When the gypsies stole little Tan from his family, he could read a little, even though he was only five years old. Ethel had instilled into the baby mind not only the alphabet, but was teaching him to “sound out” words, even those of two or three syllables. This neither Jack or his sister Sal could do; they had never even been inside a school building.
During the winter days, when there was necessarily less outdoor work, Jack had found out that his little companion knew what he did not. Tan could easily have forgotten what he had learned from Ethel had it not been for his kind, rough friend. Over an old newspaper, Tan helped Jack learn his letters; then together they sounded out, though with difficulty, the sounds of letters and syllables as well as Tan could remember them.
Sometimes, when the days grew longer, the two, so utterly unlike, would go into some churchyard and endeavor to learn more by the words on the gravestones. Jack was not above asking small boys, who might be loitering about, what this or that word spelled. By degrees, little Tan and his gypsy friend could make out most of the words of the different texts of Scripture on the stones.
Tan was specially delighted with one text when they spelled it together — “Suf-fer lit-tle children to come unto Me.” They could not make out the third word for some time. At last Tan shouted, “It’s ‘children’!” He had remembered the words of the text he had learned from Ethel long before he knew about letters, during those happy days at Ferndale that seemed so long ago and which he now found it hard to remember.
“That’s in the Bible,” Tan had told Jack. “It means, ‘Let the children come to Jesus.’ ”
“I should like to have one of them books,” the youth wistfully remarked.
“If you ask God to give you one, I know He will, because He likes people to read His book,” said Tan.
Tan now earnestly tried to find a way to get for his friend and possibly for himself the desired treasure, for such he truly considered the Holy Scriptures to be. While Jack might not have considered it a treasure, little Tan certainly did. No doubt, Tan in some way might have achieved his object, so determined was he that his kind friend should possess a Bible, had not his circumstances changed dramatically.
The caravan had arrived within six miles of the child’s old home, and pitched just on the borders of Lewisham. Jack and his father were unharnessing the horses. Meg and Sal were still offering their wares in the surrounding neighborhood. Little Tan was amusing himself by intently watching a small party of people who were slowly passing along the road skirting their camping place.
One of the young men, when taking his tobacco pouch from his pocket, accidentally dropped a piece of money. Not one of the group, who were talking and laughing loudly, noticed the coin fall, but little Tan’s sharp eyes detected the spot where it fell. At the same time another pair of eyes, not as sharp, yet far more cunning, saw the glittering coin lying in the dust, and, beckoning to Tan, whispered to him, “Go and pick it up and bring it to me. Sharp, now! But don’t let them gents see you.”
Tan darted into the road, picked up the coveted gold coin, for such it proved to be, and, running after the party, who had passed on some fifty yards, called out breathlessly, “You have dropped your money.”
“Well, you are an honest little chap,” said one of them, receiving the coin. “My word! I should have been in a fix if I’d lost this gold coin,” and, taking out a much less valuable copper coin, put it in the child’s little hand.
Flushed with delight, Tan thanked the young man, then rushed back to Jack and his father. Mr. Smith’s face looked like a thundercloud to little Tan, and caused the sunny smile to fade from his face.
“Didn’t I tell yer to bring it to me!” he shouted. “You little fool, to give it back to ’em. I’ll teach yer not to obey your father,” and, raising the stick he held in his hand, brought it down hard on little Tan’s shoulders.
The child screamed. Unfortunately for him, the young men were too far off to hear or see the brutal action. But though they could not interfere, there was one at hand who did. Just as the man in fury lifted the stick to strike again, Jack darted forward, knocking the weapon from his father’s hand.
“You’d interfere, would yer?” said the infuriated gypsy, and, picking up an old whip, struck Jack across the face. The poor lad with an effort restrained himself from returning the blow, but the man let out a volley of abuse, ending up, “You ain’t no good to me, you lazy young hound! Get out with yer! Yer sha’nt come in ’ere agin, so yer can shift for yerself.”
Jack just escaped by an inch or two a violent kick. Little Tan in the meantime had slipped into the van, and, creeping underneath a large bundle of clothes, cried bitterly, though softly. Jack answered his father in no gentle tones. Then, throwing the harness down, declared he would stand it no longer, and strolled a short distance off.
The autumn evening was closing, just as it had a year before when little Tan was taken from his home and became a part of the gypsy family. Meg and her daughter had come home, and, as they sat down to partake of their evening meal, beckoned to Jack. Sullenly he obeyed. Mrs. Smith readily detected there had been a quarrel. Little Tan, with tears running down his cheeks, had joined the women. The man came up, ignored those around the camp fire and entered the van. Meg concluded it would be best not to ask any questions. I’ll have it out with Jim later on! she told herself.
But the “later on” never came. When morning arrived Jack was gone. Once during the night little Tan had dreamed (or thought he did) that a rough face was bending over him, and Jack’s voice, subdued and quiet, was whispering, “Good-bye, little chap,” followed by an indistinct sentence, something about, “No good trying.” But none were more surprised than Tan to find out the next day that Jack was gone, and no one felt the loss or grieved more than the child whom he had befriended.
Even Meg felt it less keenly than little Tan. Accustomed to take things as they came, she told herself, He’ll turn up one o’ these days. It ain’t to be wondered at as he took himself off, considering as how his father is always a-going on at him. But I guess ’twill go harder with the little un now, since he ain’t got Jack to take his part, and I can’t always be interfering. He’ll ’ave to take his chance.
Poor Tan, his chance was a very slender one now, and this was proved that same day. The caravan started on the road shortly after the family had finished their meager breakfast. Tan was absent from his usual place at the doorway, and Sal found him sobbing out his woes in a dark corner of the van.
“It ain’t no good your fretting. Jack’s gone, and a good riddance,” said the girl.
Little Tan stood up bravely, taking his friend’s part.
“I know he has gone away, but he was the best here and I don’t like living in this house now,” and he broke down, crying bitterly.
To Tan this new sorrow was the greatest he could remember in his young life. The novelty of the traveling arrangements a year before and Jack’s friendship had enabled him to become reconciled to losing his parents and Ethel and his childhood home, but now there was nothing to interest the lonely, little boy. Nothing could take Jack’s place. All that day he wept.
Meg went out alone, and Sal prepared to take her brother’s place in selling, half expecting to find him lounging outside some tavern. Tan was left alone with Mr. Smith. Slowly the old horses plodded along the road, getting nearer and nearer scenes that, had he been a few years older, Tan would have recognized as in the neighborhood of the home he had left many months ago.
“I’ll give you a thrashing by and by if yer keeps up that crying,” Jim Smith had growled more than once that day. But for reasons best known to himself, he had refrained from carrying out his threat.
When evening came, they pushed on, only a stone’s-throw at one time from Wandsworth Park. Meg declared it inadvisable to let Tan occupy his favorite position by the door. Besides, he had no heart to do anything but sit disconsolately alone on the floor thinking of Jack. Again and again he cried, “Where could he be?” He even thought of going out to look for him, but there was no opportunity given to carry out such an idea. Besides, they had come several miles away from the spot where Jack must have left the caravan.
By the time darkness settled in for the night, they had approached Clapham. The caravan drew up by the roadside just outside the park. Meg took the opportunity to tell the child he must be a good boy now, and mind he did what Mr. Smith told him. She told him not to worry about Jack, for “he’d come back soon enough if he warn’t so well off as he’d be in the caravan.” Little Tan was quite cheered, and began to think Jack’s absence would only be for a few days. But as they journeyed on past the outskirts of London, making for the Midlands, and the days passed without Jack’s return, he lost all hope.
Mr. Smith was rougher on the child now and occasionally beat him. Because he refused to steal some potatoes one day, he whipped him, but these beatings always occurred when Meg was absent. He would have suffered more than he did from the man’s violence, had not Meg, on every possible occasion, taken him on her rounds, but even she grew more harsh and took his part less and less.
Often during the night Tan would wake up wondering, “Where could Jack be?” and, like the sad query which was so often asked by Tan’s family at Ferndale, it remained unanswered. Time alone, which by God’s great overruling mercy brings so many mysteries to light, would reveal that which was so earnestly prayed for, for little Tan never omitted, night or morning, to pray for Jack’s return.
Winter came, and still there was no one to cling to. Meg appeared to be almost tired of the child at times. They couldn’t go selling much at that time of the year, so he was just a bother to care for and brought in no income. Jim, her husband, habitually used harsh measures with him, and Sal, always morose and disagreeable, had grown, since her brother’s absence, almost unbearable.
Many a time during the long, weary winter Tan wished he could go and live with his mother in heaven, though it meant dying. Surely it would be better, he thought, than living, now that there was no one to care for or who cared about him. He had no one to talk to about Jesus, now that Jack was gone. Yet there was One who was caring for him and leading the weary child by the right way.
The rosy face was far less healthy and the blue eyes had lost much of their brightness, but what would have struck Ethel, could she have seen him and known him to be her brother, was that the golden hair had changed from the light blond shade to a decided brown. How much had happened to little Tan in that one year while his hair turned from gold to brown!
When the dreary winter days gave way to spring, a new thought took possession of Tan’s mind. Why should he not go away and find Jack? It never occurred to him that there were others, more near and dear, who, could he find them, would be what the gypsy lad had never been or could be to him.
Throughout the colder days the caravan had pitched in a sheltered spot on the outskirts of Bedford, but with the warmer and brighter month of March at hand, they were on the move again. While Tan was watching for his opportunity to go and find Jack, God was preparing a way to bring him to his parents and his home.