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The Peace Egg
by
“Have you spoken to your mistress?” asked the Captain.
“Yes, sir,” said Sarah. “And misses spoke to him, and he promised not to go round the guards again.”
“Has he broken his promise?” asked the Captain, with a look of anger and also surprise.
“When I opened the door last night, sir,” continued Sarah, in her shrill treble, “what should I see in the dark but Master Robert a-walking up and down with the carpet-brush stuck in his arm. ‘Who goes there?’ says he. ‘You owdacious boy!’ says I. ‘Didn’t you promise your ma you’d leave off them tricks?’ ‘I’m not going round the guards,’ says he; ‘I promised not. But I’m for sentry-duty to-night.’ And say what I would to him, all he had for me was, ‘You mustn’t speak to a sentry on duty.’ So I says, ‘As sure as I live till morning, I’ll go to your pa,’ for he pays no more attention to his ma than me, nor to any one else.”
“Please to see that the chair-bed in my dressing-room is moved into your mistress’s bed-room,” said the Captain. “I will attend to Master Robert.”
With this Sarah had to content herself, and she went back to the nursery. Robert was nowhere to be seen, and made no reply to her summons. On this the unwary nursemaid flounced into the bed-room to look for him, when Robert, who was hidden beneath a table, darted forth and promptly locked her in.
“You’re under arrest,” he shouted through the keyhole.
“Let me out!” shrieked Sarah.
“I’ll send a file of the guard to fetch you to the orderly-room by-and-by,” said Robert, “for ‘preferring frivolous complaints,'” and he departed to the farmyard to look at the ducks.
That night, when Robert went up to bed, the Captain quietly locked him into his dressing-room, from which the bed had been removed.
“You’re for sentry-duty to-night,” said the captain, “The carpet-brush is in the corner. Good-evening.”
As his father anticipated, Robert was soon tired of the sentry game in these new circumstances, and long before the night had half worn away he wished himself safely undressed and in his own comfortable bed. At half-past twelve o’clock he felt as if he could bear it no longer, and knocked at the Captain’s door.
“Who goes there?” said the Captain.
“Mayn’t I go to bed, please?” whined poor Robert.
“Certainly not,” said the Captain. “You’re on duty.”
And on duty poor Robert had to remain, for the Captain had a will as well as his son. So he rolled himself up in his father’s railway rug and slept on the floor.
The next night he was glad to go quietly to bed, and remain there.
IV.
The Captain’s children sat at breakfast in a large, bright nursery. It was the room where the old bachelor had died, and now her children made it merry. This is just what he would have wished.
They all sat round the table, for it was breakfast-time. There were five of them, and five bowls of boiled bread-and-milk smoked before them. Sarah, a foolish, gossiping girl, who acted as nurse till better could be found, was waiting on them, and by the table sat Darkie, the black retriever, his long, curly back swaying slightly from the difficulty of holding himself up, and his solemn hazel eyes fixed very intently on each and all of the breakfast bowls. He was as silent and sagacious as Sarah was talkative and empty-headed. The expression of his face was that of King Charles I. as painted by Vandyke. Though large, he was unassuming. Pax, the pug, on the contrary, who came up to the first joint of Darkie’s leg, stood defiantly on his dignity and his short stumps. He always placed himself in front of the bigger dog, and made a point of hustling him in door-ways and of going first down stairs. He strutted like a beadle, and carried his tail more tightly curled than a bishop’s crook. He looked as one may imagine the frog in the fable would have looked had he been able to swell himself rather nearer to the size of the ox. This was partly due to his very prominent eyes, and partly to an obesity favored by habits of lying inside the fender, and of eating meals proportioned more to his consequence than to his hunger. They were both favorites of two years’ standing, and had very nearly been given away, when the good news came of an English home for the family, dogs and all.