"'Deputy'"
"DEPUTY"
They were certainly the very oddest pair that ever the moon shone on,—Stony Durdles and the boy "Deputy."
Durdles was a stone-mason, from which occupation, undoubtedly, came his nickname "Stony," and Deputy was a hideous small boy hired by Durdles to pelt him home if he found him out too late at night, which duty the boy faithfully performed. In all the length and breadth of Cloisterham there was no more noted man than the stone-mason, Durdles, not, I regret to say, on account of his virtues, but rather because of his talent for remaining out late at night, and not being able to guide his steps homeward. There is a coarser term which might have been applied to this talent of Durdles, but we have nothing to do with that, here and now; what we desire is an introduction to the small boy who is Durdles's shadow.
One night, John Jasper, choir-master in Cloisterham Cathedral, on his way home through the Close, is brought to a standstill by the spectacle of Stony Durdles, dinner-bundle and all, leaning against the iron railing of the burial-ground, while a hideous small boy in rags flings stones at him, in the moonlight. Sometimes the stones hit him, and sometimes they miss him, but Durdles seems indifferent to either fortune. The hideous small boy, on the contrary, whenever he hits Durdles, blows a whistle of triumph through a jagged gap in the front of his mouth, where half his teeth are wanting; and whenever he misses him, yelps out, "Mulled agin!" and tries to atone for the failure by taking a more correct and vicious aim.
"What are you doing to the man?" demands Jasper.
"Makin' a cock-shy of him," replies the hideous small boy.
"Give me those stones in your hand."
"Yes, I'll give 'em you down your throat, if you come a ketchin' hold of me," says the small boy, shaking himself loose from Jasper's touch, and backing. "I'll smash your eye if you don't look out!"
"What has the man done to you?"