"I dunno. If 'e's under the daisies I shan't like it--I tell you straight I shan't like it. But we're a long-lived stock--p'raps 'e's all right. I dunno." "Shall I go up by myself to where he lives and see if he's all right?" "Not much," said Mr. Beale; "if I goes I goes, and if I stays away I stays away. It's just the not being able to make me mind up." "If he's there," said Dickie, "don't you think you _ought_ to go, just on the chance of him being there and wanting you?" "If you come to oughts," said Beale, "I oughter gone 'ome any time this twenty year. Only I ain't. See?" "Well," said Dickie, "it's your lookout. I know what I should do if it was me." Remembrance showed him the father who had leaned on his shoulder as they walked about the winding walks of the pleasant garden in old Deptford--the father who had given him the little horse, and insisted that his twenty gold pieces should be spent as he chose. "I dunno," said Beale. "What you think? Eh, matey?" "I think _let's_," said Dickie. "I lay if he's alive it 'ud be as good as three Sundays in the week to him to see you. You was his little boy once, wasn't you?" "Ay," said Beale; "he was wagoner's mate to one of Lord Arden's men. 'E used to ride me on the big cart-horses. 'E was a fine set-up chap." To hear the name of Arden on Beale's lips gave Dickie a very odd, half-pleasant, half-frightened feeling. It seemed to bring certain things very near. "Let's," he said again. "All right," said Beale, "only if it all goes wrong it ain't my fault--an' there used to be a foot-path a bit further on. You cut through the copse and cater across the eleven-acre medder, and bear along to the left by the hedge an' it brings you out under Arden Knoll, where my old man's place is." So they cut and catered and bore along, and came out under Arden Knoll, and there was a cottage, with a very neat garden full of gay flowers, and a brick pathway leading from the wooden gate to the front door. And by the front door sat an old man in a Windsor chair, with a brown spaniel at his feet and a bird in a wicker cage above his head, and he was nodding, for it was a hot day, and he was an old man and tired. "Swelp me, I can't do it!" whispered Beale. "I'll walk on a bit. You just arst for a drink, and sort of see 'ow the land lays. It might turn 'im up seeing me so sudden. Good old dad!" He walked quickly on, and Dickie was left standing by the gate. Then the brown spaniel became aware of True, and barked, and the old man said, "Down, Trusty!" in his sleep, and then woke up. His clear old eyes set in many wrinkles turned full on Dickie by the gate. "May I have a drink of water?" Dickie asked. "Come in," said the old man. And Dickie lifted the latch of smooth, brown, sun-warmed iron, and went up the brick path, as the old man slowly turned himself about in the chair. "Yonder's the well," he said; "draw up a bucket, if thy leg'll let thee, poor little chap!"