"Dead drunk, 'e was, and never a thought to the
child coming, ''Enery,' I said to him, 'it's the child you're hitting as
well as me'; but 'e was too far gone, poor soul, to take a thought."
Henry was a fine, robust child, with rosy cheeks and a sturdy, thick-set
body. He had large blue eyes and a happy, pleasant smile, but, although
he was six years of age, he could hardly talk at all, and liked to spend
the days twirling pieces of string round and round or looking into the
fire. His eyes were unlike the eyes of other children, and in their blue
depths there lurked strange apprehensions, strange anticipations,
strange remembrances. He had never, from the day of his birth, been
known to cry. When he was frightened or distressed the colour would pass
slowly from his cheeks, and strange little gasping breaths would come
from him; his body would stiffen and his hands clench. If he was angry
the colour in his face would darken and his eyes half close, and it was
then that he did, indeed, seem in the possession of some disastrous
thraldom--but he was angry very seldom, and only with certain people;
for the most part he was a happy child, "as quiet as a mouse.
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