Benny so."
"Oh, you want it too, do you?" roared he. "Then take that, and that, and that."
"Faather," said Benny, "will you strike Nell?"
The question for a moment seemed to stagger him, and he looked down upon the pleading face of his suffering child, and into those great round eyes that were full of pain and tears, and the hand that was raised to strike fell powerless to his side, and with a groan he turned away.
What was there in the face of his little daughter that touched this cruel, besotted man? We cannot tell. Perhaps he caught a glimpse in that sweet face of his early love.
It is said that he loved his first wife dearly, and that while she lived he was tolerably steady, and was never unkind to her. He even went with her to the house of prayer, and listened to her while she read the Bible aloud during winter evenings. These were happy days, but when she died all this was changed; he tried to forget his trouble in drink, and in the companionship of the lowest and most degraded men and women.
Then he married again, a coarse drunken woman, who had ever since led him a wretched life; and every year he had become more drunken and vicious.
If he yet loved anything in the world, it was his "little Nell," as he always called her. She was wonderfully like her mother, the neighbours said, and that was doubtless the reason why Dick Bates continued to love her when all love for everything else had died out of his heart.
He had never treated her before as he had treated her to-night; it was a new experience to the child, and for long after she lay on her heap of shavings with dry eyes and hot cheeks, staring into vacancy.
But when the last spark of fire had died out, and her father and stepmother were asleep in the room above, turning to her brother, who was still awake, she said,
"Put your arm about me, Benny, will yer?"
And Benny put his arm around his little sister, and pressed her face to his bosom. And then the fountain of the child's tears was broken up, and she wept as though her heart would break, and great sobs shook her little frame, and broke the silence of the night.
Benny silently kissed away the tears, and tried to comfort the little breaking heart. After awhile she grew calm, and Benny grew resolute.
"I's not going to stand this no longer," he said.
"What will you do, Benny?"
"Do? Well, I dunno, yet; but I's bound to do some'at, an' I will too."
After awhile he spoke again. "I say, Nell, ain't yer hungry? for I is. I believe I could eat a grave-stun."
"I was hungry afore faather beat me, but I doesna feel it now," was the reply.
"Well, I seen where mother put the bread an' butter, and if I dunna fork the lot I's not Ben Bates."
"But how will yer get to it, Benny?"
"Aisy 'nough, on'y you must 'elp me."
So without much noise they moved the table into the corner of the room underneath the cupboard, and placing the chair on the top of the table, Benny mounted the top, and was able to reach the cupboard without difficulty.
A fair share of the loaf remained, and "heaps of butter," Benny said.
"Now, Nell," said he, "we'll 'ave a feast."
And a feast they did have, according to Benny's thinking, for very little of either loaf or butter remained when they had finished their repast.
"What will mother say when she finds out?" said Nelly, when they had again lain down.
"We must be off afore she wakes, Nell, and never come back no more."
"Dost 'a mean it, Benny?"
"Ay do I. We mun take all our traps wi' us i' t' morning."
"Where shall us go?"
"Never fear, we'll find a shop somewheres, an' anywheres is better nor this."
"Ay, that's so."
"Now, Nell, we mun sleep a bit, 'cause as how we'll 'ave to be stirring airly."
And soon the brother and sister were fast asleep, locked in each other's arms.
CHAPTER III.
Roughing it
Ne'er saw I, never felt a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God, the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still.
Next morning Benny was stirring early, and when the first faint rays of the coming day peeped through the dust-begrimed and patched-up window, they saw the little fellow busily engaged in gathering together what things he and Nelly possessed previous to their final departure from home.
Nelly still slept on, and several times the brother paused and looked fondly down upon the fair face of the sleeping child. She looked very beautiful, Benny thought, as she lay sleeping there, with a pink spot glowing on either cheek, and the long flaxen hair thrown carelessly back from the pale forehead. Once or twice she murmured in her sheep, and the same happy smile spread over her face that he had noticed the evening before when she sat gazing into Joe Wrag's fire.
"I wonder what she's a-dreamin' on?" he murmured to himself. "Perhaps she sees the hills and flowers and trees agin."
Then he set to work again turning over a heap of rubbish that had been pushed as far back as possible under the stairs. At length a joyful exclamation burst from his lips as he came upon a small heap of potatoes.
"Here's a fortin', an' no mistake; Nell and I'll be able to walk off the lot."
And he brought them out into the room, and wrapped them up in an old handkerchief that his stepmother used to tie round her head when she went out. There were scarcely twenty potatoes altogether, but to Benny they seemed almost an inexhaustible supply.
This being done, he sat down beside his sleeping sister and waited until he should hear any movement in the room above. Gradually the cold grey light of the morning stole into the room, revealing all its squalor and dinginess, and Benny felt that he and Nelly would have to make their escape soon, or else they might be prevented. He felt very loth to awake his sister, she slept so sweetly, and he did not know where they might find a shelter when darkness covered the earth again. But there was no help for it. His father might awake any moment, and the neighbours would soon be stirring in the court and in Bowker's Row. So bending over her, he pressed his lips upon her brow: still she moved not.
"Nelly," he whispered, "it's time to be movin'."
Slowly the great round eyes opened, and looked languidly up into his face.
"Come, stir your pegs, Nell, or we'll be too late."
"Oh, ay," she said, as the recollection of the previous evening came back to her. "We 'as to be off to-day, ain't we?"
"Ay, my gal, we's goin' on our own 'ook now, so look alive."
"Does yer think we's doin' right, Benny?"
"'Course
