"Very well: where shall I find you?"
"I shall be feeding my jackdaw, or working in my garden; or, perhaps," after a moment's reflection, "I might be sitting at the top of the apple tree, or running along the kitchen garden wall. But if you don't find me in any of those places, look in the hen-house. I might be getting an egg there for Miles' tea."
"But isn't the hen-house kept locked?"
"Oh, yes, but that doesn't matter a bit. I always squeeze myself through the hen's little trap door."
"You don't expect me to do the same, I hope?"
Humphrey's sense of the ridiculous was tickled by the idea of his father's tall form struggling through the little hole of a few inches wide; and his merry laugh echoed through the room.
"What fun it would be!" he exclaimed, "you'd stick in the middle, and not be able to get in or out. How you would kick!"
Little Miles laughed till he coughed, and Sir Everard was obliged to dismiss Humphrey to the garden.
Humphrey was not engaged in any of the employments he had mentioned when his father joined him an hour later. He was standing gazing thoughtfully at the lame jackdaw hopping about on his wooden leg.
"What a funny boy you are," said his father, laying a hand on his shoulder. "I do believe you care more for that ugly old jackdaw than for anything else that you have. He always seems to me the most uninteresting of creatures and I'm sure he is very ungrateful, for the kinder you are to him the crosser he gets."