I can't think how it's happened--do you know anything of this, Bunty ?" "No, of course not! I n--never did n--n--nothing," Bunty said with chattering teeth, but his father was too occupied to notice his evident guilt, and bade him go at once.
So he went up to the stables and sent Pat posthaste back to his father.
And then he stole into the house, purloined two apples and a bit of cake from the dining-room, and went away to be utterly miserable until he had confessed.
He crept into a disused shed some distance from the house; in days gone by it had been a stable, and had a double loft over it that was only to be reached by a ladder in the last stage of dilapidation.
Bunty scrambled up, sat down in an unhappy little heap among some straw, and began thoughtfully to gnaw an apple.
If ever a little lad was in need of a wise loving, motherly mother it was this same dirty-faced, heavyhearted one who sat with his small rough head against a cobwebby beam and muttered dejectedly, "'Twasn't my fault: 'Twas the horse:" He fancied something moved in the second loft, which was divided from the one he was in by a low partition.

"Shoo--shoo, get away!" he called, thinking it was rats.

He struck the floor several times with his heavy little boots.
"Shoo!" he said.
"Bunty," The boy turned pale to his lips.

That odd, low whisper of his name, that strange rustle so near him--oh, what COULD it mean?
"Bunty." Again the name sounded.

Louder this time, but in a tired voice, that struck him some way with a strange thrill.