DISAPPEARANCE OF BILLY DOO 33 



and the cloth your honour gave for clothes is bad, 

 and when I sit, they break " ; and he looked under 

 his curly lashes at me sideways, with a look that 

 seemed to say, " Here I am, for you to beat me, or 

 what you like." 



I knew he must have been playing with the 

 tennis boys all day, and they had destroyed him. 



I said, "Go to your mother at once, and get 

 mended, and I will speak to your father." 



He went, and next day there was no Billy Doo ; 

 nor the next. Neither his father nor his uncle 

 could find him anywhere. He had not been home 

 to dinner or to sleep, and his mother, ill in bed, 

 was weeping for him. It flashed across me, for 

 the first time, that Billy Doo was the thief; though 

 no one could believe it possible. So I sent for the 

 police again ; this time to find the boy ; for I 

 imagined if he had all that money on him, some 

 one might throw him into a tank, in order to rob 

 him of it. I sent people out in all directions, and 

 they scoured the city for miles round ; though they 

 said, " How could a child go so far ? He has never 

 been away from here, where his father and mother 



live, and would be afraid to go one mile." I was 



E 



