“What!” half-shrieked the man. “Here, I say, where do you go to school? Things are coming to a pretty pass when boys like you begin teaching me, who’ve been nigh forty year in the wild-beast trade! What next?”
“Glyn Severn’s right,” said Singh sternly.
“Here’s another of them!” cried the man, looking round from face to face.
“Quite right,” continued Singh. “Why, the poorest coolie in my father’s dominions would manage one of the noble beasts far better.”
“Ho!” said Ramball sarcastically. “Then perhaps the biggest swell out of my father’s dominions would like to show me how to do it himself.”
“I don’t know that I can,” said Singh quietly; “but I dare say the poor beast would obey me if I tried.”
“Oh, pray try, then, sir.—Only, look here, governor,” continued the man, addressing Morris, who was not far off, “I don’t know whether he’s your son or your scholar—I wash my hands of it. I warn you; he’s a vicious beast, and I aren’t a-going to pay no damages if my young cock-a-hoop comes to grief.”
Singh laughed a curious, disdainful laugh. Then he took a step in the direction of the elephant, but Glyn caught him by the arm.
“Don’t do that, Glyn,” said the boy quietly. “I don’t believe he would hurt me. Come with me if you like. You know what he’ll do if he’s going to be savage, and you run one way and I’ll run the other.”
This was in a low voice, unheard by any one but him for whom it was intended; and the next moment, amidst a profound hush, the two boys moved towards the elephant, who was swaying his head slowly from side to side, and looking “ugly,” as the man Jem afterwards said.