“Well, then we will say no more,” saith Father. “Only draw up those lists, Walter, and let me have them quickly.”
Father then left the chamber: and Wat threw him down at Mother’s knee.
“O Mother, Mother, if I had but thought sooner!” crieth he. “If I could but have stood out when they laughed at me!—for that, in very deed, were the point. I did begin with keeping within my wage: and then all they mocked and flouted me, and told me no youth of any spirit should do so: and—and I gave way. Oh, if I had but held on!”
Mother softly stroked Wat’s gleaming fair hair, that is so like hers.
“My boy!” she saith, “didst thou ask for God’s strength, or try to hold on in thine own?”
Walter made no answer in words, but methought I saw the water stand in his eyes.
When Mother and Wat were both gone forth, Aunt Joyce saith,—“I cannot verily tell how it is that folk should have a fantasy that ’tis a shame to be ’feared of doing ill, and no shame at all to be ’feared of being laughed at. Why, one day when I were at home, there was little Jack Bracher a-stealing apples in mine orchard: and Hewitt (that is Aunt Joyce’s chief gardener) caught him and brought him to me. Jack, he sobbed and thrust his knuckles into his eyes, and said it were all the other lads. ‘But what did the other lads to thee?’ quoth I. ‘Oh, they dared me!’ crieth he. ‘They said I durst not take ’em: and so I had to do it.’ Now, heard you ever such stuff in your born days? Why, they might have dared me till this time next year, afore ever I had turned thief for their daring.”
“But then, Aunt, you see,” saith Ned, a twinkle in his eyes, “you are but a woman. That alters the case.”
“Just so, Ned,” quoth Aunt Joyce, the fun in her eyes as in his: “I am one of the weaker sex, I know.”
“Now, I’ll tell you,” saith Ned, “how they essayed it with me, when I first joined my ship. They dared me—my mates, wot you—to go up to the masthead, afore I had been aboard a day. ‘Now, look you here, mates,’ says I. ‘When the Admiral bids me, I’ll scale every mast in the ship; and if I break my neck, I shall but have done my duty. But I’ll do nought because I’m dared, and so that you know.’ Well, believe me who will, but they cheered me as if I had taken a galleon laden with ducats. And I’ve been their white son (favourite) ever since.”