"Me?" he questioned lightly. "Oh, I was jus'--jus' goin' a little walk up the road before I went to bed. That's all I was goin' to do, father."
Flop! A large segment of the cream blanc-mange had disintegrated itself from the fast-melting mass, and, evading William's encircling arm, had fallen on to the floor at his feet. With praiseworthy presence of mind William promptly stepped on to it and covered it with his feet. William's father turned round quickly from the stand where he was replacing his walking stick.
"What was that?"
William looked round the hall absently. "What, father?"
William's father now fastened his eyes upon William's person.
"What have you got under your coat?"
"Where?" said William with apparent surprise.
Then, looking down at the damp excrescence of his coat, as if he noticed it for the first time, "Oh, that!" with a mirthless smile. "Do you mean _that_? Oh, that's jus'--jus' somethin' I'm takin' out with me, that's all."
Again William's father grunted.
"Well," he said, "if you're going for this walk up the road why on earth don't you go, instead of standing as if you'd lost the use of your feet?"
William's father was hanging up his overcoat with his back to William, and the front door was open. William wanted no second bidding. He darted out of the door and down the drive, but he was just in time to hear the thud of a falling body, and to hear a muttered curse as the Head of the House entered the dining-room feet first on a long slide of some white, glutinous substance.
"Oh, crumbs!" gasped William as he ran.
The little girl next door was sitting in the summer-house, armed with a spoon, when William arrived. His precious burden had now saturated his shirt and was striking cold and damp on his chest. He drew it from his coat and displayed it proudly. It had certainly lost its pristine, white, rounded appearance. The marks of the cat's licks were very evident; grime from William's coat adhered to its surface; it wobbled limply over the soap dish, but the little girl's eyes sparkled as she saw it.
"Oh, William, I never thought you really would! Oh, you are wonderful!
And I _had_ it!"
"What?"
"Rice-mould for supper, but I didn't mind, because I thought--I hoped, you'd come with it. Oh, William, you _are a nice_ boy!"
William glowed with pride.
"William!" bellowed an irate voice from William's front door.
William knew that voice. It was the voice of the male parent who has stood all he's jolly well going to stand from that kid, and is out for vengeance. They'd got to the pears! Oh, crumbs! They'd got to the pears! And even the thought of Nemesis to come could not dull for William the bliss of that vision.
[Illustration: WILLIAM LEANT BACK IN A SUPERIOR, BENEVOLENT MANNER AND WATCHED THE SMILE FREEZE UPON HER FACE AND HER LOOK OF ECSTASY CHANGE TO ONE OF FURY.]
"Oh, William," said the little girl next door sadly, "they're calling you. Will you have to go?"
"Not me," said William earnestly. "I'm not going--not till they fetch me. Here! you begin. I don't want any. I've had lots of things. You eat it all."
Her face radiant with anticipation, the little girl took up her spoon.
William leant back in a superior, benevolent manner and watched the smile freeze upon her face and her look of ecstasy change to one of fury. With a horrible suspicion at his heart he seized the spoon she had dropped and took a mouthful himself.
_He had brought the rice-mould by mistake!_
CHAPTER III
WILLIAM'S BURGLAR
When William first saw him he was leaning against the wall of the White Lion, gazing at the passers-by with a moody smile upon his villainous-looking countenance.
It was evident to any careful observer that he had not confined his attentions to the exterior of the White Lion.
William, at whose heels trotted his beloved mongrel (rightly named Jumble), was passing him with a casual glance, when something attracted his attention. He stopped and looked back, then, turning round, stood in front of the tall, untidy figure, gazing up at him with frank and unabashed curiosity.
"Who cut 'em off?" he said at last in an awed whisper.
The figure raised his hands and stroked the long hair down the side of his face.
"Now yer arskin'," he said with a grin.
"Well, who _did_?" persisted William.
"That 'ud be tellin'," answered his new friend, moving unsteadily from one foot to the other. "See?"
"You got 'em cut off in the war," said William firmly.
"I didn't. I bin in the wor orl right. Stroike me pink, I bin in the wor and _that's_ the truth. But I didn't get 'em cut orf in the wor.
Well, I'll stop kiddin' yer. I'll tell yer strite. I never 'ad none.
_Nar!_"
William stood on tiptoe to peer under the untidy hair at the small apertures that in his strange new friend took the place of ears.
Admiration shone in William's eyes.
"Was you _born_ without 'em?" he said enviously.
His friend nodded.
"Nar don't yer go torkin' about it," he went on modestly, though seeming to bask in the sun of William's evident awe and respect. "I don't want all folks knowin' 'bout it. See? It kinder _marks_ a man, this 'ere sort of thing. See? Makes 'im too easy to _track_, loike.
That's why I grow me hair long. See? 'Ere, 'ave a drink?"
He put his head inside the window of the White Lion and roared out "Bottle o' lemonide fer the young gent."
William followed him to a small table in the little sunny porch, and his heart swelled with pride as he sat and quaffed his beverage with a manly air. His friend, who said his name was Mr. Blank, showed a most flattering interest in him. He elicited from him the whereabouts of his house and the number of his family, a description of the door and window fastenings, of the dining-room silver and his mother's jewellery.
William, his eyes fixed with a fascinated stare upon Mr. Blank's ears, gave the required information readily, glad to be able in any way to interest this intriguing and mysterious being.
"Tell me about the war," said William at last.
"It were orl right while it larsted," said Mr. Blank with a sigh. "It were orl right, but I s'pose, like mos' things in this 'ere world, it couldn't larst fer ever. See?"