Harry did not wait for the cold sponge, but got up at once, and then the young dogs seemed to enter into a compact to disturb the rest of poor Fred, which they did by torturing him most ingeniously.
Fred was lying fast asleep, and, the night having been warm, he had kicked all the clothes off, so Harry and Philip collected the hair-brushes in the two bedrooms, which, old and new, amounted to five; after which, Harry slipped down into the hall, and brought up the two clothes-brushes, and these they carefully arranged upon the bed, all on one side of the sleeper. They next screwed up the corner of a handkerchief, and began to tickle him on the side farthest from the brushes. The first application of the tickler produced an impatient rub; the second, an irritable scratch; but the third made the sleeper turn right over on to the sharp brushes, and begin to curl and twist about with pain.
“Oh, dear! what’s—ah—ah—er—oh, dear—don’t. What’s in the bed?” said Fred, muttering and groaning and twisting amongst the brushes, but still keeping his eyes obstinately closed.
His tormentors roared with laughter; and it was this mirth which thoroughly aroused Fred to the comprehension of his position, which he no sooner realised than he sat up in bed, but in so doing only increased his pain—penetrating hair-brushes, although meant expressly for going through the hair, having, for all that, the power to pierce the skin, as Fred found, and he soon made a sort of rabbit leap off the bed on to the floor, and confronted his tormentors, who directly took to ignoble flight; but they did not get off scot-free, for Fred managed to send a missile in the shape of one of the brushes flying after them, and it caught Harry a pretty good thump in the back with the hardest part.
“I say,” said Philip, when they were nearly dressed, “we were to have gone to the mill last night to bob for eels; let’s go to-night, or Dusty Bob will think we are not coming.”
“Oh, he wouldn’t expect us when he saw what a fire there was. He would know that we should not go directly afterwards. But we might go to-night, though. Let’s ask Mamma to have tea early, so that we can start directly after.”
“Well, but we have not had breakfast yet,” said Fred.
“Well, I know that,” said Harry; “but it’s always best to be in good time about everything, and then you don’t get all behind. I say, what shall we do this morning? I should like to go down to the seashore. Let’s ask Papa to take us.”
“Why, what’s the use,” said Philip, “when you know how busy he is about the fire? I shouldn’t like to ask him. But he said he would take us again before Fred goes back, so let’s wait and see.”
Breakfast finished, the boys went out in the garden to amuse themselves, and plenty there always seemed to be in that garden to amuse any one of reasonable desires. There was fruit in abundance to begin with—no bad thing for a commencement either, as Harry appeared to think, for he began feasting first upon the gooseberries, and then turned his attention to the cherries on the big tree in the corner by the shrubbery—the tree which bore the great white Bigareau cherries; and it was quite time they were picked, for some were split right down the side from over-ripeness, while the sparrows had been attacking others, and had committed sad havoc amongst them—the little pert rascals having picked out all the finest and ripest for their operations, and then, after taking a few bites out of the richest and sweetest part, they commenced upon another. As for Harry, who was not at all a particular youth, he used to make a point of choosing the sparrow-picked cherries—saying that they were the ripest and sweetest.