At this Jim's countenance fell, for, in common with all his brothers, he shared a strong desire to be like his father.
"You may go now, but remember you'll be takin' Andy's place some day, a-carin' for the little wans."
The idea of taking Andy's place, even at so indefinite a period as sometime, quite took the edge off his mother's rebuke, and Jim went stepping off with great importance.
"Jim!" she called again, and the boy came back.
"That's a terrible swagger you've got on you, Jim. Walk natural. Your father was niver wan of the swaggerin' sort. And jist remember that takin' care of the little b'ys ain't lordin' it over 'em nayther."
CHAPTER VII
"If I'm goin', I may as well go," thought Pat as he left his mother's door on that mid-April Saturday morning. And away he went on the railroad track at a rapid pace that did not give him much time to think.
It was the General himself who answered his knock that had a strange mixture of the bold and the timid. The General had been listening for that knock. He had been wondering what sort of a boy it was who was willing to go out by the day to do housework. The knock, told him. "He hates to come, but he comes, nevertheless," thought the General. And he arose and opened the door.
He looked into the boy's face and he saw a determined mouth and pleading eyes.
"Grit," thought the General. But he only said, "Come in, my boy."
"Yes, sir, if you please, sir, will you be tellin' Mrs. General Brady that I'm here, sir?" was Pat's answer as, with flushing cheeks, he stepped awkwardly into the room. What a fine soldierly bearing the General had, and how he must despise a boy who could turn himself into a girl!
"Sit down, Pat," said the General pleasantly. "That's your name, isn't it? I'll tell Mrs. Brady presently."
Pat sat down. He could not imagine the General with an apron on doing housework, though that was what he was trying to do while he sat there with cheeks that grew redder and more red.
"Mrs. Brady tells me you are excellent help, Pat," went on the General.
"Yes, sir," stammered Pat.
"Have you come to stay, or just for the day?"
The boy's eyes were almost beseeching as he answered, "I've come to stay, sir." What would the General think of him now?
"I suppose you like housework, then?"
"No, sir," came the answer in a low tone. "But father's gone, and there's mother and the boys and there's no work for boys in Wennott unless they turn themselves into girls."
"Better turn into a girl than into a tough from loafing on the streets, Pat," said the General heartily, as he rose from his chair. "I'll tell Mrs. Brady you are here."
There was not so much in what the genial master of the house had said, but Pat's head lifted a little. Perhaps the General did not despise him after all.
"I've good news for you, Fannie," said the General as he entered the dining-room. "Your boy has come, and come to stay."
"Oh, has he? I'm so glad." And she smiled her pleasure. "He's such a nice boy."
"He's a brave boy," said her husband with emphasis. "That boy has the grit of a hero. He may come into our kitchen for a time, but, please God, he shan't stay there. I know what he will have to take from those street boys for doing the best he can for his mother and younger brothers and he knows it, too. I saw it in his face just now. The boy that has the moral courage to face insult and abuse deserves to rise, and he shall rise. But, bless me! I'm getting rather excited over it, I see." And he smiled.
[Illustration: "'I've good news for you, Fannie,' said the General."]
"Perhaps, Tom, you could shield him a little in the street," suggested Mrs. Brady.
"I'll do my best, my dear." And then the General went away to his bank, and Mrs. Brady went into the kitchen to see Pat.
Pat was sensitive. There was something in the General's manner as he left him, something in Mrs. Brady's tones as she directed him, that restored his self-respect.
"If only I never had to be goin' on the street till after dark, 'twouldn't be so bad," thought Pat. "But there's school, and there's Jim Barrows. I'll just have to stand it, that's what I will. Mother says I'm brave, but it's not very brave inside I'm feelin'. I'd run if I could."
But Pat was to learn some day, and learn it from the General's lips, that the very bravest men have been men who wanted to run and _wouldn't_.
At General Brady's there was light lunch at noon and dinner at five, which was something Pat had already become accustomed to from having to do his own family cooking for the last six weeks. He was pretty well used to hurrying home the moment the afternoon session of school was over to prepare the meal of the day for his hungry brothers and his tired mother. On Monday, therefore, he came flying into the Brady kitchen at fifteen minutes of five. There was the dinner cooking, with no one to watch it. Where was Mrs. Brady? Pat did not stop to inquire.
His own experience told him that that dinner needed immediate attention.
Down went his books. He flew to wash his hands and put on his apron. He turned the water off the potatoes in a jiffy. "Sure and I just saved 'em, and that's all!" he cried, as he put them to steam dry.
"I'll peep in the oven, so I will," he said. "That roast needs bastin', so it does."
He heard the General come in.
"There's a puddin' in the warm oven," he continued, "but I don't know nothin' about that. It's long since we've had puddin' at home. I'll just dress the potatoes and whip 'em up light. I can do that anyway, and give the roast another baste. It's done, and I'll be settin' it in the warm oven along with the puddin'. For how do I know how Mrs. Brady wants her gravy? Where is she, I wonder?"
"Why, Pat," said a surprised voice, "can you cook?"
"Not much, ma'am," answered Pat with a blush. "But I can sometimes keep other people's cookin' from spoilin'."
"Well said!" cried the General, who was determined to make Pat feel at ease. "Fannie, give me an apron, and I'll make the gravy. I used to be a famous hand at it in the army."
Pat stared, and then such a happy look came into his eyes that the General felt a little moisture in his own.
"How that boy has been suffering!" he said to himself.
"I was detained by a caller," explained Mrs. Brady. "The dinner would surely have been spoiled if Pat had not come just when he did."
And then Pat's cup was full. He blushed, he beamed. Here was the General, the man whom his mother had held up to Pat's admiration, with an apron on, cooking! And Mrs. Brady said that he had saved the dinner.
"Let Jim Barrows say what he likes," he thought. "I'd not like to be eatin' any of his cookin'."
Cooking had risen in Pat's estimation.
"She asked me, 'Will you please not be nickin' or crackin' the dishes, Pat?' And says I, 'I'll be careful, Mrs. Brady.' But I wonder what makes 'em have these thin sort of dishes. I never seen none like 'em nowhere else."
Dinner was over and Pat was alone in the kitchen.
[Illustration: The General makes the gravy.]