With this, he snatched Dick's shilling from his hand, and threw a small, curiously-carved match-box at the little wood-picker's feet.
"Oh, you shan't! You shan't!" cried poor Dick, losing all self-control, and throwing himself bodily upon the bigger boy. "'Tis mine," he contended, breaking into a passion of sobs and tears. "I earned it myself, and I mean to have it. Give it to me this minute, and take your match-box back. A thing like that's no good to me and mother. You're a coward and a thief."
"Now stop that noise," said Stephen. "It's no use your making a fuss; I want your shilling badly. I'm saving for new skates; and there's certain to be ice on the lake in Lord Bentford's grounds early in the new year."
"And I want to buy all sorts of things for mother and the children," sobbed the miserable and indignant Dick. "Listen to me, sir!" He ceased crying, took a step towards young Filmer, and looked fearlessly into his face. "If you don't give me back my money at once," he said, "I'll go straight to the farm and tell your father."
"So that's your little game, is it?" exclaimed the bully. "Well, it's a fortunate thing you mentioned it to me, because now I can tell you what the result of your doing it would be. I should make my mother promise me that she would never have Mrs. Wilkins to do washing or charing for her again."
"O sir, you wouldn't be so wicked, surely!" Dick broke in, in accents of alarm. "We should starve outright, I believe, without mother's Wednesday and Saturday earnings at the Manor House. And the children ain't half fed as it is!" He wound up with another flood of tears.
"Then hold your tongue, now that you know what your silence is worth," replied Stephen. "I'm sure you needn't make such a cry-baby of yourself. I haven't hurt you, and I've given you a jolly little box."
"But the box isn't any use to me," Dick argued. "Please—please give me back my shilling, Master Stephen. 'Tis dreadful to be hungry; and mother started off to work this morning without a bit of anything inside her lips, because she knew if she ate breakfast there wouldn't have been enough for the little ones."
"Don't trouble to tell lies," the squire's son said, as he turned contemptuously away. "Pick up your bundle and go home, or the bogies that hang about these woods after dark will have you."
Without another word or look, he then strode off, and was quickly out of sight. When he was visible no longer, Dick Wilkins sat down on his load of sticks, hid his face in his hands, and wept long and piteously.