"Spoilt my aim," said he, shaking his head. "There aren't any more cartridges;
we shall have to run home." But they did not run. They walked very slowly, arm
in arm. And it was a matter of indifference to them whether the neglected
Amomma with two pin-fire cartridges in his inside blew up or trotted beside
them; for they had come into a golden heritage and were disposing of it with
all the wisdom of all their years.
"And I shall be----" quoth Dick, valiantly. Then he checked himself: "I don't
know what I shall be. I don't seem to be able to pass any exams, but I can
make awful caricatures of the masters. Ho! Ho!"
"Be an artist, then," said Maisie. "You're always laughing at my trying to
draw; and it will do you good."
"I'll never laugh at anything you do," he answered. "I'll be an artist, and
I'll do things."
"Artists always want money, don'tthey?"
"I've got a hundred and twenty pounds a year of my own. My guardians tell me
I'm to have it when I come of age. That will be enough to begin with."
"Ah, I'm rich," said Maisie. "I"ve got three hundred a year all my own when I'm
twenty-one. That's why Mrs. Jennett is kinder to me than she is to you. I wish,
though, that I had somebody that belonged to me,--just a father or a mother.
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