Syd Belton | Page 7

cried the old boatswain, rubbing his scythe-blade with the
stone rubber, and bringing forth a musical sound.
"You're glad of it, then?"
"Course I am, my lad. Be the making on you. Wish I was coming too."
"Bah!" ejaculated Sydney, and he left the old boatswain to commence

the toilet of the dewy lawn, while in a desultory way, for the sake of
doing something to fill up the time till breakfast, he strolled round to
the back, where a loud whistling attracted his attention.
The sound came from an outhouse, toward which the boy directed his
steps.
"Cleaning the knives, I suppose," said Sydney to himself, and going to
the door he looked in.
The tray of knives was there waiting to be cleaned, and the board and
bath-brick were on a bench, but the red-faced boy was otherwise
engaged.
He was kneeling down with a rough, curly-haired retriever dog sitting
up before him, with paws drooped and nose rigid, while Pan was
carefully balancing a knife across the pointed nose aforesaid.
Pan was so busily employed that he did not hear the step, and the first
notification he had of another's presence was given by the dog, who
raised his muzzle suddenly and uttered a loud and piteous whine
directed at Sydney--the dog's cry seeming to say, "Do make him leave
off."
The glance the boatswain's son gave made him spring at the board,
snatch up a couple of the implements, and begin to rub them to and fro
furiously, while the dog, in high glee at being freed from an arduous
task, began to leap about, barking loudly, and making dashes at his
young master's legs.
"Poor old Don--there!" cried Sydney, patting the dog's ears. "He don't
like discipline, then. Well, Pan, when are you going to sea?"
"Not never," said the boy, shortly.
"Yes, you are. Your father said he should send you."
"If he does I shall run away, so there," cried the boy.

Sydney turned away, and walked through the garden, his head bent, his
brow wrinkled, and his mind so busily occupied, that he hardly heeded
which way he went.
"If his father sends him he shall run away."
Those words kept on repeating themselves in Sydney's brain like some
jingle, and he found himself thinking of them more and more as he
passed through the gate, and went along the road that late autumn
morning, kicking up the dead leaves which lay clustering beneath the
trees.
"If his father sends him to sea he shall run away," said Sydney to
himself; and then he thought of how Pan Strake would be free, and
have no more boots and shoes or knives to clean, and not have to go
into the garden to weed the paths.
Then by a natural course he found himself thinking that if he, Sydney
Belton, were to leave home, he would escape being sent to sea--at all
events back to school--and he too would be free.
With a boy's wilful obstinacy, he carefully drew a veil over all the good,
and dragged out into the mental light all that he looked upon as bad in
his every-day life, satisfied himself that he was ill-used, and wished
that he had had a mother living to, as he called it, take his part.
"I wonder what running away would be like?" he thought. "There
would be no Uncle Tom to come and bully and bother me, and father
wouldn't be there to take his side against me. I wonder what one could
do if one ran away?"
"Morning!"
Sydney started, for he had been so intent upon his thoughts that he had
not heard the regular trot, trot of a plump cob, nor the grinding of
wheels, and he looked up to see that it was Doctor Liss who had
suddenly drawn rein in the road.

"Going for a walk, Syd?"
"Yes; but--I--Where are you going, doctor?"
"Into the town. Just been called up. Poor fellow injured in the docks
last night."
"Take me with you."
"What?" cried the doctor, smiling down in the eager face before him.
"Didn't I get scolded enough last night, you young dog, for leading you
astray?"
"Oh, but father didn't mean it. Do take me. Is he much hurt?"
"Broken leg, I hear. No, no. Go home to breakfast. Ck! Sally. Good
morning."
The doctor touched the cob as he nodded to Sydney, and the wheels of
the chaise began to turn, but with a bound the boy was out in the road,
and hanging on to the back.
"No, no, Doctor Liss, don't leave me behind. I do so want to go, and
there's plenty of time for me to get back to breakfast."
"But Sir Thomas will declare I am leading you into the evil