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“I want to sit beside you,” he said, when he’d got it.

“Do you? I don’t want you. Haven’t you got all the rest of the carriage?”

“Lift Tommy up,” he whined.

I’d a good mind to chuck him out of the window.

“Lift yourself up,” I said, “and shut up. I want to read.” Then I’m bothered if the young cad didn’t begin yelling! Just because I didn’t lift him up. I never saw such a blub-baby in all my life. I couldn’t make out what he was up to at first. I thought he was curtseying and seeing how long he could hold his breath. But when it did come out, my eye! I thought the engine-driver would hear. I was in a regular funk; I thought he’d got a fit or something; I never heard such yelling. He was black in the face over it, and dancing. I’d a good mind to pull the cord and stop the train. But I thought I’d see if I could pull him round first.

So I picked him up and stuck him up on the seat. Would you believe it, Jossy? The moment he was up he stopped howling and began grinning. It had all been a plant to get me to lift him up; and as soon as he’d made me do it he laughed at me!

I can tell you it’s not pleasant to be made a fool of, even by a kid.

“I’m sitting beside you now,” he said, as much as to tell me he’d scored one off me.

I was too disgusted to take any further notice of him. I suppose he saw I was riled, and began to be a bit civil. He pulled a nasty sticky bit of chocolate out of his pocket and held it up to my nose.

“A sweetie for you,” he said.

I didn’t want to have him yelling again, so I took it. Ugh!–all over dust and hairs, and half melted.

He watched me gulp it down, and then, to my relief, got hold of the Boy’s Own Paper and began looking at the pictures. He got sick of that soon, and went and looked out of the window. Then he came and sat by me again, and began to get jolly familiar. He stroked my cheeks with his horrid sticky hand, and then climbed up on the seat and tried to lark with my cap. Then just because I didn’t shut him up, he clambered up on my back and nearly throttled me with his arms round my neck; and– what do you think?–he began to kiss me!

That was a drop too much.

“Stow it, kid!” I said.

“Dear, dear!” he said, getting regularly maudlin, and kissing me at about two a second.

“Let go, do you hear? you’re scrugging me.”

“Nice mannie,” he said.

I didn’t know what to do until I luckily thought of my grub.

“Like a bun?” said I.

He let me go and was down beside me like a shot. You should have seen him walk into that bun! His face was all over it, and the crumbs were about an inch deep all over the place. When he got near the end of bun Number 1, he looked up as near choking as they make them, and said–

“I like buns awfully.”

“All right, have another,” said I. You see as his governor was going to meet him in town, it didn’t matter much to me if he got gripes at night. Anything to keep him quiet.

After the third bun he was about full up, and said he was thirsty. I couldn’t make the young ass understand that I had no water in the carriage. He kept on saying he was thirsty for half an hour, till we came to a station. I had made up my mind I would get into another carriage at the first stop we came to; but, somehow, it seemed rather low to leave the kid in the lurch. So I bought him a glass of milk instead, which set him up again. Nobody else got in the carriage–knew better–and off we went again.