"B-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b-b--"
"I wouldn't speak to him much if I was you, sir," said the flyman. "Every time he opens his mouth I expect to see him have a fit. I've seen some stutters, but I never see one which came within a hundred mile of his."
"I think," said Mr. Harland, when he introduced Frank J. Samuel Bindon to his wife, "that I begin to understand what Mr. Bindon meant when he wrote that he was shipping an assorted lot of sons. In his family he appears to have samples of every kind."
"Hollo!" cried John F. Ernest, as Frank J. Samuel put in an appearance in the playground, "here's Stammering Sam!"
"Maria," said Mr. Harland, about an hour later, to his wife, "Stammering Sam can fight. He has polished off John G. William. He is taking on John B. David for a change. What an interesting family those Bindons are."
On the Friday the fly which had conveyed Stammering Sam again drove up to the doors of Mulberry House. The same flyman was on the box.
"Sarah," he observed to the servant who opened the door, "I've been bringing you a queer lot of young gentlemen of late. Wednesday I brought you up one with a stutter, now I've brought you one what's only got one leg, and another what's only got one arm. You'll soon be able to keep a museum of living curiosities."
As he was speaking the flyman stood at the door of his fly, his back turned to his fares. Suddenly the servant gave an exclamation.
"Look out, Mr. Stubbs," she cried.
The flyman moved aside, just in time to avoid the full force of a blow, which although it missed his head, at which it was aimed, and only shaved his shoulder, made him roar with pain. A boy, one of the fares, was standing up in the fly, grasping, with both his hands, a curious weapon of offence--a wooden leg.