
"Mr Brownsmith's going to send me away."
"Old Brownsmith's going to send you away?"
"Yes."
"Why, what have you been a-doin' of?" he cried more fiercely than ever,
as he drove his spade into the earth.
"Nothing at all."
"He wouldn't send you away for doing nothing at all," cried Ike, giving
an obstinate clod that he had turned up a tremendous blow with his
spade, and turning it into soft mould.
"I'm to go to Hampton with Mr Brownsmith's brother," I said, "to learn
all about glass-houses."
"What, Old Brownsmith's brother Sol?"
"Yes," I said sadly, as I petted and caressed the cat.
"He's a tartar and a tyrant, that's what he is," said Ike fiercely, and
he drove in his spade as if he meant to reach Australia.
"But he understands glass," I said.
"Smash his glass!" growled Ike, digging away like a machine.
"I'm going to-day," I said after a pause, and with all a boy's longing
for a sympathetic word or two.
"Oh! are you?" he said sulkily.
"Yes, and I don't know when I shall get over here again."
"Course you don't," growled Ike, smashing another clod. I stood patting
the cat, hoping that Ike would stretch out his great rough hand to me to
say "Good-bye;" but he went on digging, as if he were very cross.
"I didn't know it till to-day, Ike," I said.
"Ho!" said Ike with a snap, and he bent down to chop an enormous
earthworm in two, but instead of doing so he gave it a flip with the
corner of his spade, and sent it flying up into a pear-tree, where I saw
it hanging across a twig till it writhed itself over, when, one end of
its long body being heavier than the other, it dropped back on to the
soft earth with a slight pat.
Still Ike did not speak, and all at once I heard Old Brownsmith's voice
calling.
"I must go now, Ike," I said, "I'll come back and say `Good-bye.'"
"And after the way as I've tried to make a man of yer," he said as if
talking to his mother earth, which he was chopping so remorselessly.
"It isn't my fault, Ike," I said. "I'll come over and see you again as
soon as I can."
"Who said it war your fault?"
"No one, Ike," I said humbly. "Don't be cross with me."
"Who is cross with yer?" cried Ike, cleaning his spade.
"You seemed to be."
"Hah!"
"I will come and see you again as soon as I can," I repeated.
"Nobody don't want you," he growled.
"Grant!"
"Coming, sir," I shouted back, and then I turned to Ike, who dug away as
hard as ever he could, without looking at me, and with a sigh I hurried
off, feeling that I must have been behaving very ungratefully to him.
Then there was a sense as of resentment as I thought of how calmly
everybody seemed to take my departure, making me think that I had done
nothing to win people's liking, and that I must be a very unpleasant,
disagreeable kind of lad, since, with the exception of Mrs Dodley and
the cat, nobody seemed to care whether I went away or stayed.