“Stop beating that little fellow! stop this instant, you inhuman wretch, or I’ll go for a policeman and have you arrested for cruelty to children,” exclaimed a very decent looking woman, the wife of the grocer at the next corner, rushing up to the window of the room where the beating was going on.
“You mind your own business,” retorted Coote, letting go the child and pushing him angrily away from him. “He’s had no more than he deserves; no, nor half so much, the idle, good-for-nothing little rascal.”
“I only wish I had the strength to give you your deserts,” returned the woman in indignant tones. “I wouldn’t hesitate for a minute, and you’d find yourself good for nothing but bed for at least a week. The idea of such a wretch as you calling himself a Christian! You’re worse than a heathen; and I declare I will have you arrested if you dare to strike that child again.”
Coote tossed his whip into a corner and glared at the woman, while poor little Harry slunk away out the room, moving as if he had scarcely strength to walk.
His sisters instantly gathered about him, crying bitterly. Ethel caught him in her arms and held him close, sobbing out her grief and pity.
“O Harry, Harry, dear little brother, I am so, so, so sorry for you!”
“I, too,” sobbed Blanche. “Oh, I wish our uncles would take us away and put us with somebody that would be kind and good to us.”
“So do I,” chimed in Nannette, tears rolling down her cheeks. “Oh, I wish, we could live with Mrs. Keith and little Mary; if only they wanted more children over there.”
“Oh, hush, hush, Nan,” said Ethel warningly; for Mrs. Coote was coming toward them, having just seen the last of the enquiring neighbors out of the gate, dismissing them with a promise that she would see to the welfare of the children and not permit them to be abused.
“You needn’t be afraid,” she said to Ethel. “I’ve no intention of adding to Harry’s punishment, for I think he has already had quite enough. I will help him upstairs, and the rest of you had best come along.”