“You’re a lucky one, you are!” Tom broke in.
“I should like to see you try it, just!” Glass-Eye retorted. “And meantime I get more smacks than halfpence. Oh, I know she’ll pay me all in a lump, when she gets it! She’s very generous, really. And her Pa and Ma ... yes ... do you know what she means to do? She’s not angry with them any longer. She’s going to stuff them with turkey and pudding at the hotel and stand them fifty francs’ worth of flowers. She’s forgiven them!”
“That’s more than I have!” replied Tom. “Her Pa will know what I am made of to-morrow, the brute! He’ll have one on the mug, for boxing my ears and kicking me out ... you know ... because of the letters from Trampy.”
“If you do that, Tom, you’ll have Miss Lily to reckon with! What! You’re laughing!” cried Glass-Eye angrily. “You don’t know how it hurts ... on one’s bones! And those pillow-fights: I’ve had my nose smashed in one of them before now! Nothing surprises me that Miss Lily says or does. Why, this very morning, she wanted to put a lighted candle in my glass eye!”
“Eh, what? A light in your eye?” exclaimed Tom suddenly. “I wonder if one really could ... I say, Jimmy, could one?”
“Yes,” said Jimmy, greatly amused, “with an invisible wire under the dress....”
“Hurrah!” cried Tom. “Would you like two shillings a day, Glass-Eye? And your food and clothes? You shall travel with me; you shall appear on the stage. Come along to the café, we’ll sign the engagement!”
“But what will Miss Lily say?” objected Glass-Eye, trembling at the idea of announcing her departure to her terrible mistress.
“Well,” said Tom, “I’ll be nice to her Pa, if she’s nice to you. Come along!”
“But I don’t know how to sign my name.”