He's such a bright little chap. Don't tell Clive, or he'd tease Madox to
death about this. It must be an absolute secret. I can just picture the
child sitting writing it with his sticky little fingers!"
"You mustn't let him know about 'Sweet William,' or there'll be a free
fight!" laughed Mavis.
William was Mrs. Treasure's little boy, and also an ardent admirer of
Merle, who gave him chocolates when she met him in the garden or the
stackyard. In spite of his mother's injunctions to 'Behave and not
trouble the visitors,' he would hang about the passages to present Merle
with handfuls of ferns and flowers grabbed at random from the hedgerows
and of no botanical value whatever; or sometimes the parlour window would
be cautiously opened from the outside, a pair of bright eyes would
appear, and a small grubby hand would push in a bird's egg or some other
country trophy as an offering. It was William who told Merle about the
'headless horseman,' a phantom rider who was reported to gallop down the
road after dusk, and whom Chagmouth mothers found useful as a bogey to
frighten their children with.
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