It was very beautiful, but I had watched that too often, so I crossed the garden and went out into the lane to see if I could find anything amusing there.
For it seemed to me that it might be very nice for my father to have found a mine of lead and silver, and that it would be very interesting to see it dug out and melted, as we had melted those pieces that day—of course in a large way; but I did not feel as if I wanted to be rich, and I would a great deal rather then have been wandering out there on the cliff with Bob Chowne or Bigley Uggleston, when I heard a shout, and, looking in the direction, there, high up on the cliff path, and coming towards me with long strides, was my last-named school-fellow.
“Hallo, Big!” I shouted, running towards him; “where are you going?”
“Coming to look after you,” he said. “Why didn’t you come over again?”
“Because I was wanted at home,” I replied. “You might have come over to me.”
“I couldn’t. I didn’t like to. Father was put out this morning, because he saw you and your father on our grounds.”
“Your grounds!” I said. “Oh, come, that is a good one.”
“Well, father always talks about it as if all the Gap belonged to him. What were you doing there?”
“Having a walk,” I was obliged to say.
“Oh, well, you might have stopped.”