I
love him, mother?'

'I think you must wait a little, sonny. Don't do anything just yet,
but try and not have angry thoughts about him. You know it was very
naughty of you to act so. I am not a bit surprised that he lost his
temper over it.'

'I'll never tie up anybody again, mother, never!'

CHAPTER VI

The Redcoats

'Mother, grandmother, some soldiers are coming here!'

Teddy tore into the house one morning after school with this
announcement, and his face was radiant with delight. His mother was
laying the cloth for dinner, and old Mrs. Platt was busy dishing up
some potatoes.

'Who told you?' asked the latter.

'I saw one--a real live soldier, a corporal with two gold stripes on his
red coat, and such white gloves; and I went up to him and talked to him.'

'Certainly modesty is lacking with you,' observed Mrs. Platt drily.

'Shyness is,' said Mrs. John rather quickly; 'but he doesn't show
forwardness as a rule.'

'Sam and Carrots and lots of the boys were with me, mother. He told us
that he and one or two more had come on to get billets--that's the
word--billets for the regiment that was marching through on their way to
Wales; and we shall see them come marching through the village in a few
days. He said most of them were going to put up in the town, but twenty
were coming to the Hare and Hounds, and they're going to sleep there.
He's such a nice man, mother; he's only going to sleep here to-night, and
then he's going on to-morrow to get some more billets ready in the next
town he comes to. Couldn't he come to tea this afternoon? Do let me ask
him, granny!'

Mrs. Platt laughed not ill-humouredly. 'You would have us take in any
scoundrel, provided he wore a red coat, wouldn't you?'

'Soldiers are never scoundrels!' asserted Teddy with hot indignation.

'Do you know all the soldiers in the British Army, then?' said his
grandmother.

'I daresay he wouldn't care to come to tea with strangers, sonny,' put in
Mrs. John gently.

'I'm sure he would, for he doesn't like the Hare and Hounds. He said he
was a teetotaller.'

'Come, that sounds good,' Mrs. Platt remarked. 'Well, you can ask him in
for your father's sake.'

Not much dinner could Teddy eat that day, and his lessons at school had
never seemed so irksome to him; but they were over at last, and he tore
off in search of his new friend, finding him at length sitting under an
old yew-tree just outside the churchyard.

'Granny says wil