Bambo sighed deeply, overcome by sad memories. A tear trickled slowly down his hollow, weather-beaten cheek, and Joan put up a smudgy, gentle, little hand to wipe it away.
"Don't be sorry, please, dear dwarf. Joan loves you; you's so kind to Joan," she murmured.
"Couldn't we be your kith and kin?" asked Darby anxiously. "I expect by 'kith and kin' you just mean friends. We'll be your friends if you'd like us to. We're both very fond of you already.—Aren't we, Joan?"
"Yes, werry," Joan assented warmly, continuing to caress the dwarf's haggard face with her soft, chubby fingers.
"Bless your dear, loving little hearts!" he ejaculated fervently, looking from one to the other of the earnest faces raised so trustfully to his. "Them's the sweetest words that anybody has spoken to poor Bambo this many's the day—since my mother died. She always had gentle words and sweet looks in plenty for her misshapen boy; and granny too, bless her! But after they went and left me the world seemed all cold and cruel, with nothing better for the likes of me than cuffs and kicks. It was always, 'Get out of the way, you object!' 'Oh, poor wretch! how horrid-looking he is!' or else jeers, gibes, and laughter. And since I became a man, this kind of a man, I mean," he explained, glancing from Joan to his stunted limbs, huge feet, and claw-like hands, "it has been harder still—harsh words and heavy blows if I did not bring in money enough at shows and fairs. Now, I think the Lord Jesus has seen my loneliness, taken pity upon me, and sent two of His own to cheer me, and brighten a bit of the wilderness for a weary pilgrim. And we'll see if the dwarf can't do something to show his gratitude," said Bambo resolutely, yet speaking softly as if to himself. "Firgrove! And this is Barchester, you may say—only about three miles from it as the crow flies—and Barchester's thirty odd miles from Firdale. It's not so far after all, and yet it would be a goodish bit to tramp," he added thoughtfully.
"But do you think we must go home?" queried Darby anxiously. "You see, when Mr. Joe and Mrs. Moll overtook us we were on our way, as I told you, to the Happy Land—we were quite close to it, in fact. Would it be right to turn back now?" the little lad asked, fixing his clear gray eyes seriously on the face of the dwarf. "Wouldn't we be like somebody—I forget who—that put his hand to the plough and looked back? Didn't Jesus say that it's wrong of any one to do that?"
"Ay, sonny, our blessed Lord does say that 'no man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God;' and, of course, we oughtn't to do it. But we must first make sure that we've put our hands upon the right plough, that it's pointed in the proper direction in the very field the great Husbandman wants us to turn over. Then we can forge right ahead, cutting the furrow clean and straight, no matter how stony the soil, or how stiff we find the ground."
"I think I understand what you mean," said Darby slowly. "You are trying to tell me as nicely as you can that we haven't got our plough pointed in the right direction. Is that it, Mr. Bambo?"
"That's it, deary, and the sooner you get it turned about the better," replied the dwarf briskly. "Your field's waiting for you at Firgrove, so back there you and missy must go as soon as ever you can give Joe and Moll the slip. My, won't the ladies be in a fine way! By this time, I expect, they'll have scoured the country, and be getting the canal dragged in search of you both."
"Isn't we goin' to the Happy Land at all, then?" asked Joan, in a tone of glad relief.