Jan finished off the tail of the pig he was drawing with a squeak of the pencil that might have come from the pig itself and, stuffing the slate into its owner’s hands, he ran up to Kitty Chuter and kissed her wet cheeks, saying, “Give I thee slate, Kitty Chuter, and I’ll make thee the best pig of all. I don’t want nothing from thee for ’t. And when school’s done, I’ll whop Tommy Green, if I sees him.”
And forthwith, without looking from the door for studies, Jan drew a fat sow with her little ones about her; the other children clustering round to peep, and crying, “He’ve made Kitty Chuter one, two, three, vour, vive pigs!”
“Ah, and there be two more you can’t see, because the old un be lying on ’em,” said Jan.
“Six, seven!” William counted; and he assisted the calculation by sticking up first a thumb and then a forefinger as he spoke.
Some who had not thought half a ball of string, or a dozen nails as good as new, too much to pay for a single pig drawn on one side of their slates, and only lasting as long as they could contrive to keep the other side in use without quite smudging that one, were now disposed to be dissatisfied with their bargains. But as the school broke up, and Tom Green was seen loitering on the other side of the road, every thing was forgotten in the general desire to see Jan carry out his threat, and “whop” a boy bigger than himself for bullying a little girl.
Jan showed no disposition to shirk, and William acted as his friend, and held his slate and book.
Success is not always to the just, however; and poor Jan was terribly beaten by his big opponent, though not without giving him some marks of the combat to carry away.
Kitty Chuter wept bitterly for Jan’s bloody nose; but he comforted her, saying, “Never mind, Kitty; if he plagues thee again, ’ll fight un again and again, till I whops he.”
But his valor was not put to the proof, for Tommy Green molested her no more.
Jan washed his face in the water-meadows, and went stout-heartedly home, where Master Lake beat him afresh, as he ironically said, “to teach him to vight young varments like himself instead of minding his book.”