Page:Lorna Doone - a romance of Exmoor (IA lornadooneromanc691blac).pdf/75

 week), "How like your father you are growing! Jack, come here, and kiss me,"—"oh, mother, if you only knew how much I want a shilling!"

"Jack, you shall never want a shilling while I am alive to give thee one. But what is it for, dear heart, dear heart?"

"To buy something over at Porlock, mother. Perhaps I will tell you afterwards. If I tell not, it will be for your good, and for the sake of the children."

"Bless the boy, one would think he was threescore years of age at least. Give me a little kiss, you Jack, and you shall have the shilling."

For I hated to kiss or be kissed in those days; and so all honest boys must do, when God puts any strength in them. But now I wanted the powder so much, that I went and kissed mother very shyly, looking round the corner first, for Betty not to see me.

But mother gave me half-a-dozen, and only one shilling for all of them; and I could not find it in my heart to ask her for another, although I would have taken it. In very quick time I ran away with the shilling in my pocket, and got Peggy out on the Porlock road without my mother knowing it. For mother was frightened of that road now, as if all the trees were murderers, and would never let me go alone so much as a hundred yards on it. And, to tell the truth, I was touched with fear for many years about it; and even now, when I ride at dark there, a man by a peat-rick makes me shiver, until I go and collar him. But this time I was very bold, having John Fry's