"HULLO, Dick Wilkins, let me see what he has given you!"
The speaker was Squire Filmer's son, a well-known bully of about fifteen years of age. As his voice—always a dreaded one—fell on Dick's ears, the little boy thrust his precious shilling into his deepest pocket and turned pale.
"Here! Are you deaf?" continued Stephen, as his demand received no answer. "Let me see this instant what the gentleman has given you, or I'll make you turn out your pockets. Oh, it's no good!" he went on as the child looked anxiously around him. "There's no escape for you. And as for calling, you might shout yourself hoarse, and no one would hear. The artist is half a mile away by now; I watched him out of sight before I spoke to you."
"I wasn't going to call to him, sir. And I wasn't going to run away either. I ain't a coward," Dick found voice enough to declare.
And he spoke the truth; no thought of flight had entered his head for a moment. He had merely glanced around with the hope that Stranger might perchance have come, as he sometimes did, to seek him.
"Oh, you are not a coward, eh? Then that's all right. Now show me that piece of money!" persisted the bully, gripping Dick's shoulder so tightly that he could have shrieked with pain, had he been less brave than he was.
"Why should I show it to you, sir? 'Twas given to me. I earned it by running an errand for the artist gentleman, I did," said Dick.
"What of that? Let me see it, I tell you, or I'll give you something to remember me by. Ah!" as Dick's hand went reluctantly into his pocket. "I thought I should bring you to reason. So the gentleman gave you this, eh? A shilling! Well, it's a great deal too much money for a little boy like you to have. Think of it I—twelve pence, to be sucked away in candy!"
"No, sir. I mean to take it home to mother," little Dick explained, in his straightforward way. "We're terribly poor now that father's dead. And the children do eat such a lot this cold weather, and—and wear out so many boots."
"Come, you don't whine badly for a youngster! Poor folks are born grumblers, and a discontented set at best," stated Stephen. "Look here, Dick Wilkins, I may as well tell you at once that I am going to have that shilling of yours, whether you like it or no; and in return, I intend to give you this pretty little box that I picked up in the road yonder about half an hour ago. Exchange is no robbery, and you may think yourself lucky to have anything."