Well, he produced, from some place or other, a brilliant jubilee handkerchief—he was a dressy man and had plenty of coloured things—and shook it with both hands to his tiny friend. And the last I saw of him, as the train steamed on towards Utrecht, was, his waving of this silk banner to the little boy on the steps; the stern lips were relaxed into a smile; the defiant face was quite wistful as he repeated: “The young rescal!”
Here the Goudsche sprits seller, in his tour up and down the platform, approached the burly Londoner again, and seeing him now in an unexpectedly melting mood, at once proffered his delicacies with noisy persistence.
“Goudsche sprits! Goudsche sprits! Sir,” he bawled in the Englishman’s face, holding out a packet.
HIS BARK IS WORSE THAN HIS BITE.
Truculence was quite glad of the interruption. He blew his nose violently on his marvellous handkerchief, and turned upon the local merchant with a glare of indignation.
“Get along! How dare you? D’ye take me for a drunkard?”
“Formidable customer that!” whispered Terence at my elbow. “Still I think his bark is worse than his bite.”
“Not a doubt of it,” I replied. “And there are more of his kind.”