"But would your father mind?" "Not he. He'll go ashore as soon as we make fast for the night and lets the horses loose to feed. He wouldn't mind." And so it turned out, for the barge was made fast to a couple of stout posts in a wider part of the canal, close to a lock where there was a public-house. The horses were turned out to graze on the thick grass beside the tow-path, and after a little hesitation I took my bundle and shoes and crept in beneath a tarpaulin raised up in the middle to make quite a tent, which Jack had contrived in the fore port of the barge. "Ain't it jolly and snug?" he cried. "Ye-es," I replied. "On'y it won't do to stop in when the sun gets on it, 'cos it's so hot and sticky. I like it. Feyther can't kick you here." This was a revelation. I had been thinking Jack's life must be one of perfect bliss. "Does your father kick you, then?" "Not now. He used to when he came home after being to the public, when he was cross; but he didn't mean nothing. Feyther's werry fond o' me. I wouldn't go back to sleep in the cabin now for no money." Jack's conversation suddenly stopped, and I knew by his hard breathing that he was asleep: but I lay awake for some time, peering out through a little hole left by the tarpaulin folds at the stars, thinking of Mr Blakeford and his pursuit; of what Mary would say when she read my letter; and from time to time I changed the position of my bundle, to try and turn it into a comfortable pillow; but, try how I would, it seemed as if the heel of one or other of my shoes insisted upon getting under my ear, and I dropped asleep at last, dreaming that they were walking all over my head. CHAPTER ELEVEN. MY VAGABOND LIFE COMES TO AN END. Somehow or other that idea about my boots being in antagonism to me seemed to pervade the whole of my slumbers till morning, when one of them, I fancied, had turned terribly vicious, and was kicking me hard in the side. I could not move, and the kicking seemed to go on, till a more vigorous blow than before roused me to consciousness; but still for a few moments I could not make out where I was, only that it was very dark and stuffy, and that. I felt stiff and sore. Just then a gruff voice awoke my mind as well as my body, and I found that some one was administering heavy pokes through the tarpaulin with what seemed to be a piece of wood. "All right, feyther," cried Jack just then; and as we scrambled out from beneath the tent I found it was grey dawn, that a heavy mist hung over the river, and that Jack's father had been poking at the tarpaulin with the end of a hitcher, the long iron-shod pole used in navigating the barge. "Going to lie abed all day?" he growled. "Git them horses to." "Come along, matey; never mind your boots," cried Jack, and he leaped ashore.