“That is my secret.”
“You have rebelled against my lawful authority. Maria, what is it my duty to do with this boy?”
“Lock him up!” answered Mrs. Fox, grimly.
“A good suggestion, Mrs. F. Imprisonment may change the boy’s ideas. He may repent his base conduct.”
“Now, young man,” said Fox, in a tone of authority, “go up to your chamber, and stay there till you’re ready to obey orders.”
Harry hesitated a moment, then quietly went upstairs. Mr. Fox was relieved, for he was a little apprehensive that his ward would prove rebellious and decline to obey.
John Fox stole up after his ward, and Harry heard the door bolted on the outside.
He was a prisoner.
When he heard the bolt slide in the lock, he said to himself: “Mr. Fox and I can never agree. He has not yet been appointed my guardian, and he never will receive the appointment. I have the right to choose for myself, as Mr. Howard told me, and I mean to exercise it.”
Some of my readers may, perhaps, picture Harry as forcing open the door of his chamber and rushing from the house, breathing loud defiance as he went. But he was a sensible boy, and meditated nothing of the kind.