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Updated: June 15, 2025
"So should I a rascal!" said the squire. "Here, Dick, don't say a word to your mother; it may alarm her." "No, father, I sha'n't say anything; but " "But what? Speak out." "May I read it and Tom?" he added, for he saw his companion's eager looks. "Well, yes, you've heard what we've been talking about what neighbour Tallington came over for."
I know, lads. Yes, I know." "Well, I suppose it is something like that, Hicky," said Dick sadly. "Ay, joost the same; bud I didn't tell Farmer Tallington as I should go for a soldier, and I didn't turn on my wife and tell her I should go to sea." Dick was silent the rest of the way home, but he shook hands very solemnly with Tom, and Tom pressed his hand hard as they parted at the farm.
The squire and Farmer Tallington accompanied them down to their quarters, which were to be at a disused farm-house close to the mouth of the little river; and incidentally Dick learned that this was the first party of labourers who were to cut the new lode or drain from near the river mouth right across the fen; that there was to be a lock with gates at the river end, to let the drain-water out at low tide, and that the banks of the drain were to be raised so as to protect the land at the sides from being flooded.
These qualities were laxity and severity the disposition to go to extremes; and in this case some idea of the way in which the work of petty sessions was carried on will be grasped when it is told that after the examination the chairman of the bench of magistrates, an old landholder of the neighbourhood, shook hands with the squire, and then less freely with Farmer Tallington.
Good heavens! think of what that would mean to to " Tallington got up and laid a hand on Bent's arm. "We won't say or think anything until we hear what Cotherstone has to say," he said. "I'll step along the street and fetch him, myself.
They heven't dree-ernt her yet," said Dave with a malicious grin. "See there, now, young Tom Tallington," he cried, stepping past the lad, and, picking up a couple of eggs in spite of the wailing of their owners, as they came napping close by, the cock bird in his glossy-green spring feathers, and a long pendent tuft hanging down from the back of his head. "How stupid!" cried Tom.
There was nothing else to be done; and as the bonfire was kept blazing the punt was hauled up, and in the midst of the howling wind and the rush of the water Dick stood looking on, his heart full as he thought of Tom Tallington asking his help away there in the darkness; while tap, tap, tap went the wheelwright's hammer, after his saw had rasped off a thin piece of board.
He wished for the man who had shot his father in this cowardly way to be brought to justice; but he was not sure that Farmer Tallington was the guilty man, and he shrank from denouncing the parent of his companion from childhood, and his father's old friend. Mr Marston came over again and tried him sorely.
The subject was hurriedly changed, Dick being after all able to make a good meal, during which he thought of the past, and of how glad he was to be friends with Tom Tallington again; and then, as he had his second help of pie to Tom's third, it seemed to him that the same person must be guilty of all these outrages, and if so it could not by any possibility be Farmer Tallington, for he never skated, and even if he could, he weighed at least sixteen stone, and the ice had broken under the weight of Tom's seven or eight.
For a time Dick was quite determined; but directly after there came before him the face of poor, kind-hearted Mrs Tallington, who had always treated him with the greatest hospitality, while, as he seemed to look at her eyes pleading upon her husband's behalf, Tom took his hand and wrung it.
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