No pop ensued. Larkins, enjoying the detection, put his hands on his knees and looked wickedly up in the old man’s face to see what was coming.
“Bless me! it is a little flat. I wonder how that happened? I’ll be most happy to change it, sir. Wife! what’s the meaning of Mr. Larkins’s ginger-pop being so flat?”
“It is very curious ginger-beer indeed, Mr. Ballhatchet,” said Norman; “and since it is liable to have such strange properties, I cannot allow it to be used any more at the school.”
“Very well, sir-as you please, sir. You are the first gentleman as has objected, sir.”
“And, once for all, I give you warning,” added Norman, “that if I have reason to believe you have been obliging the young gentlemen, the magistrates and the trustees of the road shall certainly hear of it.”
“You would not hurt a poor man, sir, as is drove to it—you as has such a name for goodness!”
“I have given you warning,” said Norman. “The next time I find any of your bottles in the school fields, your licence goes. Now, there are your goods. Give Mr. Larkins back the fifteen-pence. I wonder you are not ashamed of such a charge!”
Having extracted the money, Norman turned to leave the shop. Larkins, triumphant, “Ha! there’s Harrison!” as the tutor rode by, and they touched their caps. “How he stared! My eyes! June, you’ll be had up for dealing with old Ball!” and he went into an ecstasy of laughing. “You’ve settled him, I believe. Well, is justice satisfied?”
“It would be no use thrashing you,” said Norman, laughing, as he leaned against the parapet of the bridge, and pinched the boy’s ear. “There’s nothing to be got out of you but chaff.”
Larkins was charmed with the compliment.