stay grew stronger and stronger, the more he recalled the comfort
and kindness he had known here, the hardship and neglect he had
felt elsewhere. He knew they tried to help him, and at the bottom
of his heart he was grateful, but his rough life had made him hard
and careless, suspicious and wilful. He hated restraint of any sort,
and fought against it like an untamed creature, even while he knew
it was kindly meant, and dimly felt that he would be the better for
it. He made up his mind to be turned adrift again, to knock about
the city as he had done nearly all his life; a prospect that made him
knit his black brows, and look about the cosy little room with a
wistful expression that would have touched a much harder heart
than Mr. Bhaer’s if he had seen it. It vanished instantly, however,
when the good man came in, and said in his accustomed grave
way,
“I have heard all about it, Dan, and though you have broken the
rules again, I am going to give you one more trial, to please
Mother Bhaer.”
Dan flushed up to his forehead at this unexpected reprieve, but he
only said in his gruff way,
“I didn’t know there was any rule about bull-fighting.”
“As I never expected to have any at Plumfield, I never did make
such a rule,” answered Mr. Bhaer, smiling in spite of himself at the
boy’s excuse. Then he added gravely, “But one of the first and most
important of our few laws is the law of kindness to every dumb
creature on the place. I want everybody and everything to be happy
here, to love and trust, and serve us, as we try to love and trust and
serve them faithfully and willingly. I have often said that you were
kinder to the animals than any of the other boys, and Mrs. Bhaer
liked that trait in you very much, because she thought it showed a
good heart. But you have disappointed us in that, and we are sorry,
for we hoped to make you quite one of us. Shall we try again?”
Dan’s eyes had been on the floor, and his hands nervously picking
at the bit of wood he had been whittling as Mr. Bhaer came in, but
when he heard the kind voice ask that question, he looked up
quickly, and said in a more respectful tone than he had ever used
before,
“Yes, please.”
“Very well, then, we will say no more, only you will stay at home
from the walk to-morrow, as the other boys will and all of you
must wait on poor Buttercup till she is well again.”
“I will.”
“Now, go down to supper, and do your best, my boy, more for your
own sake than for ours.” Then Mr. Bhaer shook hands with him,
and Dan went down more tamed by kindness than he would have
been by the good whipping which Asia had strongly
recommended.
Dan did try for a day or two, but not being used to it, he soon tired
and relapsed into his old wilful ways. Mr. Bhaer was called from
home on business one day, and the boys had no lessons. They liked
this, and played hard till bedtime, when most of them turned in
and slept like dormice. Dan, however, had a plan in his head, and
when he and Nat were alone, he unfolded it.
“Look here!” he said, taking from under his bed a bottle, a cigar,
and a pack of cards, “I’m going to have some fun, and do as I used
to with the fellows in town. Here’s some beer, I got if of the old
man at the station, and this cigar; you can pay for ’em or Tommy
will, he’s got heaps of money and I haven’t a cent. I’m going to ask
him in; no, you go, they won’t mind you.”
“The folks won’t like it,” began Nat.
“They won’t know. Daddy Bhaer is away, and Mrs. Bhaer’s busy
with Ted; he’s got croup or something, and she can’t leave him. We
shan’t sit up late or make any noise, so where’s the harm?”