“No,” I said firmly.
“Then look here,” said Ike; “suppose I take the broken ladder up into the shed, and hang it up, and bring another. When the ganger finds it he’ll think it was Shock broke it, and then you’ll be all right, eh? What do you say to that?”
“That I wouldn’t be such a coward,” I said stoutly. “I shall tell Mr Brownsmith myself.”
“Oh, very well!” said Ike, stooping and picking up the broken ladder. “Here, give me that bit. I’ll soon be back. Don’t much matter. On’y four foot gone, and we wanted a shorter one. This’ll just do.”
“Then it won’t cost a hundred pounds?” I cried.
“No; nor a hundred pennies, boy. It was only my gammon. I’ll soon be back.”
I felt as if a load had been lifted off my breast as Ike came back at a heavy trot with a fresh ladder and planted it for me against the apple-tree.
“That’s about safe,” he cried. “If you feel yourself falling, hook one of your ears over a bough and hang on. Never mind the ladder: let that go.”
“That’s nonsense!” I said sharply, and Ike chuckled.
“Look ye here, boy,” he said, as I thanked him and ran up the ladder with my empty basket, “I’ll take that bough as you broke in among the gooseberries, where he never hardly comes, and I’ll tell him that I broke the ladder moving it. You’ve had plenty of trouble already, and my shoulders is bigger than yours.”