“Well, look here,” said Glyn; “wait till I have written my letter, and I will make it a short one this time, and go with you afterwards.”
“Oh, you are a disagreeable one! There won’t be time then, and it will be too late for going out. There, you see if I ask you to go again.”
Uttering these words in his snappiest way, Singh whisked himself round and stalked off.
“Can’t help it,” said Glyn to himself. “I will get it done, and then go and meet him. He’ll soon cool down, and there will be time enough to go to the shop and get back before supper.”
But, all the same, Glyn uttered a low sigh as he thrust his hands into his pockets, to jingle in one the four keys that made his bunch, and in the other several coins which formed the half of the Colonel’s previous day’s cheque.
The keys felt light in his right hand and the coins very heavy, and there was a something about him that seemed to suggest that they ought to be spent; but the boy turned his face rigorously towards the door of the theatre, when his attention was taken by Wrench’s tom-cat. He was crouching upon the sill of one of the lower windows, which was raised a little way, and evidently intently watching something within.
“What’s he after?” said Glyn to himself. “Some bird got inside, I suppose, and flying about among the rafters.”
Walking quietly up to see if his surmise were true, the cat did not hear him till he was quite close, when it bounded off the sill and made for the Doctor’s garden, to disappear among the shrubs.
“I thought he was after no good,” said Glyn to himself; and, before making for the door, he peered in at the window in expectation of seeing a robin flitting about—a favourite habit these birds had of frequenting the long room and flying from beam to beam.
But there was no bird, Glyn seeing instead the back of little Burton, seated at his desk with the flap open resting against his head, as he seemed to be peering in; and just then the little fellow uttered a low sob.