“I couldn’t, by myself. Besides, my back hasn’t been well. Did they tell you?”
George was so naturally serious that Edwin decided to be serious too.
“I did hear something about it,” he replied, with the grave confidential tone that he would have used to a man of his own age. This treatment was evidently appreciated by George, and always afterwards Edwin conversed with him as with an equal, forbearing from facetiousness.
Damp though it was, Edwin twisted himself round and sat on the wall next to the crocks, and bent over the boy beneath, who gazed with upturned face.
“Why didn’t you ask Auntie Janet to bring you?”
“I don’t generally ask for things that I really want,” said the boy, with a peculiar glance.
“I see,” said Edwin, with an air of comprehension. He did not, however, comprehend. He only felt that the boy was wonderful. Imagine the boy saying that! He bent lower. “Come on up,” he said. “I’ll give you a hand. Stick your feet into that nick there.”
Two.
In an instant George was standing on the wall, light as fluff. Edwin held him by the legs, and his hand was on Edwin’s cap. The feel of the boy was delightful; he was so lithe and so yielding, and yet firm; and his glance was so trustful and admiring. “Rough!” thought Edwin, remembering Maggie’s adjective. “He isn’t a bit rough! Unruly? Well, I dare say he can be unruly if he cares to be. It all depends how you handle him.” Thus Edwin reflected in the pride of conquest, holding close to the boy, and savouring intimately his charm. Even the boy’s slightness attracted him. Difficult to believe that he was nine years old! His body was indeed backward. So too, it appeared, was his education. And yet was there not the wisdom of centuries in, “I don’t generally ask for things that I really want?”