 CHAPTER IX HUNTING THE FOX It is idle to expect everyone to know everything in the world without being told. If we had been brought up in the country, we should have known that it is not done to hunt the fox in August, but in the Lewisham Road the most observing boy does not notice the dates when it is proper to hunt foxes. And there are some things you cannot bear to think that anybody would think you would do. That is why I wish to say plainly at the very beginning that none of us would have shot a fox on purpose even to save our skins. Of course, if a man were at bay in a cave and had to defend girls from the simultaneous attack of a herd of savage foxes it would be different. A man is bound to protect girls and to take care of them. They can jolly well take care of themselves really, it seems to me. But still, this is what Albert's uncle calls one of the rules of the game, so we are bound to defend them and fight for them to the death if needful. Denny knows a quotation which says, What dire offence from harmless causes springs, what mighty contests rise from trefoil things. He says this means that all great events come from three things, threefold, like the clover or trefoil, and the causes are always harmless, trefoil is short for threefold. There were certainly three things that led up to the adventure which is now going to be told you. The first was our Indian uncle coming down to the country to see us. The second was Denny's tooth. The third was only our wanting to go hunting, but if you counted in it makes the thing about the trefoil come right, and all these causes were harmless. It is a flattering thing to say, and it was not Oswald who said it but Dora. She said she was certain our uncle missed us, and he felt he could no longer live without seeing his dear ones, that was us. Anyway, he came down without warning, which is one of the few bad habits that excellent Indian man has, and this habit has ended in unpleasantness more than once as when we played jungles. However, this time it was all right. He came on rather a dull kind of day, when no one had thought of anything particularly amusing to do, so that as it happened to be dinner time, we had just washed our hands and faces, we were all spotlessly clean, compared with what we are sometimes I mean of course. We were just sitting down to dinner, and Albert's uncle was just plunging the knife into the hot heart of the stake-pudding when there was the rumble of wheels, and the station fly stopped at the garden gate, and in the fly sitting very upright, with his hands on his knees was our Indian relative so much beloved. He looked very smart, with a rose in his buttonhole. How different from what he looked in other days, when he helped us to pretend that our current pudding was a wild boar we were killing with our forks. Yet though tidier, his heart still beat kind and true. You should not judge people harshly, because their clothes are tidy. He had dinner with us, and then we showed him round the place, and told him everything we thought he would like to hear, and about the Tower of Mystery. And he said, It makes my blood boil to think of it. Noel said he was sorry for that, because everyone else we had told it to had owned, when we had asked them, that it froze their blood. Ah! said the uncle, but in India we learn how to freeze our blood and boil it at the same time. In those hot longitudes, perhaps, the blood is always near boiling point, which accounts for Indian tempers, though not for the curry and pepper they eat. But I must not wonder, there is no curry at all in this story. About temper, I will not say. Then uncle let us all go with him to the station, when the fly came back for him, and when we said good-bye, he tipped us all half a quid, without any insidious distinctions about age or considering whether you were a boy or a girl. Our Indian uncle is a true-born Briton, with no nonsense about him. We cheered him like one man, as the train went off, and then we offered the fly-driver a shilling to take us back to the four cross-roads. And the grateful creature did it for nothing, because, he said, the gent had tipped him something like. How scarce is true gratitude! So we cheered the driver, too, for this rare virtue, and then went home to talk about what we should do with our money. I cannot tell you all that we did with it, because money melts away like snow-wreathes in Thorgyne, as Denny says. And somehow the more you have, the more quickly it melts. We all went into Maidstone, and came back with the most beautiful lot of brown-paper parcels with things inside that supplied long-felt wants, but none of them belongs to this narration, except what Oswald and Denny clubbed to buy. This was a pistol, and it took all the money they both had, but when Oswald felt the uncomfortable inside sensation that reminds you who it is and his money are soon parted, he said to himself, I don't care, we ought to have a pistol in the house, and one that will go off, too, not those rotten flint-locks. Suppose there should be burglars, and us totally unarmed. We took it in turns to have the pistol, and we decided always to practice with it far from the house, so as not to frighten the grown-ups who are always much nervouser about firearms than we are. It was Denny's idea getting it, and Oswald owns it surprised him, but the boy was much changed in his character. We got it while the others were grubbing at the pastry-cooks in the High Street, and we said nothing till after tea, though it was hard not to fire at the birds on the telegraph wires as we came home in the train. After tea, we had a counsel in the straw loft, and Oswald said, Denny and I have got a secret. I know what it is, Dicky said contemptibly. You found out that shop in Maidstone, where peppermint rock is four ounces of penny. H.O. and I found it out before you did. Oswald said, you shut up! If you don't want to hear the secret, you'd better bunk. I'm going to administer the secret oath. This is a very solemn oath, and only used about real things, and never for pretending ones, so Dicky said, oh all right, go ahead, I thought you were only rotting. So they all took the secret oath. Noel made it up long before when he had found the first thrushes-ness we ever saw in the Blackheath Garden. I will not tell. I will not reveal. I will not touch or try to steal. And may I be called a beastly sneak if this great secret I ever repeat. It's a little wrong about the poetry, but it's a very binding promise. They all repeated it down to H.O. Now then, Dicky said, what's up? Oswald, in proud silence, drew the pistol from his breast and held it out. And there was a murmur of awful amazement and respect from every one of the council. The pistol was not loaded, so he let even the girls have it to look at. And then Dicky said, let's go hunting. And we decided that we would. H.O. wanted to go down to the village and get penny horns at the shop for the huntsmen to wind, like in the song. But we thought it would be more modest not to wind horns, or anything noisy, at any rate not until we had run down our prey. But his tall king of the song made us decide that it was the fox we wanted to hunt. We had not been particular which animal we hunted before that. Oswald let Denny have first go with the pistol, and when we went to bed he slept with it under his pillow, but not loaded for fear he should have a nightmare and draw his fell weapon before he was properly awake. Oswald let Denny have it because Denny had toothache, and a pistol is consoling, though it does not actually stop the pain in the tooth. The toothache got worse, and Albert's uncle looked at it and said it was very loose, and Denny owned he had tried to crack a peach-stone with it, which accounts. He had creosote and camphor, and went to bed early with his tooth tied up in red flannel. Oswald knows it is right to be kind when people are ill, and he forbode to wake the sufferer next morning by buzzing a pillow at him, as he generally does. He got up and went over to shake the invalid, but the bird had flown and the nest was cold. The pistol was not in the nest either, but Oswald found it afterwards under the looking glass on the dressing-table. He had just awakened the others with a hair-brush because they had not got anything the matter with their teeth, when he heard wheels, and looking out beheld Denny and Albert's uncle being driven from the door in the farmer's high cart with the red wheels. We dressed extra quick, so as to get downstairs to the bottom of the mystery, and we found a note from Albert's uncle. It was addressed to Dora, and said, Denny's toothache got him up in the small hours. He's off to the dentist to have it out with him, man to man, home to dinner. Dora said, Denny's gone to the dentist. I hope it's a relation, H.O. said. Denny must be short for dentist. I suppose he was trying to be funny. He really does try very hard. He wants to be a clown when he grows up. The others laughed. I wonder, said Dicky, whether he'll get a shilling or half a crown for it. Oswald had been meditating in gloomy silence. Now he cheered up and said, Of course! I'd forgotten that, he'll get his tooth money, and a drive too, so it's quite fair for us to have the fox hunt while he's gone. I was thinking we should have to put it off. The others agreed that it would not be unfair. We can have another one, another time if he wants to, Oswald said. We know foxes are hunted in red coats and on horseback, but we could not do this. But H.O. had the old red football jersey that was Albert's uncle's when he was at Loretto. He was pleased. But I do wish we'd had horns, he said grievingly. I should have liked to wind the horn. We can pretend horns, Doris said. But he answered, I don't want to pretend or want to wind something. Wind your watch, Dicky said, and that was unkind because we all know that H.O.'s watch is broken, and when you wind it, it only rattles inside without going in the least. We did not bother to dress up much for the hunting expedition, just cocked hats and laid swords, and we tied a card onto H.O.'s chest with moat house fox hunters on it, and we tied red flannel round all the dogs' necks to show they were foxhounds, yet it did not seem to show it plainly. Somehow it made them look as if they were not foxhounds, but their own natural breeds, only with sore throats. Oswald slipped the pistol and a few cartridges into his pocket. He knew, of course, that foxes are not shot, but as he said, who knows whether we might not meet a bear or a crocodile? We set off gaily, across the orchard and through two corn fields, and along the hedge of another field, and so we got into the wood through a gap we had happened to make a day or two before playing Follow My Leader. The wood was very quiet and green. The dogs were happy and most busy. Once Pinter started a rabbit. We said, view, hello, and immediately started in pursuit. But the rabbit went and hid, so that even Pinter could not find him, and we went on. But we saw no foxes. So at last we made Dickie be a fox and chased him down the green rides. A wide walk in a wood is called a ride, even if people never do anything but walk in it. We had only three hounds, Lady, Pinter, and Martha, so we joined the glad throng and were being hounds as hard as we could when we suddenly came barking round a corner in full chase and stopped short, for we saw that our fox had stayed his hasty flight. The fox was stooping over something reddish that lay beside the path, and he cried, I say, look here, in tones that thrilled us throughout. Our fox, whom we must now call Dickie so as not to muddle the narration, pointed to the ready thing that the dogs were sniffing at. It's a real live fox, he said, and so it was. At least it was real, only it was quite dead, and when Oswald lifted it up its head was bleeding. It had evidently been shot through the brain and expired instantly. Oswald explained this to the girls when they began to cry at the sight of the poor beast. I did not say he did not feel a bit sorry himself. The fox was cold, but its fur was so pretty, and its tail and its little feet. Dickie strung the dogs on the leash. They were so much interested we thought it was better. It does seem horrid to think it'll never see again out of its poor little eyes, Dora said, blowing her nose, and never run about through the wood again, lend me your hanky dora, said Alice, and never be hunted, or get into a hen roost or a trap or anything exciting. Poor little thing, said Dickie. The girls began to pick green chestnut leaves to cover up the poor fox's fatal wound, and Noel began to walk up and down making faces the way he always does when he's making poetry. He cannot make one without the other, it works both ways which is a comfort. What are we going to do now, H.O. said? The huntsman ought to cut off its tail, I'm quite certain, only I've broken the big blade of my knife and the other was never any good. The girls gave H.O. a shove, and even Oswood said, shut up, for somehow we all felt we did not want to play fox hunting any more that day. When his deadly wound was covered, the fox hardly looked dead at all. Oh, I wish it wasn't true, Alice said. Daisy had been crying all the time, and now she said, I should like to pray God to make it not true, but Dora kissed her and told her that was no good, and that she might pray God to take care of the fox's poor little babies, if it had any, which I believe she has done ever since. If only we could wake up and find it was a horrid dream, Alice said. It seems silly that we should have cared so much, when we had really set out to hunt foxes with dogs, but it is true, the fox's feet look so helpless, and there was a dusty mark on its side that I know should not have been there, if it had been alive and able to wash itself. Noel now said, this is the peace of poetry. Here lies poor Reynard, who is slain. She will not come to life again. I never will the huntsman's horn wind since the day that I was born until the day I die, for I don't like hunting, and this is why. Let's have a funeral, said H. Ho. This pleased everybody, and we got Dora to take off her petticoat to wrap the fox in so we could carry it to our garden and bury it without bloodying our jackets. His clothes are silly in one way, but I think they are useful too. A boy cannot take off more than his jacket and waistcoat in any emergency, or he is at once entirely undressed, but I have known Dora take off two petticoats for useful purposes and look just the same outside afterwards. We boys took it in turns to carry the fox. It was very heavy. When we got near the edge of the wood, Noel said, it would be better to bury it here, where the leaves can talk funeral songs over its grave forever, and the other foxes can come and cry if they want to. He dumped the fox down on the moss under a young oak tree, as he spoke. If Dickie fetched the spade and fork, we could bury it here, and then he could tie up the dogs at the same time. You're sick of carrying it, Dickie remarked. That's what it is. Dickie went on condition the rest of us boys went too. While we were gone the girls dragged the fox to the edge of the wood. It was a different edge to the one we went in by, close to a lane, and while they waited for the digging or fatigue-party to come back, they collected a lot of moss and green things to make the fox's long home soft for it to lie in. There are no flowers in the woods in August which is a pity. When we got back with the spade and fork we dug a hole to bury the fox in. We did not bring the dogs back because they were too interested in the funeral to behave with real respectable calmness. The ground was loose and soft and easy to dig when we had scraped away the broken bits of sticks and the dead leaves and the wild honeysuckle. Oswald used the fork and Dickie had the spade. All made faces and poetry. He was struck so that morning. And the girls sat stroking the clean parts of the fox's fur till the grave was deep enough. At last it was. Then Daisy threw in the leaves and grass, and Alice and Dora took the poor dead fox by his two ends, and we helped to put him in the grave. We could not lower him slowly. He was dropped in really. Then we covered the furry body with leaves and Noel said the burial-oad he had made up. He says this was it, but it sounds better now than it did then, so I think he must have done something to it since. The fox is burial-oad. Dear fox, sleep here and do not wake. We picked these leaves for your sake. You must not try to rise or move. We give you this with our love. Close by the wood where, once you grew, your morning friends have buried you. If you'd have lived, you'd not have been. Proper friends with us, I mean, but now you're laid upon the shelf. Poor fox, you cannot help yourself. So as I say, we are your loving friends, and here your burial-oad, dear Foxy, ends. P.S. When in the moonlight bright the fox's wander of a night, they'll pass your grave and fondly think of you exactly like we mean to always do. So now, dear Fox, adieu. Your friends are few, but true to you, adieu. When this had been said, we filled in the grave and covered the top of it with dry leaves and sticks to make it look like the rest of the wood. People might think it was a treasure and dig it up if they thought there was anything buried there, and we wished the poor fox to sleep sound and not to be disturbed. The interring was over. We folded up-door as blood-stained pink cotton petticoat and turned to leave the sad spot. We had not gone a dozen yards down the lane when we heard footsteps and a whistle behind us, and a scrabbling and whining and a gentleman with two fox terriers had called a halt just by the place where we had laid low the little red rover. The gentleman stood in the lane, but the dogs were digging. We could see their tails wagging and see the dust fly, and we saw where. We ran back. Oh, please do stop your dogs digging there, Alice said. The gentleman said, why? Because we've just had a funeral, and that's the grave. The gentleman whistled, but the fox terriers were not trained like Pinter, who was brought up by Ellswood. The gentleman took a stride through the hedge gap. What have you been a burying, pet-dicky birdie? said the gentleman kindly. He had riding breeches and white whiskers. We did not answer, because now, for the first time, it came over all of us in a rush of blushes and uncomfortableness. That burying a fox is a suspicious act. I don't know why we felt like this, but we did. Noel said dreamily, we found his murdered body in the wood, and dug a grave by which the mourners stood. But no one heard him except Ellswood, because Alice and Dora and Daisy were all jumping about with the jumps of unrestrained anguish, and saying, Oh, call them off, do, do, oh, don't, don't, don't let them dig. Alas, Ellswood was, as usual, right. The ground of the grave had not been trampled down hard enough, and he had said so plainly at the time, but his prudent councils had been overruled. Now these busy-bodying, meddling, mischief-making fox-terriers, how different from Pinter, who mined his own business until told otherwise, had scratched away the earth, and laid bare the reddish tip of the poor corpse's tail. We all turned to go without a word. It seemed to be no use staying any longer. But in a moment the gentlemen with the whiskers had got Noel and Dickie each by an ear. They were nearest him. H.O. hid in the hedge. Oswald, to whose noble breast, sneakishness is, I am thankful to say, a stranger, would have scorned to escape, but he ordered his sisters to bunk in a tone of command which made refusal impossible. And bunked sharp, too, he added sternly, cut along home, so they cut. The white-whiskered gentleman now encouraged his angry fox-terriers, by every means at his command, to continue their vile and degrading occupation, holding on all the time to the ears of Dickie and Noel, who scorned to ask for mercy. He got purple and Noel got white. It was Oswald who said, Don't hang on to them, sir. We won't cut. I give you my word of honour. Your word of honour, said the gentleman, in tones for which, in happier days, when people drew their bright blades and fought duels, I would have had his heart's dearest blood. But now Oswald remained calm and polite as ever. Yes, on my honour, he said, and the gentleman dropped the ears of Oswald's brothers at the sound of his firm, unswerving tones. He dropped the ears and pulled out the body of the fox and held it up. The dogs jumped up and yelled. Now, he said, you talk very big about words of honour. Can you speak the truth? He said, if you think we shot it, you're wrong. We know better than that. The white-whiskered one turned suddenly to H.O. and pulled him out of the hedge. And what does that mean, he said? And he was pink with fury to the ends of his large ears as he pointed to the card on H.O.'s breast which said, Moat House Fox Hunters. Then Oswald said, We were playing at fox hunting, but we couldn't find anything but a rabbit that hid. So my brother was being the fox. And then we found the fox shot dead, and I don't know who did it, and we are very sorry for it, and we buried it, and that's all. Not quite, said the riding-bridge's gentleman, with what I think you call a bitter smile. Not quite. This is my land, and I'll have you up for trespass and damage. Come along now, no nonsense. I'm a magistrate, and I'm Master of the Hounds, a vixen, too. What did you shoot her with? You're too young to have a gun. Sneak your father's revolver, I suppose. Oswald thought it was better to be goldenly silent. But it was vain. The Master of the Hounds made him empty his pockets, and there was the pistol and the cartridges. The magistrate laughed a harsh laugh of successful disagreeableness. All right, he said, Where's your license? You come with me a week or two in prison. I don't believe now he could have done it, but we all thought then he could, and would, what's more. So H.O. began to cry. But Noel spoke up. His teeth were chattering, yet he spoke up like a man. He said, You don't know us? You've no right not to believe us until you've found us out in a lie. We don't tell lies, you ask Albert's uncle if we do. Hold your tongue, said the white whiskered, but Noel's blood was up. If you do put us in prison without being sure, he said, trembling more and more, You are a horrible tyrant like Caligula and Herod or Nero and the Spanish Inquisition, and I will write a poem about it in prison, and people will curse you for ever. Upon my word, said white whiskers, We'll see about that. And he turned up the lane with the fox hanging from one hand and Noel's ear once more reposing in the other. I thought Noel would cry or faint, but he bore up nobly exactly like an early Christian martyr. The rest of us came along too. I carried the spade, and Dickie had the fork. H.O. had the card, and Noel had the magistrate. At the end of the lane there was Alice. She had bunked home, obeying the orders of her thoughtful brother, but she bottled back again like a shot, so as not to be out of the scrape. She is almost worthy to be a boy for some things. She spoke to Mr. Magistrate, and said, Where are you taking him? The outraged majesty of the magistrate said, To prison, you naughty little girl. Alice said, Noel will faint. Someone tried to take him to prison before, about a dog. Do please come to our house and see our uncle. At least he's not, but it's the same thing. We didn't kill the fox, if that's what you think. Indeed we didn't. Oh, dear, I do wish you'd think of your own little boys and girls if you've got any, or else about when you were little. You wouldn't be so horrid if you did. I don't know which, if either, of these objects the foxhound master thought of, but he said, Well, lead on, and he let go Noel's ear, and Alice snuggled up to Noel and put her arm round him. It was a frightened procession, whose cheeks were pale with alarm, except those between white whiskers and they were red, that wound in at our gate and into the hall among the old oak furniture, and black and white marble floor and things. Dora and Daisy were at the door, the pink petticoat lay on the table all stained with the gore of the departed. Dora looked at us all, and she saw that it was serious. She pulled out the big oak chair and said, Won't you sit down? Very kindly to the white whiskered magistrate. He grunted but did as she said. Then he looked about him in a silence that was not comforting, and so did we. At last he said, Come, you didn't try to bolt, speak the truth, and I'll say no more. We said we had. Then he laid the fox on the table, spreading out the petticoat under it, and he took out a knife and the girls hid their faces. Then Oswald did not care to look. Wounds in battle are all very well, but it's different to see a dead fox cut into with a knife. Next moment the magistrate wiped something on his handkerchief, and then laid it on the table and put one of my cartridges beside it. It was the bullet that had killed the fox. Look here, he said. And it was too true. The bullets were the same. A thrill of despair ran through Oswald. He now knows how a hero feels when he is innocently accused of a crime, and the judge is putting on the black cap, and the evidence is convulsive and all human aid is despaired of. He can't help it, he said. We didn't kill it, and that's all there is to it. The white-wiskered magistrate may have been master of the foxhounds, but he was not master of his temper, which is more important, I should think, than a lot of beastly dogs. He said several words which Oswald would never repeat, much less in his own conversing, and besides that he called us obstinate little beggars. Then suddenly Albert's uncle entered into the midst of a silence freighted with despairing reflections. The MFH got up and told his tale. It was mainly lies, or to be more polite. It was hardly any of it true, though I supposed he believed it. I am very sorry, sir, said Albert's uncle, looking at the bullets. You'll excuse me asking for the children's version? Oh, certainly, sir, certainly, fuming, the foxhound magistrate replied. Then Albert's uncle said, Now Oswald, I know I can trust you to speak the exact truth. So Oswald did. Then the white-whiskered foxmaster laid the bullets before Albert's uncle, and I felt this would be a trial to his faith far worse than the rack or the thumbscrew in the days of the Armada. And then Denny came in. He looked at the fox on the table. You found it, then, he said. The master of foxhounds would have spoken, but Albert's uncle said, One moment, Denny, you've seen this fox before. Sir, said Denny, I, but Albert's uncle said, Take time, think before you speak and say the exact truth. No, don't whisper to Oswald. This boy, he said to the injured foxmaster, has been with me since seven this morning. His tale, whatever it is, will be independent evidence. But Denny would not speak, though again and again Albert's uncle told him to. I can't, until I've asked Oswald something, he said at last. White-whiskers said, That looks bad, eh? But Oswald said, Don't whisper old chap, Ask me whatever you like, but speak up. So Denny said, I can't, without breaking the secret oath. So then Oswald began to see, and he said, Break away for all your worth, it's all right. And Denny said, Drawing relief's deepest breath. Well then, Oswald and I have got a pistol, shares, and I had it last night. And when I couldn't sleep last night because of the toothache, I got up and went out early this morning, and I took the pistol, and I loaded it just for fun, and down in the wood I heard a whining like a dog. And I went, and there was the poor fox caught in an iron trap with teeth, and I went to let it out, and it bit me, look here's the place, and the pistol went off, and the fox died, and I'm so sorry. But why didn't you tell the others? They weren't awake when I went to the dentist. But why didn't you tell your uncle if you've been with him all the morning? It was the oath, H.O. said. May I be called, abeasely sneak, If this great secret I ever repeat? White-whiskers actually grinned. Well, he said, I see it was an accident, my boy. Then he turned to us and said, I owe you an apology for doubting your word, all of you. I hope it's accepted. We said it was all right, and he was to never mind. But all the same we hated him for it. He tried to make up for his unbelievingness afterwards by asking Albert's uncle to shoot rabbits. But we did not really forgive him till the day when he sent the fox's brush to Alice, mounted in silver, with a note about her plucky conduct in standing by her brothers. We got a lecture about not playing with firearms, about no punishment, because our conduct had not been exactly sinful, Albert's uncle said, but merely silly. The pistol and the cartridges were confiscated. I hope the house will never be attacked by burglars. When it is, Albert's uncle will only have himself to thank if we are rapidly overpowered, because it will be his fault that we shall have to meet them totally unarmed, and be their almost unresisting prey. CHAPTER IX BEING THE FURTHER ADVENTURES OF THE TREASURE SEEKERS CHAPTER X THE SALE OF ANTIQUITIES It began one morning at breakfast. It was the fifteenth of August, the birthday of Napoleon the Great, Oswald Bastable, and another very nice writer. Oswald was to keep his birthday on the Saturday, so that his father could be there. A birthday when there are only many happy returns is a little like Sunday or Christmas Eve. Oswald had a birthday card or two. That was all, but he did not repine because he knew they always make it up for you, for putting off keeping your birthday, and he looked forward to Saturday. Albert's uncle had a whole stack of letters as usual, and presently he tossed one over to Dora and said, What do you say, little lady? Shall we let them come? But Dora, butter-fingered as ever, missed the catch, and Dick and Noel both had a try for it, so that the letter went into the place where the bacon had been, and where now only a frozen-looking lake of bacon-fat was slowly hardening, and then somehow it got into the marmalade, and then H.O. got it, and Dora said, I don't want the nasty thing now, or grease and stickiness. So H.O. read it aloud. Maidstone Society of Antiquities and Field Club, August the 14th 1900 Dear Sir, at a meeting of the H.O.'s stuck fast here, and the writing was really very bad, like a spider that has been in the ink-pot crawling in a hurry over the paper without stopping to rub its feet properly on the mat. So Oswald took the letter. He is aboveminding a little marmalade or bacon. He began to read. It ran thus. It's not antiquities, you little silly, he said, it's antiquaries. The others are very good word, said Albert's uncle, but I never call names at breakfast myself. It upsets the digestion, my egregious Oswald. That's a name, though, said Alice, and you got it out of Storky, too. Go on, Oswald. So Oswald went on where he had been interrupted. Maidstone Society of Antiquaries and Field Club, August the 14th 1900 Dear Sir, at a meeting of the committee of this society, it was agreed that a field day should be held on August the 20th, when the society proposes to visit the interesting Church of Ivy Bridge, and also the Roman remains in the vicinity. Our president, Mr. Longchamps, FRS, has obtained permission to open a barrow in the Three Trees pasture. We venture to ask whether you would allow the members of the society to walk through your grounds, and to inspect, from without, of course, your beautiful house, which is, as you are doubtless aware, of great historic interest, having been for some years the residence of the celebrated Sir Thomas Wyatt. I am, Dear Sir, yours faithfully, Edward K. Turnbull, on sec. Just so, said Albert's uncle, well, shall we permit the eye of the Maidstone Antiquities to profane these sacred solitudes, and the foot of the Field Club to kick up dust upon our gravel? Our gravel is all grass, H.O. said, and the girls said, oh, do let them come. It was Alice, who said, why not ask them to tea? They'll be very tired coming all the way from Maidstone. Would you really like it? Albert's uncle asked. I'm afraid they'll be but dull dogs the Antiquities, stuffy old gentleman with amphorae in their buttonholes instead of orchids, and pedigrees poking out of all their pockets. We laughed, because we knew what an amphorae is. If you don't, you might look it up in a dicker. It's not a flower, though it sounds like one out of the gardening book, the kind you never hear of any one growing. Dora said she thought it would be splendid. And we could have out the best china, she said, and decorate the table with flowers. We could have tea in the garden. We've never had a party since we've been here. I warn you that your guests may be boresome. However, have it your own way, Albert's uncle said. And he went off to write the invitation to tea to the Maidstone Antiquities. I know that it is the wrong word, but somehow we all used it whenever we spoke of them, which was often. In a day or two, Albert's uncle came into tea with a lightly clouded brow. You've let me in for a nice thing, he said. I asked the Antiquities to tea, and I asked casually how many we might expect. I thought we might need at least a full dozen of the best tea cups. Now the secretary writes, accepting my kind invitation. Oh, good, we cried. And how many are coming? Oh, only about sixty, was the groaning rejoiner. Perhaps more should the weather be exceptionally favourable. Though stunned at first, we presently decided that we were pleased. We had never, never given such a big party. The girls were allowed to help in the kitchen, where Mrs. Pettigrew made cakes all day long without stopping. They did not let us boys be there, though I cannot see any harm in putting your finger in a cake before it is baked and then licking your finger. If you are careful to put a different finger in the cake next time. Cake before it is baked is delicious, like a sort of cream. Albert's uncle said that he was the prey of despair. He drove into Maidstone one day. When we asked him where he was going, he said, to get my haircut. If I keep it this length, I shall certainly tear it out by double handfuls in the extremity of my anguish every time I think of those innumerable antiquities. But we found out afterwards that he really went to borrow China and things to give the antiquities their tea out of, though he did have his haircut too because he is the soul of truth and honour. Oswood had a very good sort of birthday, with bows and arrows as well as other presents. I think these were meant to make up for the pistol that was taken away after the adventure of the fox hunting. These gave us boys something to do between the birthday keeping, which was on the Saturday and the Wednesday when the antiquities were to come. We did not allow the girls to play with the bows and arrows because they had the cakes that we were cut off from. There was little or no unpleasantness over this. On the Tuesday, we went down to look at the Roman place where the antiquities were going to dig. We sat on the Roman wall and ate nuts. And as we sat there, we saw coming through the beet field two labourers with picks and shovels, and a very young man with thin legs and a bicycle. It turned out afterwards to be a free will, the first we had ever seen. They stopped at a mound inside the Roman wall, and the men took their coats off and spat on their hands. We went down at once, of course. The thin-legged bicyclist explained his machine to us very fully and carefully when we asked him, and then we saw the men were cutting turfs, and turning them over and rolling them up and putting them in a heap. So we asked the gentleman with the thin legs what they were doing. He said, they are beginning the preliminary excavation in readiness for tomorrow. What's up tomorrow, H.O. asked. Tomorrow we propose to open this burrow and examine it. Then you're the antiquities, said H.O. I'm the secretary, said the gentleman, smiling but narrowly. Oh, you're all coming to tea with us, Dora said, and added anxiously, how many of you do you think there'll be? Oh, not more than 80 or 90, I should think, replied the gentleman. This took our breath away, and we went home. As we went, Oswald, who noticed his many things that would pass unobserved by the light and careless, saw Denny frowning hard, so he said, what's up? I've got an idea, the dentist said. Let's call a council. The dentist had grown quite used to our ways now. We had called him dentist ever since the Fox Hunt day. He called a council, as if he had been used to calling such things all his life and having them come, too, whereas we all know that his former existing was that of a white mouse in a trap with that cat of a mirrored stone aunt watching him through the bars. That is what is called a figure of speech, Albert's uncle told me. Councils I held in the straw loft. As soon as we were all there, and the straw had stopped rustling after our sitting down, Dicky said, I hope it's nothing to do with the would-be goods. No, said Denny in a hurry, quite the opposite. I hope it's nothing wrong, said Dora and Daisy together. It's hail to thee, blithe spirit, bird, thou never word, said Denny. I mean, I think it's what is called a lark. You never know your lark, go on dentist, said Dicky. Well then, do you know a book called The Daisy Chain? We didn't. It's by Miss Charlotte M. Young, Daisy interrupted. And it's about a family of poor motherless children who tried so hard to be good, and they were confirmed and had a bazaar and went to church at the minster, and one of them got married and wore black-watered silk and silver ornaments. So her baby died, and then she was sorry she had not been a good mother to it, and—here Dicky got up and said he'd got some snares to attend to, and he'd receive a report of the council after it was over. But he only got as far as the trap door, and then Oswald, the fleet of foot, closed with him, and they rolled together on the floor while all the others called out, Come back, come back, like guinea-hens on a fence. Through the rustle and bustle and hustle of the struggle with Dicky, Oswald heard the voice of Denny murmuring one of his everlasting quotations, Come back, come back, he cried in Greek, Across the stormy water, and I'll forgive your highland cheek, My daughter, oh my daughter. When quiet was restored, and Dicky had agreed to go through with the council, Denny said, The Daisy Chain is not a bit like that really, it's a ripping book. One of the boys dresses up like a lady and comes to call, and another tries to hit his little sister with a hoe. It's jolly fine, I tell you. Denny is learning to say what he thinks just like the other boys. He would never have learnt words such as ripping and jolly fine while under the aren't all tyranny. Since then I have read The Daisy Chain. It is a first rate book for girls and little boys. But we did not want to talk about The Daisy Chain just then, so Oswald said, But what's your lark? Denny got pale pink and said, Don't hurry me, I'll tell you directly. Let me think a minute. Then he shut his pale pink eyelids a moment in thought, and then opened them, and stood up on the straw, and said very fast, Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears, or if not ears, pots. You know, Albert's uncle said they were going to open the barrow to look for Roman remains tomorrow. Don't you think it's a pity they shouldn't find any? Perhaps they will, Dora said. But Oswald saw, and he said, Primus, go ahead, old man. The dentist went ahead. In The Daisy Chain, he said, they dug in a Roman encampment, and the children went first, and put some pottery there they'd made themselves, and Harry's old medal of the Duke of Wellington. The doctor helped them to some stuff to partly efface the inscription, and all the grown-ups were sold. I thought we might, you may break, you may shatter, the vase if you will, but the scent of the Romans will cling round it still. Denny sat down amid applause. It really was a great idea, at least for him. It seemed to just add what was wanted to the visit of the Maidstone Antiquities. To sell the Antiquities thoroughly would be indeed splendiferous. Of course Dora made haste to point out that we had not got an old medal of the Duke of Wellington, and that we hadn't any doctor who would help us to stuff to efface, etc. But we stonely bade her stow it. We weren't going to do exactly like those daisies chain kids. The pottery was easy. We had made a lot of it by the stream, which was the Nile when we discovered its source, and dried it in the sun, and then baked it under a bonfire, like in foul play. And most of the things were such queer shapes that they should have done for almost anything, Groman, or Greek, or even Egyptian, or anti-Diluvian, or household milk jugs of the cavemen, Albert's uncle said. The pots were fortunately quite ready and dirty, because we had already buried them in mixed sand and river mud to improve the colour and not remembered to wash it off. So the council at once collected it all, and some rusty hinges and some brass buttons, and a file without a handle, and the girl council has carried it all concealed in their pineafors, while the men members carried digging tools. H.O. and Daisy were sent on ahead as scouts to see if the coast was clear. We have learned the true usefulness of scouts from reading about the Transvaal War, but all was still in the hush of the evening sunset on the Roman ruin. We posted centuries who were to lie on their stomachs on the walls and give a long, low, signifying whistle if ought approached. Then we dug a tunnel, like the one we did after treasure, when we happened to bury a boy. It took some time, but never shall it be said that a bastard will grudge time or trouble when a lark was at stake. We put the things in as naturally as we could, and shoved the dirt back till everything looked just as before. Then we went home late for tea. But it was in a good cause, and there was no hot toast, only bread and butter, which does not get cold with waiting. That night Alice whispered to Oswald on the stairs, as we went up to bed, Make me outside your door when the others are asleep, ist not a word. Oswald said, no kid, and she replied in the affirmation. So he kept awake by biting his tongue and pulling his hair, for he shrinks from no pain if it is needful and right. And when the others all slept to the sleep of innocent youth, he got up and went out, and there was Alice dressed. She said, I found some broken things that look ever so much more Roman. They were on top of the cupboard in the library. If you all come with me, we'll bury them just to see how surprised the others will be. It was a wild and daring act, but Oswald did not mind. He said, wait half a shake, and he put on his knickerbockers and jacket, and slipped a few peppermints into his pocket in case of catching cold. It is these thoughtful expedience which mark the born explorer and adventurer. It was a little cold, but the white moonlight was very fair to see, and we decided we'd do some other daring moonlight act some other day. We got out of the front door which is never locked till Albert's uncle goes to bed at twelve or one, and we ran swiftly and silently across the bridge and through the fields to the Roman ruin. Alice told me afterwards she should have been afraid if it had been dark, but the moonlight made it as bright as day is in your dreams. Oswald had taken the spade and a sheet of newspaper. We did not take all the parts Alice had found, but just the two that weren't broken, two crooked jugs made of stuff like flower pots are made of. We made two long cuts with the spade and lifted the turf up and scratched the earth under, and took it out very carefully and handfuls onto the newspaper till the hole was deepish. Then we put in the jugs and filled it up with earth and flattened the turf over. Turf stretches like elastic. This we did a couple of yards from the place where the mound was dug by the men, and we had been so careful with the newspaper that there was no loose earth about. Then we went home in the wet moonlight. At least the grass was very wet, chuckling through the peppermint, and got up to bed without anyone knowing a single thing about it. The next day the antiquities came. It was a jolly hot day, and the tables were spread under the trees on the lawn like a large and very grand Sunday school treat. There were dozens of different kinds of cakes and bread and butter, both white and brown, and gooseberries and plums and jam sandwiches, and the girls decorated the tables with flowers, blue laksperr and white kentaberry bells. At about three there was a noise of people walking in the road, and presently the antiquities began to come in at the front gate, and stood about on the lawn by twos and threes and sixes and sevens, looking shy and uncomfy, exactly like a Sunday school treat. Presently some gentlemen came, who looked like the teachers. They were not shy, and they came right up to the door, so Albert's uncle, who had not been too proud to be up in our room with us, watching the people on the lawn through the netting of our short blinds, said, I suppose that's the committee, come on. So we all went down, we were in our Sunday things, and Albert's uncle received the committee like a feudal system barren, and we were his retainers. He talked about dates and kingposts and gables and mullions and foundations and records, and Sir Thomas Wyatt and poetry and Julius Caesar and Roman remains, and lich gates and churches, and dog's tooth molding till the brain of Oswald reeled. I suppose that Albert's uncle remarked that all our mouths were open, which is a sign of reels in the brain, for he whispered, go hence, and mingle unsuspected with the crowd. So we went out onto the lawn, which was now crowded with men and women and one child. This was a girl. She was fat, and we tried to talk to her, though we did not like her. She was covered in red velvet, like an armchair. But she wouldn't. We thought at first she was from a deaf and dumb asylum, where her kind of teachers had only managed to teach the afflicted to say yes and no. But afterwards we knew better, for Noel heard her say to her mother, I wish you hadn't brought me, Mamar. I didn't have a pretty teacup, and I haven't enjoyed my tea one bit. And she had had five pieces of cake, besides little cakes and nearly a whole plate of plums, and there were only twelve pretty teacups altogether. Our grown-ups talked to us in a most uninterested way, and then the President read a paper about the motels which we couldn't understand, and other people made speeches we couldn't understand either, except the part about kind hospitality, which made us not know where to look. Then Dora and Alice and Daisy and Mrs. Pettigrew poured out the tea, and we handed cups and plates. Uncle took me behind a bush to see him tear what was left of his hair, when he found there were one hundred and twenty-three antiquities present, and I heard the President say to the Secretary that tea always fetched him. Then it was time for the Roman ruin, and our hearts beat high as we took our hats. It was exactly like Sunday, and joined the crowded procession of eager antiquities. Many of them had umbrellas and overcoats, though the weather was fiery and without a cloud. That is the sort of people they were. The ladies all wore stiff bonnets, and no one took their gloves off, though of course it was quite in the country, and it is not wrong to take your gloves off there. We had planned to be quite close when the digging went on, but Albert's uncle made us a mystic sign and drew us apart. Then he said, the stalls and dress circle are for the guests. The hosts and hostesses retired to the gallery, where I am credibly informed an excellent view may be obtained. So we all went up on the Roman walls, and thus missed the cream of the lark, for we could not exactly see what was happening. But we saw that things were being taken from the ground as the men dug, and passed around for the antiquities to look at, and we knew they must be our Roman remains, but the antiquities did not seem to care for them much, though we heard sounds of pleased laughter. And at last Alice and I exchanged meaning glances when the spot was reached where we had put in the extras. Then the crowd closed up thick and we heard excited talk and we knew we really had sold the antiquities this time. Presently the bonnets and coats began to spread out and trickle towards the house, and we were aware that all would soon be over. So we cut home the back way just in time to hear the president saying to Albert's uncle, a genuine find, most interesting, oh really you ought to have one, well if you insist. And so by slow and dull degrees the thick sprinkling of antiquities melted off the lawn, the party was over, and only the dirty teacups and plates and the trampled grass and the pleasures of memory were left. We had a very beautiful supper out of doors too, with jam sandwiches and cakes and things that were over, and as we watched the setting monarch of the skies, I mean the sun, Alice said, let's tell. We let the dentist tell because it was he who hatched the lark, but we helped him a little in the narrating of the fell plot, because he has yet to learn how to tell a story straight from the beginning. When he had done, and we had done, Albert's uncle said, well it amused you and you'll be glad to learn that it amused your friends the antiquities. Didn't they think they were Roman, Daisy said, they did in the Daisy chain. Not in the least, said Albert's uncle, but the treasurer and secretary were charmed by your ingenious preparations for their reception. We didn't want them to be disappointed, said Dora. They weren't, said Albert's uncle, steady on with those plums, H.O. A little way beyond the treasure you had prepared for them, they found two specimens of real Roman pottery, which sent every man jack of them home, thanking his stars that he had been born a happy little antiquary child. Those were our jugs, said Alice, and we really have sold the antiquities. She unfolded the tale about our getting the jugs and burying them in the moonlight and the mound, and the others listened with deeply respectful interest. We really have done it this time, haven't we? She added, in tones of well-deserved triumph. But Oswald had noticed a queer look about Albert's uncle from almost the beginning of Alice's recital, and he now had the sensation of something being up. Which has on other occasions frozen his noble blood. The silence of Albert's uncle now froze it yet more architically. Haven't we, repeated Alice, unconscious of what her sensitive brother's delicate feelings had already got hold of. We have done it this time, haven't we? Since you ask me, thus pointedly, answered Albert's uncle at last, I cannot but confess that I think you have indeed done it. Those pots on the top of the library cupboard are Roman pottery. The amphorae which you hid in the mound are probably, I can't say for certain, mind, priceless. They are the property of the owner of this house. You have taken them out and buried them. The president of the Maidstone Antiquarian Society has taken them away in his bag. Now what are you going to do? Alice and I did not know what to say or where to look. The others added to our pained position by some ungenerous murmurs about our not being so jolly clever as we thought ourselves. There was a very far from pleasing silence. Then Oswald got up. He said, Alice, come here a sec. I want to speak to you. As Albert's uncle had offered no advice, Oswald disdained to ask him for any. Alice got up, too, and she and Oswald went into the garden and sat down on the bench under the quince tree and wished they had never tried to have a private lark of their own with the antiquities. A private sail, Albert's uncle called it afterwards. But regrets, as nearly always happens, were vain. Something had to be done. But what? Oswald and Alice sat in silent desperateness and the voices of the gay and careless others came to them from the lawn where, heartless in their youngness, they were playing tag. I don't know how they could. Oswald would not like to play tag when his brother and sister were in a hole, but Oswald is an exception to some boys. But Dickie told me afterwards he thought it was only a joke of Albert's uncle's. The dusk grew duska till you could hardly tell the quinces from the leaves and Alice and Oswald still sat exhausted with hard thinking, but they could not think of anything. And it grew so dark that the moonlight began to show. Then Alice jumped up, just as Oswald was opening his mouth to say the same thing and said, of course, how silly, I know, come on in Oswald, and they went on in. Oswald was still far too proud to consult anyone else, but he just asked carelessly if Alice and he might go into Maidstone the next day to buy some wire netting for a rabbit hutch and to see after one or two things. Albert's uncle said, certainly, and they went by train with the bailiff from the farm who was going in about some sheep-dip and to buy pigs. At any other time, Oswald would not have been able to bear to leave the bailiff without seeing the pigs bought, but now it was different, for he and Alice had the weight on their bosoms of being thieves without having meant it, and nothing, not even pigs, had power to charm the young but honourable Oswald till that stain had been wiped away. So he took Alice to the secretary of the Maidstone Antiquities House, and Mr Turnbull was out, but the maid servant kindly told us where the president lived, and ere long the trembling feet of the unfortunate brother and sister vibrated on the spotless gravel of Camberdown Villa. When they asked, they were told that Mr Longchamps was at home. Then they waited, paralysed with undescribed emotions in a large room with books and swords and glassbook cases with rotten looking odds and ends in them. Mr Longchamps was a collector. That meant he stuck to anything no matter how ugly and silly, if only it was old. He came in rubbing his hands and very kind. He remembered us very well, he said, and asked what he could do for us. Oswald for once was done. He could not find words in which to own himself the ass he had been. But Alice was less delicately moulded, she said, Oh, if you please, we are most awfully sorry and we hope you'll forgive us, but we thought it would be such a pity for you and all the other poor dear antiquities to come all that way and then find nothing Roman, so we put some pots and things in the burrow for you to find. So I perceived, said the President, stroking his white beard and smiling more agreeably at us. A harmless joke, my dear. Youth's the season for jesting. There's no harm done. Pray think no more about it. It's very honourable of you to come and apologise, I'm sure. His brow began to wear the furrowed anxious look of one who would feign be rid of his guests and get back to what he was doing before they interrupted him. Alice said, We didn't really come for that. It's much worse. Those were two real true Roman jugs you took away. We put them there. They aren't ours. We didn't know they were real Roman. We wanted to sell the antiquities, I mean antiquaries, and we were sold ourselves. This is serious, said the gentleman. I suppose you'd know the jugs if you saw them again. Anywhere, said Oswald, with the confidential rashness of one who does not know what he is talking about. Mr. Longchamps opened the door of a little room leading out of the one we were in and beckoned us to follow. We found ourselves amid shelves and shelves of pottery of all sorts, and two whole shelves, small ones, were filled with the sort of jug we wanted. Well, said the President, with a veiled menacing sort of smile like a wicked cardinal, which is it? Oswald said, I don't know. Alice said, I should know if I had it in my hand. The President patiently took the jugs down one after another, and Alice tried to look inside them, and one after another she shook her head and gave them back. At last she said, You didn't wash them! Mr. Longchamps shuddered and said, No. Then, said Alice, there is something written with lead pencil inside both the jugs. I wish I hadn't. I would rather you didn't read it. I didn't know it would be a nice old gentleman like you who would find it. I thought it would be the younger gentleman with the thin legs and the narrow smile. Mr. Turnbull The President seemed to recognize the description unerringly. Well, well, boys will be boys, girls, I mean. I won't be angry. Look at all the jugs and see if you can find yours. Alice did, and the next one she looked at she said, This is one, and two jugs further on she said, This is the other. Well, the President said, These are certainly the specimens which I obtained yesterday. If your uncle will call on me, I will return them to him. But it's a disappointment. Yes, I think you must let me look inside. He did. And at the first one he said nothing. At the second he laughed. Well, well, he said, We can't expect old heads on young shoulders. You're not the first who went forth to shear and return shorn. Nor it appears, am I. Next time you have a sale of antiquities, take care that you yourself are not sold. Good day to you, my dear. Don't let the incident prey on your mind, he said to Alice. Bless your heart. I was a boy once myself, unlikely as you may think it. Goodbye. We were in time to see the pigs bought after all. I asked Alice what on earth it was she scribbled inside the beastly jugs, and she owned that just to make the lark complete, she had written, sucks in one of the jugs and sold again silly in the other. But we know well enough who it was that was sold. And if ever we have any antiquities to tea again, they shan't find so much as a Greek waistcoat button if we can help it. Unless sits the president, for he did not behave at all badly. For a man of his age, I think he behaved exceedingly well. Oswald can picture a very different scene having been enacted over those rotten pots if the president had been an otherwise sort of man. But that picture is not pleasing, so Oswald will not distress you by drawing it for you. You can most likely do it easily for yourself. End of CHAPTER X Read by Alan and Hazel Chant of Tumbridge, Inc. in England. CHAPTER XI The Benevolent Bar The tramp was very dusty about the feet and legs, and his clothes were very ragged and dirty. But he had cheerful twinkly grey eyes, and he touched his cap to the girls when he spoke to us, though a little as though he would rather not. We were on top of the big wall of the Roman ruin in the three-tree pasture. We had just concluded a severe siege with bows and arrows, the ones that were given us to make up for the pistol that was confiscated after the sad, but not a sinful occasion when it shot a fox. To avoid accidents that you would be sorry for afterwards, Oswald, in his thoughtfulness, had decreed that everyone has to wear wire masks. Luckily, there were plenty of these, because a man who lived in the motel once went to Rome, where they throw hundreds and thousands at each other in play, and call it a comfort battle, or Battaglia di confetti. That's real Italian. And he wanted to get up that sort of thing among the village people, but they were too beastly slack, so he chucked it. And in the attic were the wire masks he bought home with him from Rome, which people wear to prevent the nasty comforts from getting in their mouths and eyes. So we were all armed to the teeth with masks and arrows, but in attacking or defending a fort, your real strength is not in your equipment, but in your power of shove. Oswald, Alice, Noel, and Denny defended the fort. We were much the strongest side, but that was not how Dickey and Oswald picked up. The others got in, it is true, but that was only because an arrow hit Dickey on the nose. It bled quarts as usual, though hit only through the wire mask. Then he put into dock for repairs, and while the defending party weren't looking, he sneaked up the wall at the back and shoved Oswald off and fell on top of him, so that the fort, now that it had lost its gallant young leader, the life and soul of the besieged party, was of course soon overpowered and had to surrender. Then we sat on the top and ate some peppermints Albert's uncle bought us in a bag of from Maidstone when he went to fetch away the Roman pottery we tried to sell the antiquities with. The battle was over, and peace raged among us as we sat in the sun on the big wall and looked at the fields, all blue and swimming in the heat. We saw the tramp coming through the beach field. He made a dusty blot on the fair scene. When he saw us, he came close to the wall and touched his cap, as I have said, and remarked, Excuse me interrupting of your sports, young gentlemen and ladies, but if you could so far oblige as to tell a laboring man the way to the nearest pub, it's a dry day and no error. The rose and crown is the best pub, said Dickie, and the landlady is a friend of ours. It's about a mile if you go by the field path. Law Lover Duck, said the tramp, a miles a long way and walkings a dry job this year, weather. We said we agreed with him. Upon my sacred, said the tramp, if there were a pump handy, I believe I'd take a turn at it. I would indeed so help me if I wouldn't, though water always upsets me and makes me and shaky. We had not cared much about tramp since the adventure of the villainous sailor-man and the Tower of Mystery, but we had the dogs on the wall with us. Lady was awfully difficult to get up on account of her long, dear-hound legs. And the position was a strong one and easy to defend. Besides, the tramp did not look like that bad sailor nor talk like it, and we considerably outnumbered the tramp anyway. Alice nudged Oswald and said something about Sir Philip Sidney. And the tramp's need being greater than his. So Oswald was obliged to go to the hole in the top of the wall where we store provisions during sieges and get out the bottle of ginger beer, which he had gone without when the others had theirs, so as to drink it when he got really thirsty. Meanwhile Alice said, We've got some ginger beer. My brother's getting it. I hope you won't mind drinking out of our glass. We can't wash it, you know, unless we rinse it out with a little ginger beer. Don't you do it, miss, he said eagerly. Never waste good liquor on washing. The glass was beside us on the wall. Oswald filled it with ginger beer and handed down the foaming tanker to the tramp. He had to lie on his young stomach to do this. The tramp was really quite polite, one of nature's gentlemen and a man as well, as we found out afterwards. He said, Here's to you before he drank. Then he drained the glass until the rim rested on his nose. Swelt me, but I was dry, he said. Don't seem to matter much what it is this weather, do it, so long as it's nothing wet. Well, here's thanking you. You're very welcome, said Dora. I'm glad you liked it. Like it, said he. I don't suppose you know what it's like to have a thirst on you. Talk of free schools and free libraries and free baths and wash houses and such. Why don't someone start free drinks? He'd be an hero, he would. I'd vote for him any day of the week and one over. If you don't object, I'll set down a bit and put on a pipe. He sat down on the grass and began to smoke. We asked him questions about himself and he told us many of his secret sorrows, especially about there being no work nowadays for an honest man. And at last he dropped asleep in the middle of a story about a vestry he worked for that hadn't acted fair and square by him like he had by them, or it. I don't know if vestry is singular or plural, and we went home. But before we went, we held a hurried council and collected what money we could from the little we had with us. It was Nightpence Haipney, and wrapped it in an old envelope Dicky had in his pocket and put it gently on the billowing middle of the poor tramp's sleeping waistcoat so that he would find it when he woke. None of the dogs said a single syllable whilst we were doing this, so we knew they believed him to be poor but honest, and we always find it safe to take their word for things like that. As we went home, a brooding silence fell upon us. We found out afterwards that those words of the poor tramp's about free drinks had sunk deep in all our hearts and rankled there. After dinner we went out and sat with our feet in the stream. People tell you it makes your grub disagree with you to do this just after meals, but it never hurts us. There is a fallen willow across the stream that just seats the eight of us. Only the ones at the end can't get their feet in the water properly because of the bushes, so we kept changing places. We had got some licorice root to chew. This helps thought. Dora broke a peaceful silence with this speech. Free drinks. The words awoke a response in every breast. I wonder someone doesn't, H.O. said, leaning back until he nearly toppled in and was only saved by Oswald and Alice at their own deadly peril. Do for goodness' sake sit still, H.O. observed Alice. It would be a glorious act. I wish we could. What, sit still, asked H.O. No, my child, replied Oswald. Most of us can do that when we try. Your angel sister is only wishing to set up free drinks for the poor and thirsty. Not for all of them, Alice said, just a few. Change places now, Dickie. My feet aren't properly wet at all. It is very difficult to change places safely on the willow. The changers have to crawl over the laps of the others while the rest sit tight and hold on for all their worth. But the hard task was accomplished, and then Alice went on. And we couldn't do it for always. Only a day or two, just while our money held out. Eiffel Tower lemonade's the best, and you get a jolly lot of it for your money, too. There must be a great many sincerely thirsty persons go along the Dover Road every day. It wouldn't be bad. We've got a little chink between us, said Oswald. And then think how the poor, grateful creatures would linger and tell us about their inmost sorrows. It would be most frightfully interesting. We could write all their agonied life histories down afterwards, like all the year-round Christmas numbers. Oh, do-lets! Alice was wriggling so with earnestness that Dickie thumped her to make her calm. We might do it just for one day, Oswald said. But it wouldn't be much. Only a drop in the ocean compared with the enormous dryness of all the people in the whole world. Still, every little helps, as the mermaid said when she cried into the sea. I know a piece of poetry about that, Denny said. Small things are best, care and unrest to wealth and rank are given. But little things, on little wings, do something or other, I forget what, but it means the same as Oswald was saying about the mermaid. What are you going to call it? asked Noel, coming out of a dream. Call what? The Free Drinks Game. It's a horrid shame if the Free Drinks Game doesn't have a name you would be to blame if anyone came and— Oh, shut up, remarked Dickie. You've been making that rot up all the time we've been talking instead of listening properly. Dickie hates poetry. I don't mind it so very much myself, especially Macaulay's and Kipling's and Noel's. There was a lot more lame and dame and name and game and things, and now I've forgotten it, Noel said in a gloom. Never mind, Alice answered. It'll come back to you in the silent watches of the night. You see if it doesn't. But really, Noel's right. It ought to have a name. Free drinks company, thirsty travellers' rest, the travellers' joy. These names were suggested, but not cared for extra. Then somebody said—I think it was Oswald— Why not The House Beautiful? It can't be a house. It must be in the road. It'll only be a store. The store-beautiful is simply silly, Oswald said. The bar-beautiful, then, said Dickie, who knows what the rose-and-crown bar is like inside, which, of course, is hidden from girls. Oh, wait a minute, cried the dentist, snapping his fingers like he always does when he's trying to remember things. I thought of something. Only Daisy tickled me and it's gone. I know. Let's call it the Benevolent Bar. It was exactly right, and told the whole truth in two words. Benevolent showed it was free, and bar showed what was free, e.g. things to drink. The Benevolent Bar it was. We went home to prepare for the morrow, for, of course, we meant to do it the very next day. Procrastination is, you know what, and delays are dangerous. If we had waited long, we might have happened to spend our money on something else. The utmost secrecy had to be observed, because Mrs. Pettigrew hates tramps. Most people do who keep fouls. Albert's uncle was in London till the next evening, so we could not consult him. But we know he is always chock-full of intelligent sympathy with the poor and needy. Acting with the deepest disguise, we made an awning to cover the Benevolent Bar keepers from the searching eyes of the monarch of the skies. We found some old striped sun-blinds in the attic, and the girls sewed them together. They were not very big when they'd done this, so we added the girls' striped petticoats. I am sorry their petticoats turn up constantly in my narrative, but they really are very useful, especially when the band is cut off. The girls borrowed Mrs. Pettigrew's sewing machine. They could not ask her leave without explanations, which we did not wish to give just then, and she had lent it to them before. We took it into the cellar to work it so that she should not hear the noise and ask bothering questions. They had to balance it on one end of the beer stand. It was not easy. While they were doing the sewing, we boys went out and got willow poles and chopped the twigs off and got ready as well as we could to put up the awning. When we returned, a detachment of us went down to the shop in the village for Eiffel Tower lemonade. We bought seven and sixpence worth. Then we made a great label to say what the bar was for. There was nothing else to do except make rosettes out of a blue sash of daisies to show we belonged to the benevolent bar. The next day was as hot as ever. We rose early from our innocent slumbers and went out to the Dover Road to the spot we had marked down the day before. We went out across roads so as to be able to give drinks to as many people as possible. We hid the awning and poles behind the hedge and went home to Brecker. After break, we got the big zinc bath they washed clothes in and after filling it with clean water we just had to empty it again because it was too heavy to lift. So we carried it vacant to the tristing spot and left H.O. and Noel to guard it and we went and fetched separate pails of water, very heavy work and no one who wasn't really benevolent would have bothered about it for an instant. Oswald alone carried three pails so did Dickie and the dentist. Then we rolled down some empty barrels and stood up three of them by the roadside and put planks on them. This made a very first class table and we covered it with the best tablecloth combined in the linen cupboard. We brought out several glasses and some tea cups, not the best ones. Oswald was firm about that and the kettle and spirit lamp and the teapot in case any weary tramp woman fancied a cup of tea instead of Eiffel Tower. H.O. and Noel had to go down to the shop for tea. They need not a grumble, they had not carried any of the water and they're having to go the second time was only because we forgot to tell them to get some real lemons to put on the bar to show what the drink would be like when you get it. The man at the shop kindly gave us tick for the lemons and we cashed up most of our next week's pocket money. Two or three people passed while we were getting things ready but no one said anything except the man who said, Blooming Sunday School treat, and as it was too early in the day for anyone to be thirsty we did not stop the way for us to tell them their thirst could be slaked without cost at our benevolent bar. But when everything was quite ready and our blue rosettes fastened upon our breasts over our benevolent hearts we stuck up the great placard we had made with benevolent bar, free drinks to all weary travellers in white wadding on red calico like Christmas decorations in church. We had meant to fasten this to the edge of the awning but we had to pin it to the front of the tablecloth because I'm sorry to say the awning went wrong from the first. We could not drive the willow poles into the road, it was much too hard and in the ditch it was too soft besides being no use so we just had to cover our benevolent heads with our hats and take it in turns to go into the shade of the tree on the other side of the road for we had pitched our table on the sunny side of the way of course relying on our broken reed-like awning and wishing to give it a fair chance. Everything looked very nice and we longed to see somebody really miserable coming along so as to be able to relieve their distress. A man and a woman were the first. They stopped and stared. But when Alice said, Free drinks, free drinks, aren't you thirsty? They said, no thank you, and went on. Then came a person from the village. He didn't even say thank you when we asked him and Oswald began to fear it might be like the awful time when we wandered about on Christmas Day trying to find poor persons and persuade them to eat our conscience pudding. But a man in a blue jersey and a red bundled eased Oswald's fears by being willing to drink a glass of lemonade and even to say thank you, I'm sure, quite nicely. After that it was better. As we had foreseen there were plenty of thirsty people walking along the Dover Road and even some from the Cross Road. We had had the pleasure of seeing nineteen tumblers drained to the dregs ere we tasted any ourselves. Nobody asked for tea. More people went by than we gave lemonade to. Some wouldn't have it because they were too grand. One man told us he could pay for his own liquor when he was dry which praise be he wasn't over and above, at present. And others asked if we hadn't any beer. And when we said no, they said it showed what sort we were as if the sort were not a good one, which it is. And another man said, slops again. You never get nothing for nothing, not this side of heaven you don't. Look at the bloom in blue ribbon on them, oh law. And went on quite sadly without having a drink. Our pig-man who helped us on the Tower of Mystery Day went by and we hailed him and explained it all to him and gave him a drink and asked him to call as he came back. He liked it all and said we were a real good sort. How different from the man who wanted the beer. Then he went on. One thing I didn't like and that was the way boys began to gather. Of course we could not refuse to give drinks to any traveller who was old enough to ask for it. But when one boy had had three glasses of lemonade and asked for another, Oswald said, I think you've had jolly well enough. You can't be really thirsty after all that lot. The boy said, oh, can't I? You'll just see if I can't. And went away. Presently he came back with four other boys all bigger than Oswald and they all asked for lemonade. Oswald gave it to the four new ones but he was determined in his behaviour to the other one and wouldn't give him a drop. Then the five of them went and sat on a gate a little way off and kept laughing in a nasty way and whenever a boy went by they called out, I say here's a go and as often as not the new boy would hang about with them. It was disquieting. For though they had nearly all had lemonade we could see it had not made them friendly. A great glorious glow of goodness gladdened that those go all together and are called alliteration. Our heart, when we saw our own tramp coming down the road, the dogs did not growl at him as they had at the boys or the beer man. I did not say before that we had the dogs with us because we had promised never to go out without them. Oswald said hello and the tramp said hello. Then Alice said you see we've taken your advice we're giving free drinks. Doesn't it all look nice? It does that said the tramp. I don't mind if I do. So we gave him two glasses of lemonade succeedingly and thanked him for giving us the idea. He said we were very welcome and if we'd no objection he'd sit down a bit and put on a pipe. He did and after talking a little more he fell asleep. Drinking anything seemed to end in sleep with him. I always thought it was only beer and things made people sleepy but he was not so. When he was asleep he rolled into the ditch but it did not wake him up. The boys were getting very noisy and they began to shout things and to make silly noises with their mouths. And when Oswald and Dickie went over to them and told them just to chuck it they were worse than ever. I think perhaps Oswald and Dickie might have fought and settled them though there were eleven yet back to back you can always do it against overwhelming numbers in a book. Only Alice called out Oswald here's some more come back. We went. Three big men were coming down the road very red and hot and not amiable looking. They stopped in front of the benevolent bar and slowly read the wadding and the red stuff label. Then one of them said he was blessed or something like that and another said he was too. The third one said blessed or not a drink's a drink blew ribbon though by a word you ought not to say though it is in the Bible and the catechism as well. Let's have a liquor little missy. The dogs were growling but Oswald thought it best not to take any notice of what the dogs said but to give these men each a drink so he did. They drank. But not as if they cared about it very much and then they set down their glasses on the table a liberty no one else had entered into and began to try and chaff Oswald. Oswald said in an under voice to H.O. Just take charge I want to speak to the girls a sec call if you want anything. Then he drew the others away to say he thought there had been enough of it and considering the boys and the new three men perhaps we better chuck it and go home we'd been benevolent nearly four hours anyway. While this conversation and the objections of the others were going on H.O. perpetuated an act which nearly wrecked the benevolent bar of course Oswald was not an eye or ear witness of what happened but from what H.O. said in the calmer moments of later life I think this was about what happened one of the big disagreeable men said to H.O. I ain't got such a thing as a drop of spirit have ya H.O. said no we hadn't any lemonade and tea lemonade and tea blank bad word I told you about and blazes replied the bad character for such he afterwards proved to be what's that then he pointed to a bottle named Dewar's whiskey which stood on the table near the spirit kettle oh is that what you want said H.O. kindly the man is understood to have said he should bloom in well think so but H.O. is not sure about the blooming he held out his glass with about half the lemonade in it and H.O. generously filled up the tumbler out of the bottle labeled Dewar's whiskey the man took a great drink and then suddenly he spat out what happened to be left in his mouth just then and began to swear it was then that Oswald and Dicky rushed upon the scene the man was shaking his fist in H.O.'s face and H.O. was still holding on to the bottle we had brought out the methylated spirit in for the lamp in case of anyone wanting tea which they hadn't if I was Jim said the second Ruffian for such indeed they were when he had snatched the bottle from H.O. and smelt it I chucked the whole show over the hedge so I would and you young gutter sniped after it so I wouldn't Oswald saw in a moment that in point of strength if not numbers he and his party were outmatched and the unfriendly boys were drawing gladly near it is no shame to signal for help when in distress the best ships do it every day Oswald shouted help help before the words were out of his brave yet trembling lips our own tramp leapt like an antelope from the ditch and said well then what's up the biggest of the three men immediately knocked him down he lay still the biggest then said come on any more of you come on Oswald was so enraged at this cowardly attack that he actually hit out at the big man and he really got one in just above the belt then he shut his eyes because he felt that now all was indeed up there was a shout and a scuffle and Oswald opened his eyes in astonishment at finding himself still whole and unimpaired our own tramp had artfully simulated insensibleness to get the men off their guard and then had suddenly got his arms round a leg each of two of the men and pulled them to the ground helped by Dickie who saw his game and rushed in at the same time exactly like Oswald would have done he had not had his eyes shut ready to meet his doom the unpleasant boys shouted and the third man tried to help his unrespectable friends now on their backs involved in a desperate struggle with our own tramp who was on top of them accompanied by Dickie it all happened in a minute and it was all mixed up the dogs were growling and barking Martha had one of the men by the trouser leg and Pintcher had another screaming like mad and the strange boys shouted and laughed little beasts and then suddenly our pig man came round the corner and two friends of his with him he had gone and fetched them to take care of us if anything unpleasant occurred it was very thoughtful and just like him fetch the police! cried the pig man in noble tones and H.O. started running to do it but the scoundrels struggled from under Dickie and our tramp shook off the dogs and some bits of trouser and fled heavily down the road our pig man said get along home to the disagreeable boys and shooed them as if they were hens and they went H.O. ran back when they began to go up the road and there we were all standing breathless in tears on the scene of the late desperate engagement Oswald gives you his word of honour that his and Dickie's tears were tears of pure rage there are such things as tears of pure rage anyone who knows will tell you so we picked up our own tramp and bathed the lump on his forehead with lemonade the water in the zinc bath had been upsetting the struggle then he and the pig man and his kind friends helped us carry our things home the pig man advised us on the way not to try these sort of kind actions without getting a grown-up to help us we've been advised this before but now I really think we shall never try to be benevolent to the poor and needy again at any rate not unless we know them very well first we have seen our own tramp often since the pig man gave him a job he has got work to do at last the pig man says he's not such a very bad chap only he will fall asleep at the least drop of drink we know that is his failing we saw it at once but it was lucky for us he fell asleep that day near our benevolent bath I will not go into what my father said about it all there was a good deal in it about minding your own business there generally is in most of the talkings too we get but he gave our tramp a sovereign and the pig man says he went to sleep on it for a solid week end of chapter 11 read by Alan and Hazel Chance of Tumbridge in Kent, England with sound effects by Smudge who tried to assist in the reading