Every now and again the shop bell tinkled and
Zachary went out to attend to it, and then Mr. Zanti drew near to Peter as
though he were going to confide in him but he never said anything, only
laughed.
Once he mentioned Stephen.
"You know where he is?" Peter broke in with an eager whisper.
"Ah, ha--that would be telling," and Mr. Zanti winked his eye.
Peter's heart warmed under the friendliness of it all. There was very much
of the boy still in him and he began to look back upon the days that he had
spent with no other company than his own thoughts as cold and friendless.
Zachary Tan had been always ready to receive him warmly. Why had he passed
him so churlishly by and refused his outstretched hand? But there was
more in it than that. Mr. Zanti attracted him most compellingly. The
gaily-dressed genial man spoke to him of all the glitter and adventure of
the outside world. Back, crowding upon him, came all those adventurous
thoughts and desires that he had known before in Mr. Zanti's company--but
tinged now by that grey threatening background of Scaw House and its
melancholy inhabitants! What would he not give to escape? Perhaps Mr.
Zanti!... The little green room began to extend its narrow walls and
to include in its boundaries flashing rivers, shining cities, wide and
bounteous plains. Beyond the shop--dark now with its treasures mysteriously
gleaming--the steep little street held up its lamps to be transformed into
yellow flame, and at its foot by the wooden jetty, as the night fell, the
sea crept ever more secretly with its white fingers gleaming below the
shingles of the beach.
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