He paid the penny, threw aside his cap, and took the gun, though after all it was only a sham one, and what a miss he made!  What business had every one to set up that great hoarse laugh? which made him so angry that he had nearly turned on Dick and cuffed him for his pains.

However, he was the more bent on trying again, and the owner of the gallery shewed him how to manage better.  He hit anything but the middle of the star, and just saw how he thought he might hit next time.  Next time was barely a miss, so that the man actually gave him a gin-drop to encourage him.  That made him mad to meet with real success; but it was the turn of another ‘young gent,’ as the man called him, and Harold had to stand by, with his penny in his hand, burning with impatience, and fancying he could mend each shot of that young gent, and another, and another, and another, who all thrust in to claim their rights before him.  His turn came at last; and so short and straight was the gallery, that he really did hit once the side of the star, and once the middle, and thus gained one gingerbread-nut, and three of the gin-drops.

It would have been his nature to share them with Alfred, but he could not do so without saying where he had been, and that he could not do, so he gave one to Dick, and swallowed the rest to keep out the cold.

Just then the town clock struck six, and frightened him.  He had been there three-quarters of an hour.  What would they say at the post-office?

The clerk looked out of his hole as angry as clerk could look.  ’This won’t do, King,’ he said.  ’Late for sorting!  Fine, remember—­near an hour after time.’

‘Pony cast a shoe, Sir,’ said Harold.  He had never been so near a downright falsehood.

’Whew!  Then I suppose I must not report you this time!  But look out!  You’re getting slack.’

No time this for borrowing of the clerk.  Harold was really frightened, for he had dawdled much more than he ought of late, and though he sometimes fancied himself sick of the whole post business, a complaint to his mother would be a dreadful matter.  It put everything else out of his head; and he ran off in great haste to get the money from Betsey Hardman, knocking loud at her green door.

What a cloud of steamy heat the room was, with the fire glowing like a red furnace, and five black irons standing up before it; and clothes-baskets full of heaps of whiteness, and horses with vapoury webs of lace and cambric hanging on them; and the three ironing-boards, where smoothness ran along with the irons; and the heaps of folded clothes; and Betsey in her white apron, broad and red in the midst of her maidens!

’Ha!  Harold King!  Well, to be sure, you are a stranger!  Don’t come nigh that there hoss; it’s Mrs. Parnell’s best pocket-handkerchiefs, real Walencines!’ (she meant Valenciennes.) ’If you’ll just run up and see Mother, I’ll have it out of the way, and we’ll have a cup of tea.’