A Christmas Child: A Sketch of a Boy-Life

"I not know for that, Master Ted," said David, "is it all kinds of work; ay, indeed; and I see you very near always busy – dear me, yes; working very good, Master Ted – ay."

"I like to be busy. I wish thoo'd let me help thoo to cut the grass," said Ted, eyeing David wistfully, as he started his big scythe, for the old gardener knew nothing of mowing machines, and would most likely have looked upon them with great contempt. But he stopped short a moment to look down at wee Ted, staring up at him and wishing to be in his place.

"No, indeed, Master Ted bach!" he said; "you soon have your cliver little legs and arms cut to pieces, if you use with my scythe, Master Ted – ay, indeed, d'rectly. It look easy, to be sure, but it not so easy even for a cliver man like you, Master Ted – no, indeed. But I tell you what you shall do. You shall help to make the grass to a heaps, and then I put it in a barrow and wheel it off. Ay, indeed; that be the best."

This proposal was very much to Ted's taste. Chevie and he, at a safe distance from David's scythe, thought it great fun to toss about the soft fine grass and imagine they were helping David tremendously. And after a while, when Chevie began to think he had had enough of it, and with a sort of condescending growl by way of explanation, stretched himself out in the sunshine for a little forenoon sleep, David left off cutting, and, with Ted's help of course, filled the barrow and wheeled it off to the corner where the grass was to lie to be out of the way. It was beginning to be rather hot, though still quite early, and Ted's face grew somewhat red with his exertions as he ran beside David.

"You better ride now; jump in, Master Ted," said the gardener, when his barrow was empty. So he lifted him in and wheeled him back to the lawn, which was quite after Ted's own heart.

"Isn't thoo going to cut with thoo's big scissors?" said Ted after a while.

"It is want oiling," said David, "and I forget to do them. I shall leave the borders till after dinner, – ay, sure," and he was going on with his scything when suddenly a voice was heard from the house calling him.

"David, David, you're wanted," said the voice, and then the cook made her appearance at the side of the house. "There's a note to take to – ."

They could not hear to where, but David had to go. He glanced round him, and, afraid of Ted's experiments, shouldered his scythe and walked off with it for fear of accidents.

"Are you going in, Master Ted?" he asked.

"Nurse is going to call me when she's ready," said Ted composedly, and knowing that the little fellow often played about by himself for a while, good David left him without any more anxiety. He had got his scythe safe, he never thought of the big pair of shears he had left lying in the grass!

Now these gigantic "scissors" as he called them had always had a wonderful attraction for Ted. He used to think how funny they would look beside the very tiny fine pair his mother worked with – the pretty scissors that lay in her little case lined with velvet and satin. Ted had not, in those days, heard of Gulliver and his strange adventures, but if he had, one might have imagined that to his fancy the two pairs of scissors were like a Brobdignag and a Lilliputian. And no sooner had David disappeared than unfortunately the great scissors caught his eyes.

"Zem's still sticked fast," he said to himself. "David says zem needs oil. Wiss I had some oil. P'raps the fissy oil to make Ted grow big would do. But the scissors is big enough. Ted wonders if the fissy oil would make zem bigger. Zem couldn't be much bigger."

Ted laughed a little to himself at the funny fancy. Then he sat and stared at the scissors. What did they remind him of? Ah yes, they were like the shears of "the great, long, red-legged scissor man," in the wonderful story of "Conrad Suck-a-thumb," in his German picture-book. Almost, as he gazed at them, it seemed to Ted that the figure of the scissors man would suddenly dart out from among the bushes and seize his property.

"But him wouldn't cut Ted's fumbs," thought the little man to himself, "'cos Ted never sucks zem. What a pity the scissors is sticked fast! Poor David can't cut with zem. P'raps Ted could oilen zem for poor David! Ted will go and get some fissy oil."

No sooner thought than done. Up jumped Ted, and was starting off to the house when a growl from Cheviott made him stop. The dog had just awakened, and seeing his little master setting off somewhere thought it his business to inquire where to and why. He lifted his head and gave it a sort of sleepy shake, then growled again, but gently of course.

"What did thoo say, Chevie?" said Ted. "Did thoo want to know where I was going? Stay here, Chevie. Ted will be back in a minute – him's on'y going to get some fissy oil to oilen poor David's scissors."

And off he set, though a third growl from Cheviott followed him as he ran.

"What does Chevie mean?" thought Ted. "P'raps him's thinking muzzer said Ted mustn't touch zem big scissors. But muzzer on'y meant Ted wasn't to cutten with zem. Muzzer would like Ted to help poor David," and, his conscience quite at rest, he trotted on contentedly.

CHAPTER III

WISHES AND FEARS

Children. "Here are the nails, and may we help?
Jessie. You shall if I should want help.
Children. Will you want it then?
Please want it – we like helping."

There was no one in the nursery, fortunately for Ted's plans. Unfortunately rather, we should perhaps say, for if nurse had been there, she would have asked for what he wanted the little bottle which had held the cod-liver oil, that he had lately left off taking, but of which a few drops still remained.

Ted climbed on to a chair and reached the shelf where it stood, and in two minutes he was off again, bottle in hand, in triumph. He found Cheviott lying still, where he had left him; he looked up and yawned as Ted appeared, and then growled with an air of satisfaction. It was sometimes a little difficult for Chevie to decide exactly how much care he was to take of Ted. After all, a little two-legged boy that could talk was not quite the same as a lamb, or even a sheep. He could not run round him barking, to prevent his trotting where he wished – there were plainly some things Ted had to do with and understood which Chevie's dog-experience did not reach to.

So Cheviott lay there and blinked his honest eyes in the sunshine, and stared at Ted and wondered what he was after now! For Ted was in a very tip-top state of delight! He sat down cross-legged on the grass, drew the delicious big shears to him – they were heavy for him even to pull – and uncorking the bottle of "fissy" oil, began operations.

"Zem is sticked fast, to be soore," he said to himself, adopting David's favourite expression, as he tugged and tugged in vain. "If thoo could hold one side and Ted the other, they would soon come loosened," he observed to Cheviott. But Cheviott only growled faintly and blinked at his master sleepily, and after a good deal more tugging Ted did manage to open the shears, which indeed at last flew apart so sharply that the boy toppled over with the shock, and rolled for a moment or two on the grass, though happily not on the shears, before he recovered his balance.

Laughing merrily, he pulled himself up again. Luckily the bottle had not been overturned. Ted poured a drop or two carefully on to his fingers, quite regardless of the fishy smell, and proceeded to anoint the scissors. This he repeated several times, polishing them all over till they shone, but not understanding that the place where the oil was needed was the hinge, he directed the best of his attention to the general shininess.

Then he sat and looked at them admiringly.

"Won't David be p'eased?" he said. "Zem's oilened all over now. Ted must see if they don't sticken fast now."

With nearly as much difficulty as he had had to open them, Ted now managed to shut them.

"Zem's better," thought the busy little man, "but Ted must see how they cut."

He laid them flat on the grass, at a place where the blades had not been completely sheared by the scythe. Tug number one – the oil had really done some good, they opened more easily – tug number two, behold them gaping – tug number three, they bite the grass, and Ted is just going to shout in triumph when a quick shock of pain stabs through him. He had been kneeling almost on the shears, and their cruel jaws had snipped, with the grass, the tender fleshy part of his poor little leg!

It was not the pain that frightened him so much as the feeling held fast by the now dreadful scissors.

"David, David," he cried, "oh, please come. Nurse, please come. Ted has cuttened hisself."

His little voice sounded clear and shrill in the summer quiet of the peaceful garden, and nurse, who had been hastening to come out to him, heard it from the open window. David too was on his way back, and poor Ted was soon released. But it was a bad cut – he had to be carried into the house to have it bathed and sponged and tenderly bound up by mother's fingers. He left off crying when he saw how sorry mother looked.

"Ted is so sorry to t'ouble thoo," he said.

"And mother is sorry for Ted," she replied. "But, my dear little boy," she went on, when the poor leg was comfortable and its owner forgetting its pain on mother's knee, "don't you remember that mother told you not to touch David's tools?"

"Oh ses," he replied. "Ted wouldn't touch zem for hisself, but it was to help David," and the innocent confidence with which he looked up in her face went to his mother's heart.

"But still, dear Ted, you must try to understand that what mother says, you must do exactly. Mother likes you to be kind and helping to people, but still mother knows better than you, and that is why, when she tells you things, you must remember to do what she says."

Ted looked grave and a little puzzled, and seeing this his mother thought it best to say no more just then. The lesson of obedience was one that Ted found rather puzzling, you see, but what his mother had said had made a mark in his mind. He thought about it often, and as he grew bigger other things happened, as you will hear, to make him think of it still more.

It was rather a trial to Ted not to be able to run about as usual that afternoon, for had he done so, the cut might have begun to bleed again, so he had to sit still in the nursery, looking out at the window and hoping and hoping that Percy would soon come back. Once David and his barrow passed underneath, and the gardener called up to know if Master Ted's leg was better. Ted shook his head rather dolefully.

"Him's better," he said, "but Ted can't run about. Ted's so sad, David. Muzzer's got letters to write and Percy's out."

A kind thought struck David. He went round to the drawing-room window and tapped at it gently. Ted's mother was writing there. Might he wheel Master Ted in his barrow to the part of the garden where he was working? – he would take good care of him – "the little gentleman never cut himself if I with him – no, indeed; I make him safe enough."

And Ted's mother consented gladly. So in a few minutes he was comfortably installed on a nice heap of dry grass, with Cheviott close beside him and David near at hand.

"You never touch my tools again, Master Ted, for a bit; no, to be sure; do you now?" said David.

"No," said Ted. "Muzzer says I mustn't. But wasn't the big scissors nicely oilened, David?"

"Oh, fust rate – ay," said David. "Though I not say it is a cliver smell – no. I not like the smell, Master Ted."

"Never mind," replied Ted reassuringly. "Ted will ask muzzer for some cock-alone for thoo. Thoo can put some on the scissors."

"What's that, Master Ted?" inquired David, who was not at all above getting information out of his little master.