"Yo' are reg'lar used up," he said, taking hold of the old fellow kindly by the arm. "Shall I walk yer up the hill?"
John withdrew himself.
"Suverins!" he repeated, in a low, hoarse voice. "She ain't got 'em, I tell yer—she ain't got 'em!"
The last words rose to a sort of cry, and, without another word to
Watson, the old man started at a feeble run, his head hanging.
Watson followed him, afraid lest he should drop in the road. Instead, John seemed to gather strength. He made straight for the hill, taking no heed whatever of two or three startled acquaintances who stopped and shouted to him. When the ground began to rise he stumbled again and again, but, by a marvel, did not fall, and his pace hardly slackened. Watson had difficulty in keeping up with him.
But when the policeman reached his own cottage on the side of the road, he stopped, panting, and contented himself with looking after the mounting figure. As soon as it turned the corner of the Costrells' lane, he went into his own house, said a word to his wife, and sat himself down at his own back door to await events—to ponder, also, a few conversations he had held that morning, with Mrs. Moulsey at "the shop," with Dawson, with Hall the butcher. Poor old John—poor old fellow!
When Bolderfield reached the paling in front of the Costrells' cottage, he paused a moment, holding for support to the half-open gate and struggling for breath. "I must keep my 'edd, I must," he was saying to himself piteously; "don' yer be a fool, John Borroful, don' yer be a fool!"
As he stood there, a child's face pushed the window-blind of the cottage aside, and the lame boy's large eyes looked Bolderfield up and down. Immediately after, the door opened, and all four children stood huddling behind each other on the threshold. They all looked shyly at the newcomer. They knew him, but in six months they had grown strange to him.
"Arthur, where's your mother?" said John, at last able to walk firmly up to the door.
"Don' know."