of coloured glass, but the
loveliest of fruit, some smooth and of rich, deep, fiery crimson; others
yellowish or with russet gold on their smooth skins, while others again
were larger and covered with a fine down, upon which lay a rich soft
carmine flush.

I had seen peaches and nectarines growing before, trained up against
walls; but here they were studded about beautiful little unsupported
trees, and their numbers and the novelty of the sight were to me
delightful.

I began to understand now why Old Brownsmith had arranged with his
brother for me to come; and, full of visions of the future and of how I
was going to learn how to grow fruit in this perfection, I stopped,
gazing here and there at the ripe and ripening peaches, that looked so
beautiful that I thought it would be a sin for them to be picked.

In fact, I had been so long amongst fruit that, though I liked it, I
found so much pleasure in its production that I rarely thought of eating
any, and though this sounds a strange thing for a boy to say, it is none
the less perfectly true. In fact, as a rule, gardeners rather grudge
themselves a taste of their own delicacies.

I must have been in this house a full quarter of an hour, and had only
seen one end, and I had turned into a cross walk of red tiles looking to
right and left, when, just beyond the stem of one peach-tree whose fruit
was ripening and had ripened fast, I saw just as it had fallen one great
juicy peach with a bruise on its side, and a crack through which its
delicious essence was escaping. Pale creamy was the downy skin, with a
bloom of softest crimson on the side beyond the bruise and crack, and
making a soft hissing noise as I drew in my breath--a noise that I meant
to express, "Oh, what a pity!"--I stooped down and reached over to pick
up the damaged fruit, and to lay it upon one of the open shelves where I
had seen a couple more already placed.

I heard no step, had seen no one in the place, but just as I leaned over
to get the fruit there was a swishing sound as of something parting the
air with great swiftness, and I uttered a cry of pain, for I felt a
sensation as if a sharp knife had suddenly fallen upon my back, and that
knife was red hot, and, after it had divided it, had seared the flesh.

I had taken the peach in my hand when the pain made me involuntarily
crush it before it fell from my fingers upon the rich earth; and,
grinding my teeth with rage and agony, I started round to