I
should have called him Smith if that had not been Thomasina's name. As
it is, I propose to call him Broom. He was found under a bush of broom,
and it goes very well with John, and sounds plain and respectable."
So Miss Betty bought a Bible, and on the flyleaf of it she wrote in her
fine, round, gentlewoman's writing--_"John Broom. With good wishes for
his welfare, temporal and eternal. From a sincere friend!"_ And when the
inscription was dry the Bible was wrapped in brown paper, and put by in
Thomasina's trunk till John Broom should come to years of discretion.
He was slow to reach them, though in other respects he grew fast.
When he began to walk he would walk barefoot. To be out of doors was his
delight, but on the threshold of the house he always sat down and
discarded his shoes and stockings. Thomasina bastinadoed the soles of
his feet with the soles of his shoes "to teach him the use of them," so
she said. But Miss Kitty sighed, and thought of the lawyer's prediction.
There was no blinking the fact that the child was as troublesome as he
was pretty. The very demon of mischief danced in his black eyes, and
seemed to possess his feet and fingers as if with quicksilver. And if,
as Thomasina said, you "never knew what he would be at next," you might
also be pretty sure that it would be something he ought to have left
undone.
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