“Mr Thomas Fraser, my gal?”
“Mr Thomas beat him dreadfully,” continued Jessie, “till he cried for mercy; and dear Tom—”
“Mr Thomas, my gal,” said Dick, correcting.
“Made him go down upon his knees and beg my pardon, and then he brought me away.”
“God bless him!” said Dick fervently, “But it’s Mr Thomas Fraser, my dear; and he’s nothing to you but a brave, true young fellow, who acted like a man. But, that it should come to this!” he groaned, striding up and down the room. “This is being a poor man, and having to eat other people’s bread. Oh, it’s dreadful, dreadful! If she’d been rich Max’s daughter, mother, no one would have dared to insult her; and as for this blackguard, I’ll—”
He caught up the hammer, and had reached the door, when Jessie and her mother ran and clung to him, Mrs Shingle locking the door till he promised to be content with the castigation the fellow had received.
“Mr Tom would be sure to beat him well, father,” said Mrs Shingle.
“Well, that is one comfort,” said Dick, cooling a little. “I should have nearly killed any blackguard who had touched you. Well, mother,” he continued, “when things comes to the worst they mends; but it don’t seem to be so with us any more than with shoes, unless some one mends ’em, I mean to mend ours somehow. ‘Why don’t you try?’ every one says. Well, I do try.”
Just then the boy came back, and making a sign to Jessie and his wife not to let him see their trouble, all tried to resume their work, but in a despairing, half-hearted manner, in the midst of which, in a doleful, choking voice, Dick began to sing over his sewing, while the boy seemed to keep time with the hammer with which he was driving in nails.
“For we always are so jolly, oh—
So jolly, oh—so jolly, oh—so jolly—”