n
dark eyes gazing out at him from under the shadowy penthouse of the
great black sun-bonnet, with so intent and compelling a stare that his
mouth closed without saying a word. He climbed up on to a chair and
twisted his feet round the legs by way of anchorage.

Then he sat up and stared back at Grannie, and as an exhibition of
nonchalance and high spirit, put out his tongue at her.

Grannie only looked at him.

And, bit by bit, the tongue withdrew, and only the gaping mouth was
left, and above it a pair of frightened green eyes, transmitting to the
perverse little soul within new impressions and vague terrors.

Before long his left arm went up over his face to shut out the sight of
Grannie's dreadful staring eyes, and when, after a sufficient interval,
he ventured a peep at her and found her eyes still fixed on him, he
howled, "Take it off! Take it off!" and slipped his anchors and slid to
the floor, hunching his back at this tormentor who could beat him on his
own ground.

For that week he gave no trouble to any one. But after it he never went
near Grannie's room, and for years he never spoke to her. When he passed
her open door, or in front of her window, he hunched his shoulder
protectively and averted his eyes.

Resenting control in any shape or form, Tom naturally objected to
school.

His stepmother would have had him go--for his own sake as well as hers.
But his father took a not unusual Sark view of the matter.

"What's the odds?" said he. "He'll have the farm. Book-learning will be
no use to him," and in spite of Nancy's protests--which Tom regarded as
simply the natural outcrop of her ill-will towards him--the boy grew up
untaught and uncontrolled, and knowing none but the worst of all
masters--himself.

On occasion, when the tale of provocation reached its limit, his father
thrashed him, until there came a day when Tom upset the usual course of
proceedings by snatching the stick out of his father's hands, and would
have belaboured him in turn if he had not been promptly knocked down.

After that his father judged it best for all concerned that he should
flight his troublesome wings outside for a while. So he sent him off in
a trading-ship, in the somewhat forlorn hope that a knowledge of the
world would knock some of the devil out of him--a hope which, like many
another, fell short of accomplishment.

The world knocks a good deal out of a man, but it also knocks a good
deal in. Tom came back fro