‘Because I once got sixpence out of you!’ He is not able to resist it.
‘Tommy,’ says Susan, ‘your collar is dirty, and you must come back to the house with me to get another.’ As she speaks she catches Tommy, who has not yet got to the years of civilization, and who hates clean collars, and prepares to march him off.
‘Tommy,’ says Mr. Crosby, ‘wait a minute; your sister won’t, but perhaps you will. There is a photographer in town to-day; he has come down from Dublin. And your aunt says she would like to have some of you photographed.’ Here there is a distinct slowing in Susan’s march past, though she disdains to turn her head, or show further mark of interest. ‘Don’t you want to be photographed, Tommy? I do, badly.’
‘What is it?’ asks Tommy, whose views of amusement as a rule mean lollipops, and those only, and who has no knowledge of cameras or kodaks.
‘It’s painful, as a rule,’ says Crosby. ‘But children seldom suffer. It’s only people of my age who come out with their noses twisted. Did you ever have your nose twisted, Tommy? It hurts awfully, I can tell you. But’—with a glance at Susan—‘other things hurt worse. You ought to speak to Susan, Tommy—to tell her that prolonged cruelty sometimes ends in the death of the victim.’
At this Susan faces round. ‘What I think is,’ says she, ‘that you ought to give me back that horrid sixpence.’
‘It isn’t horrid.’
‘You should give it back, at all events.’
‘Oh, Susan, anything but that—my life even.’
‘What’—with mounting indignation—‘can you want it for, except to annoy me?’