"What's his name!"

"I don't know his name."

"Where does he live?"

"I don't know."

"How can you count him, then?"

"He did talk to me, and very kindlike too."

His father laughed again.

"Why, child, you're just counting everybody you know. That don't make 'em friends."

"Don't it? I thought it did. Well, but they shall be my friends. I shall make 'em."

"How will you do that?"

"They can't help themselves then, if they would. If I choose to be their friend, you know, they can't prevent me. Then there's that girl at the crossing."

"A fine set of friends you do have, to be sure, Diamond!"

"Surely she's a friend anyhow, father. If it hadn't been for her, you would never have got Mrs. Coleman and Miss Coleman to carry home."

His father was silent, for he saw that Diamond was right, and was ashamed to find himself more ungrateful than he had thought.

"Then there's the new gentleman," Diamond went on.

"If he do as he say," interposed his father.

"And why shouldn't he? I daresay sixpence ain't too much for him to spare. But I don't quite understand, father: is n.o.body your friend but the one that does something for you?"

"No, I won't say that, my boy. You would have to leave out baby then."

"Oh no, I shouldn't. Baby can laugh in your face, and crow in your ears, and make you feel so happy. Call you that nothing, father?"

The father's heart was fairly touched now. He made no answer to this last appeal, and Diamond ended off with saying:

"And there's the best of mine to come yet--and that's you, daddy--except it be mother, you know. You're my friend, daddy, ain't you? And I'm your friend, ain't I?"

"And G.o.d for us all," said his father, and then they were both silent for that was very solemn.

CHAPTER XX. DIAMOND LEARNS TO READ

THE question of the tall gentleman as to whether Diamond could read or not set his father thinking it was high time he could; and as soon as old Diamond was suppered and bedded, he began the task that very night.

But it was not much of a task to Diamond, for his father took for his lesson-book those very rhymes his mother had picked up on the sea-sh.o.r.e; and as Diamond was not beginning too soon, he learned very fast indeed.

Within a month he was able to spell out most of the verses for himself.

But he had never come upon the poem he thought he had heard his mother read from it that day. He had looked through and through the book several times after he knew the letters and a few words, fancying he could tell the look of it, but had always failed to find one more like it than another. So he wisely gave up the search till he could really read. Then he resolved to begin at the beginning, and read them all straight through. This took him nearly a fortnight. When he had almost reached the end, he came upon the following verses, which took his fancy much, although they were certainly not very like those he was in search of.

LITTLE BOY BLUE

Little Boy Blue lost his way in a wood.

Sing apples and cherries, roses and honey; He said, "I would not go back if I could, It's all so jolly and funny."

He sang, "This wood is all my own, Apples and cherries, roses and honey; So here I'll sit, like a king on my throne, All so jolly and funny."

A little snake crept out of the tree, Apples and cherries, roses and honey; "Lie down at my feet, little snake," said he, All so jolly and funny.

A little bird sang in the tree overhead, Apples and cherries, roses and honey; "Come and sing your song on my finger instead, All so jolly and funny."

The snake coiled up; and the bird flew down, And sang him the song of Birdie Brown.

Little Boy Blue found it tiresome to sit, And he thought he had better walk on a bit.

So up he got, his way to take, And he said, "Come along, little bird and snake."

And waves of snake o'er the damp leaves pa.s.sed, And the snake went first and Birdie Brown last;

By Boy Blue's head, with flutter and dart, Flew Birdie Brown with its song in its heart.

He came where the apples grew red and sweet: "Tree, drop me an apple down at my feet."

He came where the cherries hung plump and red: "Come to my mouth, sweet kisses," he said.

And the boughs bow down, and the apples they dapple The gra.s.s, too many for him to grapple.

And the cheeriest cherries, with never a miss, Fall to his mouth, each a full-grown kiss.

He met a little brook singing a song.

He said, "Little brook, you are going wrong.

"You must follow me, follow me, follow, I say Do as I tell you, and come this way."

And the song-singing, sing-songing forest brook Leaped from its bed and after him took,

Followed him, followed. And pale and wan, The dead leaves rustled as the water ran.

And every bird high up on the bough, And every creature low down below,

He called, and the creatures obeyed the call, Took their legs and their wings and followed him all;

Squirrels that carried their tails like a sack, Each on his own little humpy brown back;