"Let your daughter answer that question," remarked Ottley discreetly.
But Edwin put in warmly: "Nga-Hepé was too rich and too powerful, and the chief grew jealous. It was a big shame; and if I had been Whero, I should have been worse than he was."
Whero's grandfather deigned no reply. He stalked up the well-worn steps into Mrs. Hirpington's kitchen, and seating himself at the long table called out for supper. Edwin just peeped in at the door, avoiding Mrs. Hirpington's eye, for fear she should interfere to prevent him going with the old Maori.
"I shall see her when I come back," he thought, as he strolled on towards the stable, keeping an anxious watch over the gate, afraid lest the fordmaster should himself appear at the last moment and detain him.
"You have brought Nga-Hepé's horse," said Ottley. as he entered the nearest stall. "We must have him, for he knows the way. We have only to give him his head, and he is safe to take the road to his master's door."
"If you have him you must have me," persisted Edwin, and the thing was settled. He nestled down in the clean straw under Beauty's manger, and waited, elate with the prospect of a night of adventure, and stoutly resisted all Dunter's persuasions to go in to supper.
Wondering at the shy fit which had seized the boy, Dunter brought him a hunch of bread and cheese, and left the lantern swinging in the stable from the hook in the ceiling, ere he went in with Ottley to share the good feed always to be found in Mrs. Hirpington's kitchen, leaving Edwin alone with the horses. He latched the stable-door, as the nights were growing cold. The gates were not yet barred, for Mr. Hirpington and his men were now expected every minute.
Edwin's thoughts had gone back to the corduroy road, which Dunter had told him was made of the trunks of trees laid close together, with a layer of saplings on the top to fill up the interstices. He was making it in miniature with some bits of rush and reed scattered about the stables, when the latch was softly lifted, and Whero stood before him. Not the Whero he had parted from by the white pines, but the lean skeleton of a boy with big, staring eyes, and bony arms coming out from the loose folds of the blanket he was wearing, like the arms of a harlequin. Edwin sprang up to meet him, exclaiming, "Your grandfather is here." But instead of replying, Whero was vigorously rubbing faces with his good old Beauty.
"Have you come to meet your grandfather?" asked Edwin.
"No," answered the boy abruptly. "I've come to ask Ottley to take me to school." His voice was hollow, and his teeth seemed to snap together at the sight of the bread in Edwin's hand.