!Tention Part 13

"An officer is a soldier, Punch."

"Of course he is. Oh, well, I don't wonder you didn't want to be fetched away. Learning to be an officer, eh? That's fine. Didn't your uncle want you to be a soldier, then?"

"No. He wanted me to go as a private pupil with a lawyer."

"What, and get to be a lawyer?" cried the boy excitedly. "Oh, I say, you weren't going to stand that?"

"No, Punch. Perhaps I should have obeyed him, only I knew that it had always been my father's wish that I should go into the army, and he had left the money for my education and to buy a commission when I left the military school."

"Here, I know," cried the boy excitedly; "you needn't tell me no more.

I heard a story once about a wicked uncle. I know--your one bought the commission and kept it for himself."

"No, Punch; that wouldn't work out right. When I begged him to let me stay at the military school he mocked at me, and laughed, and said that my poor father must have been mad to think of throwing away money like that; and over and over again he insisted that I should go on with my studies of the law, and give up all notion of wearing a red coat, for he could see that that was all I thought about."

"Well?" said the boy.

"Well, Punch?"

"And then you punched his head, and ran away from home."

"No, I did not."

"Then you ought to have done. I would if anybody said my poor father was mad; and, besides, your uncle must have been a bad un to want to make you a lawyer. I suppose he was a lawyer too."

"Yes."

"There, if I didn't think so! But he must have been a bad un. Said you wanted to be a soldier so as to wear the uniform? Well, if you did want to, that's only nat'ral. A soldier's always proud of his uniform. I heard our colonel say that it was the king's livery and something to be proud on. I am proud of mine, even if it has got a bit raggy-taggy with sleeping out in it in all sorts of weather, and roos.h.i.+ng through bushes and mud, and crossing streams. But soldiers don't think of that sort of thing, and we shall all have new things served out by-and-by. Well, go on."

"Oh, that's about all, Punch."

"You get on. I know better. Tain't half all. I want you to come to the cutting off and taking the s.h.i.+lling."

"Oh, you want to hear that?"

"Why, of course I do. Why, it's all the juicy part. Don't hang fire.

Let's have it with a rush now. Fix bayonets, and at them!"

"Why, Punch," said Pen, laughing, "don't you tell me again that you are not getting better!"

"I waren't going to now. This warms a fellow up a bit. I say, your uncle is a bad un, and no mistake. There, forward!"

"But I have nearly told all, Punch. Life got so miserable at home, and I was so sick of the law, that I led such a life with my uncle through begging him to let me go back to the school, that he, one day--"

"Well, whatcher stopping for?" cried the boy, whose cheeks were flushed and eyes sparkling with excitement.

"I don't like talking about it," replied Pen. "I suppose I was wrong, for my father had left all the management of my affairs in his brother-in-law's hands."

"Why, you said your uncle's hands just now!"

"Yes, Punch; in my mother's brother's hands, so he was my uncle."

"Well, go on."

"And I had been begging him to alter his plans."

"Yes, and let you go back to the school?"

"And I suppose he was tired out with what he called my obstinacy, and he told me that if ever I dared to mention the army again he would give me a sound flogging."

"And you up and said you would like to catch him at it?" cried Punch excitedly. "No, Punch; but I lost my temper."

"Enough to make you! Then you knocked him down?"

"No, Punch, but I told him he was forgetting the commands my father had given him, and that I would never go to the lawyer's office again."

"Well, and what then?"

"Then, Punch? Oh, I don't like to talk about it. It makes me feel hot all over even to think."

"Of course it does. It makes me hot too; but then, you see, I'm weak.

But do go on. What happened then?"

"He knocked me down," said the lad hoa.r.s.ely.

"Oh!" cried the boy, trying to spring up from his rough couch, but sinking back with the great beads of perspiration standing upon his brown forehead. "Don't you tell me you stood that!"

"No, Punch; I couldn't. That night I went right away from home, just as I stood, made my way to London, and the next day I went to King Street, Westminster, and saw where the recruiting sergeants were marching up and down."

"I know," cried the boy, "with their canes under their arms and their colours flying."

"Yes, Punch, and I picked out the one in the new regiment, the --th Rifles."

"Yes," cried Punch, "the Rifle green with the red collars and cuffs."

Pen, half-excited by his recollections, half-amused at the boy's intense interest, nodded again.

"And took the king's s.h.i.+lling," cried Punch; "and I know, but I want you to tell me--you joined ours just to show that uncle that you wanted to serve the king, and not for the sake of the scarlet coat."

"Yes, Punch, that was why; and that's all."

CHAPTER NINE.

HOW TO TREAT AN ENEMY.

"Well, but is that all?" said Punch.