About this story
Sent for firewood, he falls in with Mr. Beale, who offers to be a kinder father than the one he lost, then asks him through a country house's window to unbolt its door for two waiting men. The raid ends in gunfire, and Dickie must explain himself without naming the man he just agreed to call Father.
How it opens
The rabbit hutch was the last hopeful object in the yard where you lived with an unkind keeper.
AuntEmpty wood earns threepence, Dickie, and grief over it earns nothing.
Man Next DoorWe can turn the soil and put living green where the hutch stood.
Your lameness made digging hard, but a borrowed penny purchased a packet labeled artistic bird seed.
If birds can eat it, perhaps the earth can make something bright from it.
Man Next DoorSeeds are promises with poor handwriting; let us plant them and see.