'It's a lie, Tom Tracy,' Harold said. 'Mr. Arthur does not take care of
us. We do it ourselves, and have for ever so long. He did give us the
house, but it ain't for you to twit me of that. Whose house is this, I'd
like to know? It isn't yours, nor your father's, and there isn't a thing
in it yours. It is all Mr. Arthur's.'
'Wall, we are to be his _hares_--Jack, and Maude, and me. Mother says
so,' Tom stammered out, while Jerry, who had been looking intently,
first at one boy, and then at the other, called out in her own language:
'Nein, nein, nein,' and struck her hand toward Tom.
'What does she mean by her "Nine, nine, nine,'" he asked of Miss Howard,
who replied that she thought it was the German for 'No, no, no,' and
that the child probably did not approve of him.
Tom knew she did not, and though she was only a baby, be felt chagrined
and irritable. Had he dared, he would have struck Harold, who asked him
what he meant by being his uncle's _hare._ But he was afraid of Miss
Howard, and remembering it must be time for the inquest, he slipped from
the room, whispering fiercely to Harold as he passed him:
'Darn you, Hal Hastings, I'll thrash you yet.'
'Let me know when you are ready, and also when you get to be your
uncle's _hare_,' was Harold's taunting reply, as the door closed upon
the discomfited Tom.
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