“Magg wants to marry Polly,” I said oracularly. “Don’t you remember that day when we went round by the back, and heard her ordering him off?”
“Yes, I remember,” said Mercer, with his mouth full. “I was thinking about it. I don’t wonder at Bob whacking him. Polly’s too good for such a miserable, shuffling, cheating fellow as he is. I hate him now. I used to like him, though I didn’t like him. I liked him because he was so clever at getting snakes and hedgehogs and weasels. He always knew where to find lizards. But he’s a cheat. You pay him, and then he says you didn’t, and keeps on worrying you for more money. I’ll never buy anything of him again.”
“That’s what you always say, Tom,” I replied, “and next time he has a good bird or anything, you buy it.”
“Well, I’ve done with him this time. Look: there he is.”
For about fifty yards away there was Magglin, long-haired and dirty-looking, seated on the bank, with his elbows on his knees and his face buried in his hands.
But he was so quick of ear, that, though we were walking along the grassy margin of the road, he heard us coming, and started up fierce and excited of aspect, but only to soften down and touch his cap, with a servile grin upon his face.
“Hullo, Mr Mercer, sir,” he whined; “looking for me?”
“No,” said my companion. “Why should I look for you?”
“Thought you wanted to pay me that shilling you owe me, sir.”
“I don’t owe you a shilling.”