nhealthy: and, come to think of it,
with his life in the lease, 'tis only due to ourselves to advise the
woman." She only said this to ease her feelings: but the truth was (and
William John knew it) she yearned for a child of her own, even to the
extent sometimes of wanting to adopt one.

Well, this terrible accident not only widowed the poor soul, but brought
all her little jealousies, as you might say, home to roost. She couldn't
abide Nandy, and Nandy had reached an age when boys aren't at their best.
But adopt him she had to; and, what tried her worse, she was forced to
look after his health with more than a mother's care. For, outside of a
stockingful of guineas, all her capital was sunk in Merry-Garden, and all
Merry-Garden hung now on the boy's life.

The worst trial of all was that, somehow or other, Nandy got to know his
value and the reason of it, and from that day he gave Aunt Barbree no
peace. He wouldn't go to school; study gave him a headache. His mother
had taught him to read and write, but under Aunt Barbree's roof he learned
no more than he was minded to, and among the things he taught himself was
a tolerable imitation of a hacking cough. With this and the help of a
hollow tooth he could spit blood whenever he wanted a shilling.
He played this game for about six months, until the poor woman--who was
losing flesh with lying awake at night and wondering what would happen to
her when cast out in the cold world--fixed up her courage to know the
worst, and carried him off to a Plymouth doctor. The doctor advised her
to take the boy home and give him the strap.

Aunt Barbree applied this treatment for a time, but dropped it in the end.
The boy was growing too tall for it. The visit to the doctor, however,
worked like a miracle in one way.

"Auntie," said the penitent one day, "I'm feeling a different boy
altogether, this last week or two."

"I reckoned you would," said Aunt Barbree.

"My appetite's improving. Have you noticed my appetite?"

"Heaven is my witness!" said Aunt Barbree. The cherry season was
beginning. She had consulted with a friend of hers in Saltash, the wife
of a confectioner. It seems that apprentices in the confectionery trade
are allowed to eat pastry and lollypops without let or hindrance, until
they take a surfeit and are cured for ever after. Aunt Barbree was
beginning to wonder why the cure worked so slow in the case of fresh
fruit. "Heaven is my witness, I _have!_