I Have a Difficult Task

"Climbed up the wall, has he?"

"I don't know, Sir Francis," I replied; "but he has got into the garden
lately."

"That's right, my lad, be frank," he said. "I know he has got into the
garden. I caught my young gentleman and took him to task. He says he
came because you were here."

"I'm afraid that is why he did come, Sir Francis," I said.

"Did you tell him to come?"

"No, Sir Francis. We were never very friendly."

"Ho!" he said, and he walked on looking at the peaches for a few
minutes, and then went away, leaving me to wipe the cold perspiration
off my forehead, for I had fully expected a severe scolding.

I finished my task in the peach-house, and then went to see how the
celery was getting on, for I found that when Mr Solomon gave me a task
he expected me to continue to watch, whatever it was.

"So that I may feel that when I have put anything in your hands it will
be properly done," he said more than once; so, feeling that I was
responsible for the success of the celery plants, I was on my way to the
bottom garden by the pond, thinking of the encounter I had when I was
busy watering there that day, when, as I turned down one of the alleys
of the garden, I saw a man in the distance digging up a piece of ground
with a broad spade, and turning over the soil in that easy regular way,
levelling it as he went, that experienced gardeners acquire.