“She-arn’t! ’Tain’t your wall.”
“Get down!” cried Tom fiercely.
“Get down yerself. Who are you, I should like to know?”
Tom stooped and picked up a clod of earth, and Pete ducked his head, the motion causing his toes to slip out of a crevice between two bricks, and he disappeared, but only to scramble up again.
“You heave that at me,” he cried fiercely, “and I’ll come over and smash yer.”
Tom felt disposed to risk the smashing, and drew back his hand to throw the clod, when his wrist was caught, for his uncle had heard what passed, and returned to the door.
“Don’t do that, my boy,” he said quietly. Then to Pete, “Get down off that wall.”
“She-arn’t! Who are you?” cried the great hulking fellow, and he scrambled a little more upward, so as to hang over with his elbows on the top bricks.
“Then stop there,” said Uncle Richard quietly. “Don’t take any notice of him, Tom; the fellow is half an idiot.”
“So are you!” yelled Pete. “Yah! Who pulled the—”