A Brace of Boys | Page 5

harm done him, when they ascribed to his delicate organization the fact that, at an age when love runs riot in all healthy blood, he could not see a balmoral without his cheeks rivaling the most vivid stripe in it. They flattered themselves that he would outgrow his bashfulness, but Daniel had no such hope, and frequently confided in me that he thought he should never marry at all.
About two hours after Billy's disappearance under his mother's convoy, the defender of the oppressed returned to my room bearing the dog under his arm. His cheeks shone with washing like a pair of waxy Spitzenbergs, and other indignities had been offered him to the extent of the brush and comb. He also had a whole jacket on.
"Well, Billy," said I, "what are you going to do with your dog?"
"I don't know what I'm going to do. I've a great mind to be a bad, disobedient boy with him, and not have my days long in the land which the Lord my God giveth me."
"O Billy!"
"I can't help it. They won't be long if I don't mind ma, she says; and she wants me to be mean, and put Crab out in the street to have Patsy catch him and tie coffee-pots to his tail. I--I--I--"
Here my small nephew dug his fist into his eye and looked down.
I told Billy to stop where he was, and went to intercede with Lu. She was persuaded to entertain the angels of magnanimity and heroism in the disguise of a young fighting character, and to accept my surety for the behavior of his dog. Billy and I also obtained permission to go out together and be gone the entire afternoon.
We put Crab on a comfortable bed of rags in an old shoe box, and then strolled, hand-in-hand, across that most delightful of New York breathing-places, Stuyvesant Square.
"Uncle Teddy!" exclaimed Billy with ardor; "I wish I could do something to show you how much I think of you for being so good to me. I don't know how. Would it make you happy if I was to learn a hymn for you--a smashing big hymn--six verses, long metre, and no grumbling?"
"No, Billy; you make me happy enough just by being a good boy."
"Oh, Uncle Teddy!" replied Billy decidedly, "I'm afraid I can't do it. I've tried so often and I always make such an awful mess of it."
"Perhaps you get discouraged too easily--"
"Well, if a savings-bank won't do it, there ain't any chance for a boy. I got father to get me a savings-bank once and began being good just as hard as ever I could for three cents a day. Every night I got 'em, I put 'em in reg'lar, and sometimes I'd keep being good three whole days running. That made a sight of money, I tell you. Then I'd do something, ma said, to kick my pail of milk over, and those nights I didn't get anything. I used to put in most of my marble and candy money, too."
"What were you going to do with it?"
"It was for an Objeck, Uncle Teddy. That's a kind of Indian, you know, that eats people and wants the gospel. That's what pa says, anyway; I didn't ever see one."
"Well, didn't that make you happy--to help the poor little heathen children?"
"Oh, does it, Uncle Teddy? They never got a cent of it. One time I was good so long I got scared. I was afraid I'd never want to fly my kite on a roof again or go anywhere where I oughtn't, or have any fun. I couldn't see any use of going and saving my money to send out to the Objecks if it was going to make good boys of 'em. It was awful hard for me to have to be a good boy, and it must be worse for them 'cause they ain't used to it. So when there wasn't anybody upstairs I went and shook a lot of pennies out of my chimney and bought ever so much taffy and marbles and popcorn. Was that awful mean, Uncle Teddy?"
The question involved such complications that I hesitated. Before I could decide what to answer Billy continued:
"Ma said it was robbing the heathen, and didn't I get it? I thought if it was robbing I'd have a cop after me."
"What's a 'cop'?"
"That's what the boys call a policeman, Uncle Teddy; and then I should be taken away and put in an awful black place underground, like Johnny Wilson when he broke Mrs. Perkins's window. I was scared, I tell you. But I didn't get anything worse than a whipping, and having my savings bank taken away from me with all that was left in it, I haven't tried to be good since, much."
We now