But at this moment came a knocking and crying from within the press.
“Oh! no—’twasn’t mammy; ’twas I that did it. Don’t take mammy.”
“You see, ma’am, you give useless trouble. Please open that door—I shall have to force it, otherwise,” he added, as very pale and trembling she hesitated.
Standing as he might before his commanding officer, stiff, with his heels together, with his inflexibly serene face, full before her, he extended his hand, and said simply, “The key, ma’am.”
In all human natures—the wildest and most stubborn—there is a point at which submission follows command, and there was that in the serenity of the ex-Sergeant-Major which went direct to the instinct of obedience.
It was quite idle any longer trying to conceal the boy. With a dreadful ache at her heart she put her hand in her pocket and handed him the key.
As the door opened the little boy shrank to the very back of the recess, from whence he saw the stout form of the Sergeant stooped low, as his blue, smooth fixed countenance peered narrowly into the dark. After a few seconds he seemed to discern the figure of the boy.
“Come, you sir, get out,” said the commanding voice of the visitor, as the cane which he carried in his hand, paid round with wax-end for some three inches at the extremity, began switching his little legs smartly.
“Oh, sir, for the love of God!” cried Marjory, clinging to his hand. “Oh, sir, he’s the gentlest little creature, and he’ll do whatever he’s bid, and the lovingest child in the world.”
The boy had got out by this time, and looking wonderingly in the man’s face, was unconsciously, with the wincing of pain, lifting his leg slightly, for the sting of the cane was quite new to him.