“When I am eight,” he replied.
“And sha'n't I call you David then, and won't you play with me in the Gardens any more?”
He looked at Bailey, and Bailey signalled him to be firm.
“Oh, no,” said David cheerily.
Thus sharply did I learn how much longer I was to have of him. Strange that a little boy can give so much pain. I dropped his hand and walked on in silence, and presently I did my most churlish to hurt him by ending the story abruptly in a very cruel way. “Ten years have elapsed,” said I, “since I last spoke, and our two heroes, now gay young men, are revisiting the wrecked island of their childhood. 'Did we wreck ourselves,' said one, 'or was there someone to help us?' And the other who was the younger, replied, 'I think there was someone to help us, a man with a dog. I think he used to tell me stories in the Kensington Gardens, but I forget all about him; I don't remember even his name.'”
This tame ending bored Bailey, and he drifted away from us, but David still walked by my side, and he was grown so quiet that I knew a storm was brewing. Suddenly he flashed lightning on me. “It's not true,” he cried, “it's a lie!” He gripped my hand. “I sha'n't never forget you, father.”
Strange that a little boy can give so much pleasure.
Yet I could go on. “You will forget, David, but there was once a boy who would have remembered.”
“Timothy?” said he at once. He thinks Timothy was a real boy, and is very jealous of him. He turned his back to me, and stood alone and wept passionately, while I waited for him. You may be sure I begged his pardon, and made it all right with him, and had him laughing and happy again before I let him go. But nevertheless what I said was true. David is not my boy, and he will forget. But Timothy would have remembered.