Harding's Luck Part 18

d.i.c.kie laughed. p.a.w.ning the rattle seemed suddenly to have become a very old and good joke between them.

"Look 'ere, mister," he said; "that c.h.i.n.k wot you lent me to get to Gravesend with." He paused, and added in his other voice, "It was very good of you, sir."

"I'm not going to lend you any more, if that's what you're after," said the Jew, who had already reproached himself for his confiding generosity.

"It's not that I'm after," said d.i.c.kie, with dignity. "I wish to repay you."

"Got the money?" said the Jew, laughing not unkindly.

"No," said d.i.c.kie; "but I've got this." He handed the little box across the counter.

"Where'd you get it?"

"I made it."

The p.a.w.nbroker laughed again. "Well, well, I'll ask no questions and you'll tell me no lies, eh?"

"I shall certainly tell you no lies," said d.i.c.kie, with the dignity of the dream boy who was not a cripple and was heir to a great and gentle name; "will you take it instead of the money?"

The p.a.w.nbroker turned the box over in his hands, while kindness and honesty struggled fiercely within him against the habits of a business life. d.i.c.kie eyed the china vases and concertinas and teaspoons tied together in fan shape, and waited silently.

"It's worth more than what I lent you," the man said at last with an effort; "and it isn't every one who would own that, mind you."

"I know it isn't," said d.i.c.kie; "will you please take it to pay my debt to you, and if it is worth more, accept it as a grateful gift from one who is still gratefully your debtor."

"You'd make your fortune on the halls," said the man, as Beale had said; "the way you talk beats everything. All serene. I'll take the box in full discharge of your debt. But you might as well tell me where you got it."

"I made it," said d.i.c.kie, and put his lips together very tightly.

"You did--did you? Then I'll tell you what. I'll give you four bob for every one of them you make and bring to me. You might do different coats of arms--see?"

"I was only taught to do one," said d.i.c.kie.

Just then a customer came in--a woman with her Sunday dress and a pair of sheets to p.a.w.n because her man was out of work and the children were hungry.

"Run along, now," said the Jew, "I've nothing more for you to-day."

d.i.c.kie flushed and went.

Three days later the crutch clattered in at the p.a.w.nbroker's door, and d.i.c.kie laid two more little boxes on the counter.

"Here you are," he said. The p.a.w.nbroker looked and exclaimed and questioned and wondered, and d.i.c.kie went away with eight silver s.h.i.+llings in his pocket, the first coins he had ever carried in his life. They seemed to have been coined in some fairy mint; they were so different from any other money he had ever handled.

Mr. Beale, waiting for him by New Cross Station, put his empty pipe in his pocket and strolled down to meet him. d.i.c.kie drew him down a side street and held out the silver. "Two days' work," he said. "We ain't no call to take the road 'cept for a pleasure trip. I got a trade, I 'ave.

'Ow much a week's four bob a day? Twenty-four bob I make it."

"Lor!" said Mr. Beale, with his mouth open.

"Now I tell you what, you get 'old of some more old sofy legs and a stone and a strap to sharpen my knife with. And there we are.

Twenty-four s.h.i.+llings a week for a chap an' 'is nipper ain't so dusty, farver, is it? I've thought it all up and settled it all out. So long as the weather holds we'll sleep in the bed with the green curtains, and I'll 'ave a green wood for my workshop, and when the nights get cold we'll rent a room of our very own and live like toffs, won't us?"

The child's eyes were s.h.i.+ning with excitement.

"'Pon my sam, I believe you _like_ work," said Mr. Beale in tones of intense astonishment.

"I like it better'n cadgin'," said d.i.c.kie.

They did as d.i.c.kie had said, and for two days Mr. Beale was content to eat and doze and wake and watch d.i.c.kie's busy fingers and eat and doze again. But on the third day he announced that he was getting the fidgets in his legs.

"I must do a prowl," he said; "I'll be back afore sundown. Don't you forget to eat your dinner when the sun comes level the top of that high tree. So long, matey."

Mr. Beale slouched off in the suns.h.i.+ne in his filthy old clothes, and d.i.c.kie was left to work alone in the green and golden wood. It was very still. d.i.c.kie hardly moved at all, and the chips that fell from his work fell more softly than the twigs and acorns that dropped now and then from some high bough. A goldfinch swung on a swaying hazel branch and looked at him with bright eyes, unafraid; a gra.s.s snake slid swiftly by--it was out on particular business of its own, so it was not afraid of d.i.c.kie nor he of it. A wood-pigeon swept rustling wings across the glade where he sat, and once a squirrel ran right along a bough to look down at him and chatter, thickening its tail as a cat does hers when she is angry.

It was a long and very beautiful day, the first that d.i.c.kie had ever spent alone. He worked harder than ever, and when by the lessening light it was impossible to work any longer, he lay back against a tree root to rest his tired back and to gloat over the thought that he had made two boxes in one day--eight s.h.i.+llings--in one single day, eight splendid s.h.i.+llings.

The sun was quite down before Mr. Beale returned. He looked unnaturally fat, and as he sat down on the moss something inside the front of his jacket moved and whined.

"Oh! what is it?" d.i.c.kie asked, sitting up, alert in a moment; "not a dawg? Oh! farver, you don't know how I've always wanted a dawg."

"Well, you've a-got yer want now, three times over, you 'ave," said Beale, and, unb.u.t.toning his jacket, took out a double handful of soft, fluffy sprawling arms and legs and heads and tails--three little fat, white puppies.

"Oh, the jolly little beasts!" said d.i.c.kie; "ain't they fine? Where did you get them?"

"They was give me," said Mr. Beale, re-knotting his handkerchief, "by a lady in the country."

He fixed his eyes on the soft blue of the darkening sky.

"Try another," said d.i.c.kie calmly.

"Ah! it ain't no use trying to deceive the nipper--that sharp he is,"

said Beale, with a mixture of pride and confusion. "Well, then, not to deceive you, mate, I bought 'em."

"What with?" said d.i.c.kie, lightning quick.

"With--with money, mate--with money, of course."

"How'd you get it?"

No answer.

"You didn't pinch it?"

"No--on my sacred sam, I didn't," said Beale eagerly; "pinching leads to trouble. I've 'ad my lesson."

"You cadged it, then?" said d.i.c.kie.

"Well," said Beale sheepishly, "what if I did?"

"You've spoiled everything," said d.i.c.kie, furious, and he flung the two newly finished boxes violently to the ground, and sat frowning with eyes downcast.