kins,
whose business it was to collect the skins which my father had bought
from the farmers round about. A distinct vision presented itself to me
of Bill and his cart, from which dangled the sanguinary exuviae of
defunct animals, while in front the said Bill sat enthroned,
dirty-clad, and dirty-handed, with his pipe in his mouth. The idea of
John Halifax in such a position was not agreeable.

"But, father--"

He read deprecation in my looks--alas! he knew too well how I disliked
the tan-yard and all belonging to it. "Thee'rt a fool, and the lad's
another. He may go about his business for me."

"But, father, isn't there anything else?"

"I have nothing else, or if I had I wouldn't give it. He that will not
work neither shall he eat."

"I will work," said John, sturdily--he had listened, scarcely
comprehending, to my father and me. "I don't care what it is, if only
it's honest work."

Abel Fletcher was mollified. He turned his back on me--but that I
little minded--and addressed himself solely to John Halifax.

"Canst thee drive?"

"That I can!" and his eyes brightened with boyish delight.

"Tut! it's only a cart--the cart with the skins. Dost thee know
anything of tanning?"

"No, but I can learn."

"Hey, not so fast! still, better be fast than slow. In the meantime,
thee can drive the cart."

"Thank you, sir--Abel Fletcher, I mean--I'll do it well. That is, as
well as I can."

"And mind! no stopping on the road. No drinking, to find the king's
cursed shilling at the bottom of the glass, like poor Bill, for thy
mother to come crying and pestering. Thee hasn't got one, eh? So much
the better, all women are born fools, especially mothers."

"Sir!" The lad's face was all crimson and quivering; his voice choked;
it was with difficulty he smothered down a burst of tears. Perhaps this
self-control was more moving than if he had wept--at least, it answered
better with my father.

After a few minutes more, during which his stick had made a little
grave in the middle of the walk, and buried something there--I think
something besides the pebble--Abel Fletcher said, not unkindly:

"Well, I'll take thee; though it isn't often I take a lad without a
character of some sort--I suppose thee hast none."

"None," was the answer, while the straightforward, steady gaze which
accompanied it unconsciously contradicted the statement; his own honest
face was the lad's best witness--at all events I thought so.