Part 25 (2/2)

”Tracy, fetch the water, you lazy jaundiced toad!” he commanded. The sallow student rose unwillingly, and moved off with his face still bent upon the thrilling pages of ”The Wild Boys of New York,” which he held folded small in his hand for convenience of perusal.

Presently the tea being made, the white cloth was laid on the gra.s.s, and the entire company of the Smoutchy Boys crowded about, always excepting the sentinels at the east and west doors, who being on duty could not immediately partic.i.p.ate. The sheep's-head-pie, the bread, the b.u.t.ter, the fruits were all set out in order, and the whole presented such an appearance as the inside of the Castle of Windy Standard had never seen through all its generations.

Prissy conducted herself precisely as if she had been dispensing afternoon tea to callers in the drawing-room, as, since her last birthday, her father had occasionally permitted her to do.

”Do you take sugar?” she asked, delicately poising a piece in the dolls' sugar-tongs, and smiling her most politefully conventional smile at Nipper Donnan.

The brigand chief had never been asked such a question before, and had no answer of the usual kind at hand. But he replied for all that.

”_Rather!_” he cried in a burst, ”if the grocer's not lookin'!”

”I mean in your tea! Do you take sugar in your tea?”

Prissy was still smiling.

Nipper appeared to acquiesce. Two k.n.o.bs of sugar were dropped in. The whipped cream out of the wide-mouthed bottle was spooned delicately on the top, and with a yet more charming smile the cup was pa.s.sed to him.

He held it between his finger and thumb, as an inquiring naturalist holds a rare beetle. Then he put it down on a low fragment of wall and looked at it.

”One lump or two?” queried Prissy again, graciously transferring her attentions to Joe Craig.

”Eh, what?” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed that warrior. Prissy repeated her question.

”As many as I can get!” cried the boy.

So one by one the brigands were served, and the subdued look which rests upon a Sunday-school picnic at the hour of refreshment settled down upon them. The Smoutchy boy is bad and bold, but he does not like you to see him in the act of eating. His instinct is to get behind a wall, or into the thick of a copse and do it there. A similar feeling sends the sparrow with a larger crumb than the others into the seclusion of his nest among the ivy.

Nevertheless the bread and jam, the raisins, and the sheep's-head-pie disappeared 'like snow off a d.y.k.e.' The wonder of the thimbleful cups, continually replenished, grew more and more surprising; and, winking slyly at each other the Smoutchies pa.s.sed them in with a touch of their caps to be filled and refilled again and again. Prissy kept the kettle beside her, out of which she poured the water brought by Timothy Tracy as she wanted it. The golden colour of the tea degenerated, but so long as a few drops of milk remained to mask the fraud from their eyes, the Smoutchies drank the warm water with equal relish.

”Besides it's so much better for your nerves, you know!” said Prissy, putting her action upon a hygienic basis.

At first the boys had been inclined to s.n.a.t.c.h the viands from the table-cloth, and there was one footprint on the further edge. But the iron hand of Nipper Donnan knocked two or three intruders sprawling, and after that the eatables were distributed as patiently and exactly as at a Lord Mayor's banquet.

”Please will you let that boy get up?--I think he must have been sat upon quite long enough now,” said Prissy, who could not bear to listen to the uneasy groaning of the oppressed prisoner.

The chief granted the boon. The sitter and his victim came in and were regaled amicably from one plate. ”Pieces” and full cups of tea were despatched to the distant sentinels, and finally the whole company was in the midst of was.h.i.+ng up, when Prissy, who had been kneeling on the gra.s.s wiping saucers one by one, suddenly rose to her feet with a little cry.

”Oh, it is so dreadful--I _quite_ forgot!”

The Smoutchies stood open-mouthed, some holding dishes, some with belated pieces of pie, some only with their hands in their pockets, but all waiting eagerly for the revelation of the dreadful thing which their hostess had forgotten.

”Why, we forgot to say grace!” she cried--”well, anyway I am glad I remembered in time. We can say it now. Who is the youngest?”

The boys all looked guiltily at each other. Prissy picked out a small boy of stunted aspect, but whose face was old and wizened. He had just put a piece of tobacco into his mouth to take away the taste of the tea.

”You say it, little boy,” she said pointedly, and shut her eyes for him to begin.

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