And, as
I said, it was half-past four as they hastened up the path again
to the top gate of the Barracks.
"I hope he's been good," Judy said, as she turned the handle.
"Yes, you come, too, Pip"--for that young gentleman hung back one
agonized second. "Twenty kicks or blows divided by two only make
ten, you see."
They went up the long stone veranda and stopped at one door.
There was a little knot of young officers laughing and talking
close by.
"Take my word, 'twas as good as a play to see Wooly grabbing his
youngster, and stuffing it into a cab, and getting in himself, all
with a look of ponderous injured dignity," one said, and laughed
at the recollection.
Another blew away a cloud of cigar smoke. "It was a jolly little
beggar," he said. "It doubled its fists and landed His High
Mightiness one in the eye; and then its shoe dropped off, and
we all rushed to pick it up, and it was muddy and generally
dilapidated, and old Wooly went red slowly up to his ear-tips as
he tried to put it on."
A little figure stepped into the middle of the group--a little
figure with an impossibly short and shabby ulster, thin
black-stockinged legs, and a big hat crushed over a tangle of
curls.
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