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“I’m sure I sha’n’t,” said Polly, who was equally well informed as to the position of affairs at headquarters. “Go, if you dare.”

“I won’t if you want me not,” said Harry, discreetly waiving the question of apologies.

“But I’d rather you went,” said the obdurate Polly. “You’re always telling tales. Go and tell now, if you’re not afraid.”

So Harry went. But at the bottom of the stairs he lingered again, and was meditating how to return with most credit to his dignity, when Polly’s face appeared through the banisters, and Polly’s sharp tongue goaded him on.

“Ah! I see you. You’re stopping. You daren’t go.”

“I dare,” said Harry; and at last he went.

As he turned the handle of the door, Mr. Skratdj turned round.

“Please, Papa—-” Harry began.

“Get away with you!” cried Mr. Skratdj. “Didn’t I tell you I was not to be disturbed this morning? What an extraor—-“

But Harry had shut the door, and withdrawn precipitately.

Once outside, he returned to the nursery with dignified steps, and an air of apparent satisfaction, saying,

“You’re to give me the bricks, please.”

“Who says so?”

“Why, who should say so? Where have I been, pray?”

“I don’t know, and I don’t care.”

“I’ve been to Papa. There!”

“Did he say I was to give up the bricks?”

“I’ve told you.”

“No, you’ve not.”

“I sha’n’t tell you any more.”

“Then I’ll go to Papa and ask.”

“Go by all means.”

“I won’t if you’ll tell me truly.”

“I sha’n’t tell you anything. Go and ask, if you dare,” said Harry, only too glad to have the tables turned.

Polly’s expedition met with the same fate, and she attempted to cover her retreat in a similar manner.

“Ah! you didn’t tell.”

“I don’t believe you asked Papa.”

“Don’t you? Very well!”

“Well, did you?”

“Never mind.”

Etc., etc., etc.

Meanwhile Mr. Skratdj scolded Mrs. Skratdj for not keeping the children in better order. And Mrs. Skratdj said it was quite impossible to do so when Mr. Skratdj spoilt Harry as he did, and weakened her (Mrs. Skratdj’s) authority by constant interference.

Difference of sex gave point to many of these nursery squabbles, as it so often does to domestic broils.

“Boys never will do what they’re asked,” Polly would complain.

“Girls ask such unreasonable things,” was Harry’s retort.

“Not half so unreasonable as the things you ask.”

“Ah! that’s a different thing! Women have got to do what men tell them, whether it’s reasonable or not.”

“No, they’ve not!” said Polly. “At least, that’s only husbands and wives.”

“All women are inferior animals,” said Harry.

“Try ordering Mamma to do what you want, and see!” said Polly.

“Men have got to give orders, and women have to obey,” said Harry, falling back on the general principle. “And when I get a wife, I’ll take care I make her do what I tell her. But you’ll have to obey your husband when you get one.”

“I won’t have a husband, and then I can do as I like.”

“Oh, won’t you? You’ll try to get one, I know. Girls always want to be married.”

“I’m sure I don’t know why,” said Polly; “they must have had enough of men if they have brothers.”

And so they went on, ad infinitum, with ceaseless arguments that proved nothing and convinced nobody, and a continual stream of contradiction that just fell short of downright quarrelling.

Indeed, there was a kind of snapping even less near to a dispute than in the cases just mentioned. The little Skratdjs, like some other children, were under the unfortunate delusion that it sounds clever to hear little boys and girls snap each other up with smart sayings, and old and rather vulgar play upon words, such as:

“I’ll give you a Christmas box. Which ear will you have it on?”

“I won’t stand it.”

“Pray take a chair.”

“You shall have it to-morrow.”

“To-morrow never comes.”

And so if a visitor kindly began to talk to one of the children, another was sure to draw near and “take up” all the first child’s answers, with smart comments, and catches that sounded as silly as they were tiresome and impertinent.