Читать книгу Prince Dusty. A Story of the Oil Regions онлайн

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Mr. John Dustin, who sat smoking his evening pipe by an open window, rarely interfered with his wife’s management of the children; but now he spoke up saying:

“That won’t do, wife; you only gave the boy bread and water for his dinner, and it won’t do to send him to bed without any supper. I believe in proper punishment, where it is deserved, as much as anybody; but when it comes to starving, that’s quite another thing. It shall never be said that my brother Richard’s only son was starved in his uncle’s house. So give the boy his supper, and plenty of it. Then you can send him to bed if you see fit.”

Mrs. Dustin knew that when her husband spoke in this tone he meant to be obeyed; so, without a word, she set a plain but bountiful meal before Arthur. From a long experience of bread-and-water punishments and supperless nights the boy was wise enough to eat heartily all that he possibly could, in spite of his heavy heart. He ate in silence, and for some time nobody else spoke; only Dick, who sat at the farther end of the room with the other children, chuckled and made faces behind Arthur’s back, for the benefit, and to the huge delight, of his companions. He was greatly pleased at the result of his tale-bearing; for it was he who, overhearing Arthur tell Cynthia that he had been well-shooting with Brace Barlow, had hurried to the house, and repeated the information, with some picturesque additions of his own devising, to his mother.