They entered Cheltenham at about half-past eleven, and were having lunch on the top of Leckhampton Hill, on the other side of it, by half-past one. Robert had not allowed any stop in Cheltenham except for shopping. "We don't want towns," he said, "except historic ones."
"But this is historic," said Jack; "Jessop was at school here."
The pull up Leckhampton Hill was very stiff, and they were all glad to take lunch easily, and since Robert had arranged a short day—only three or four miles more, to a very nice-looking spot on the other side of Birdlip—they rested with clear consciences; and, as it happened, rested again in the Birdlip Hotel, where they had tea in the garden overlooking the Severn Valley on the top of just such a precipice as Bredon.
It was half-past three before they started again on their next five miles, and they had done about three of them, and had just passed Teddington, when Gregory, who was walking with Kink beside Moses, suddenly dashed ahead towards a bundle which was lying in the middle of the road.
He bent down over it, and then began to shriek for the others to come too.
"What is it?" cried Jack, as they raced up.
"It's a baby!" Gregory said, wild with excitement. "A real baby!"
Janet, who had been behind, sprang forward as she heard these remarkable words, and easily reached the bundle first.
"So it is," she exclaimed, picking it tenderly up and opening the wraps round its face.
It was a swarthy mite, very tightly bound into its clothes.
"What an extraordinary thing!" said Mary. "Fancy finding a baby on the road!"
"It has probably been abandoned," said Hester. "Very likely it is of noble birth, and was stolen by gipsies and stained brown, and now they are afraid of pursuit and have left it."
"How could it be of noble birth?" Gregory asked. "Look how hideous it is!"
"Looks have nothing to do with high lineage," said Hester. "There have been very ugly kings."
"It isn't hideous," said Janet. "It's a perfect darling. But what are we to do with it?"
"If it's a boy," said Gregory, "let's keep it and make it into a long-stop. We want one badly." (Gregory, as I have said, hated fielding.)
"Let's adopt it," said Hester. "Mother often says how she wishes we were still babies."
"Don't let's adopt it if it's a girl," said Gregory.
"It doesn't matter what a baby is," said Hester,—"whether it's a boy or a girl. The important thing is that it's a baby. When it gets too big, we can let it go."
"I'm dreadfully afraid," said Janet, "that we shall have to try to find out whose it is and give it back now."
"Well," said Mary, "we needn't try too hard, need we?"
"How are you going to try, anyway?" Jack asked, with some scorn. "You can't stop everyone you see and say, 'Have you lost a baby?' This old man just coming along, for instance."
"Wouldn't a good way," said Robert, "be to write a little placard:
FOUND, A BABY.Inquire Within.
and stick it on the caravan?"
They liked that idea, but Janet suggested that it would be best to ask Kink first.
"There's only one thing to do," said Kink, "and that is to hand it over to the police at the next place we come to."
"Police again!" said Horace. "You're always talking of the police."
"Well," said Kink, "that's what they're for. And if you think a moment or two, you'll all see what a trouble a baby would be. We shall reach Oxenton in a little while, and we can leave the baby there."
But, as it happened, they had no need to, for there suddenly appeared before them a caravan covered with baskets which was being urged towards them by a young woman who tugged at the horse's head in a kind of frenzy. As she drew nearer they could hear that she was wailing.
"It must be her baby," said Janet, holding the bundle up; but the woman did not see it, and Janet told Jack to run on quickly and meet her, and tell her that they had the baby and it was not hurt.
Jack did so, and the woman left the horse to be cared for by the man and boy who walked behind, and ran to Janet, and seized the bundle from her, and hugged it so tightly that the baby, for the first time, uttered a little cry.
"Where did you find it?" the gipsy woman asked; and Janet told her the story.
"It must have rolled out of the van while I was in front with the horse," said the gipsy. "We didn't miss it. We've had to come back three miles at least."
By this time the two caravans had met, and the man was brought up by the woman and told the story, and they all expressed their gratitude to Janet for nursing the child so kindly.
"Bless your pretty heart!" the gipsy woman said again and again, while her husband asked if there was anything that they could do for her and her party.
"I don't think so," said Janet. "We liked to take care of it, of course."
The gipsy man asked a number of questions about the Slowcoach, and then suggested that he should show them a good place to camp, and make their fire for them, and he added: "I'll tell you what—you all come and have supper with us. I'll bet you've talked about playing at gipsies often enough; well, we'll get a real gipsy supper—a slap-up one. What's the time?"
He looked at the sun. "Nearly five. Well, we'll have supper at half-past seven, and we'll do you proud. Will you come?"
Janet considered.
"Of course, Janet," said Robert.
"Why don't you say yes?" said Gregory.
Hester shrank a little towards the Slowcoach, and Janet went to talk to Kink.
She came back and thanked the gipsy, but said that they would not all come, but the boys would gladly do so.
"I'm sorry you won't be there," said the man. "But we'll give the young gents a square meal—and tasty, too! Something to relish! What do you say, now," he asked Gregory, "to a hedgehog? I don't expect you've ever eaten that."
"Hedgehog!" said Gregory. "No, but I've always wanted to." And, in fact, he had been thinking of nothing else for the last five minutes.
"You shall have it," said the man. "Baked or stewed?"
"Which is best?" Gregory asked.
"Stewed," said the man. "But if you'd like it baked—Or, I'll tell you. We'll have one of each. We got two to-day. This shall be a banquet."
The gipsies really were very grateful folk. The boy got wood for them; the man made their fire—much better than it had ever been made before—and lit it without any paper, and with only one match.
It was at last arranged that they should all share the same supper, although the woman should sit with the girls and the boys with the man. And so they did; and they found the hedgehog very good, especially the baked one, which had been enclosed in a mould of clay and pushed right into the middle of the fire. It tasted a little like pork, only more delicate.
"When you invited us to come to supper," Robert said, "you asked what the time was, and then looked at the sun and said it was nearly five. And it was—almost exactly. How do you do that?"
"Ah," said the gipsy, "I can't explain. There it is. I know by the sun, but I can't teach you, because you must live out of doors and never have a clock, or it's no good."
"And can you tell it when there's no sun?" Robert asked.
"Pretty well," said the man.
"How lucky you are!" said Horace.
"Well, I don't know," said the man. "What about rain? When it's raining hard, and we're huddling in the van and can't get any dry sticks for the fire, and our feet are soaked, what are you doing? Why, you're all snug in your houses, with a real roof over you."
"I'd much rather live in a caravan than a house," said Horace.
The man laughed. "You're a young gent out for a spree," he said. "You don't count. You wonder at me," he continued, "being able to tell the time by the skies. But I dare say there's one, at any rate, of you who can find a train in that thing they call Bradshaw, isn't there?"
"I can," said Robert.
"Well, there you are," said the gipsy. "What's luck? Nothing. Everyone's got a little. No one's got much."
"Oh, but the millionaires?" said Horace.
"Millionaires!" said the gipsy. "Why, you don't think they're lucky, do you?"
"I always have done so," said Horace.
"Go on!" said the gipsy. "Why, we're luckier than what they are. We've got enough to eat and drink,—and no one wants more,—and along with it no rent and taxes, no servants, no tall hats, no offices, no motor-cars, no fear of thieves. Millionaires have no rest at all. No sitting under a tree by the fire smoking a pipe."
"And no hedgehogs," said Gregory.
"No—no hedgehogs. Nothing but butcher's meat that costs its weight in gold. Take my advice, young gents," said the gipsy, "and never envy anybody."
Meanwhile the others were very happy by the Slowcoach fire. The gipsy woman, hugging her baby, kept as close to Janet as if she were a spaniel. Their name was Lee, she said, and they made baskets. They lived at Reading in the winter and were on the road all the rest of the year. The young boy was her brother. His name was Keziah. Her husband's name was Jasper. The baby's was Rhoda.
Hester was very anxious to ask questions about kidnapping, but she did not quite like to, and was, in fact, silent.
The gipsy woman noticed it after a while, and remarked upon it. "That little dark one there," she said; "why doesn't she speak?"
Janet said something about Hester being naturally quiet and thoughtful.
"Oh, no," said the woman, "I know what it is: she's frightened of me. She's heard stories about the gipsies stealing children and staining their faces with walnut juice; haven't you, dearie?"
Hester admitted it.
"There," said the woman, laughing triumphantly. "But don't be frightened, dearie," she added. "That's only stories. And even if it ever did happen, it couldn't again, what with railway trains and telegraphs and telephones and motor-cars and newspapers. How could we help being found out? Why," she continued, "so far from stealing children, there was a boy running away from school once who offered us a pound to let him join our caravan and stain his face and go with us to Bristol, where he could get on to a ship as a stowaway, as he called it; but Jasper wouldn't let him. I wanted to; but Jasper was dead against it. 'No,' he said, 'gipsies have a bad enough time as it is, without getting into trouble helping boys to run away from school.' That shows what we are, dearie," she added to Hester, with a smile.
"And don't you ever tell fortunes?" Hester asked.
"I won't say I've never done that," the gypsy said.
"Won't you tell mine?" Hester asked. "I've got a sixpence."
"Just cross my hand with it," said the woman, "but don't give it to me. I couldn't take money from any of you."
So Hester, with her heart beating very fast, crossed the gipsy's hand with the sixpence, and the gipsy held both hers and peered at them very hard while Janet nursed the baby.
"This," said the gipsy at last, "is a very remarkable hand. I see stories and people reading them. I see a dark gentleman and a gentleman of middling colour."
"Yes," said Hester. "Can't you tell me anything more about them?"
"Well," said the gipsy, "I can't, because they are only little boys just now. But I see a beautiful wedding. White satin. Flowers. Bridesmaids."
The gipsy stopped, and Hester drew her hand back. It was terribly romantic and exciting.
Before the woman said good night and went to her caravan, Hester took her sixpence to Kink and asked him to bore a hole in it. And then she threaded it on a piece of string and tied it round the baby's neck.
The gipsy woman was very grateful. "A beautiful wedding," she said again. "Such flowers! Music, too."
"Wasn't it wonderful?" Hester said to Janet before they went to sleep.
"What?" Janet asked.
"The gipsy knowing I was fond of writing."
"No," said Janet, "it wasn't wonderful at all. There was a great ink stain on your finger."
When they awoke the next morning the gipsies had gone—nothing remained of them but the burnt circle on the ground which any encampment makes and a little rubbish; but at the mouth of the boys' tent lay a bundle of sticks and two rabbits.
Kink looked at the rabbits with a narrow eye. "Better hurry up and get them eaten," he said, "or one of those policemen that Master Campbell is so fond of may be asking awkward questions. And it wouldn't be a bad thing," Kink added, "to have a good look round and see if there's anything missing."
"Oh, Kink," said Janet, "how horrid you are to be so suspicious! And after all their gratitude, too!"
"Yes," said Kink; "but gipsies is gipsies. They were gipsies before they were grateful, and I reckon they'll be gipsies after."
But in spite of his examination he found no signs of any theft.
They were away soon after breakfast, which seemed a little flat at first after the excitement of last night. But they soon lost that feeling in hunger. It was a very windy day, with showers now and then; but it was bracing too, especially on this very high road, hundreds of feet above the sea-level.
Robert pointed out how straight it was, and told them it was made by the Romans eighteen hundred years ago, and it ran right through Cirencester (which they called Corinium) to Speen (which they called Spinae). Its name was then Ermin Street. And it amused the children to imagine they too were Romans clanking along this fine highway.
It was after lunch that they came upon an old woman—sitting beside the road just beyond Tredington. Long before they reached her they heard her moaning and groaning.
"What is it?" Janet asked.
The old woman moaned and groaned.
"Are you ill?" Janet asked.
The old woman groaned and moaned.
"Kinky," said Janet, "come and see if we can help her."
Kink murmured to himself and came to her.
"What's up, missis?" he asked.
"It's my poor heart," said the old woman with an Irish brogue. "I'm very queer. It's near death I am. For the love of Heaven give me a ride in the beautiful caravan."
"Where do you want to go?" Kink growled at her.
"To Alverminster," she said. "To see my daughter. She lives there. She's been married these five years to a carpenter, and she's just had another baby, bless it's wee face! But me poor heart's that bad I can't go another step."
Kink drew Janet aside. "She's an old humbug," he said, "and she smells of gin. Better let her be."
"Oh, Kinky," said Janet, "how can we! The poor old thing, and her daughter waiting to see her!"
"Daughter!" Kink snorted. "She's got no daughter. She's trying it on."
"How horrid you are!" Janet said. "I mean to give her a lift, anyway."
"It's against my advice," said Kink. "Anyway, promise me you won't give her any money."
"Very well," said Janet, and she invited the old woman to sit on a chair at the back of the caravan.
"The saints protect you for your kindness!" said the old woman, getting to her feet and making her way up the steps with more ease than Janet had dared to expect. "The saints protect you all—all except that suspicious ould gossoon wid the whip," she added, glowering at Kink, who was by no means backward in glowering at her in reply.
"If you had such a thing as a drop of spirits," said the old woman to Janet, who had taken a seat beside her, "I should be all right. The doctor says that there's nothing like a little stimulant for such flutterings and spasms as worry me."
"I'm afraid we haven't," said Janet; "but I could make you a cup of tea."
"There's a darlin'," said the old woman. "It's not so helpful as spirits, but there's comfort in it too."
Her sharp little eyes followed Janet as she moved about and brought together all the tea requisites.
"You're a handy young lady," she said, "and may Heaven send you a fine husband when the time comes! Ah, it's myself as a girl you remind me of, with your quick, pretty ways."
"Where did you live when you were a girl?" Janet asked.
"In a little village called Kilbeggy," said the old woman. "My father was a farmer there until the trouble came upon him. But it's little enough happiness we had after that, and niver a piece of meat passed our lips for years. Nothing but potatoes and bread. And you're eating meat twice a day, I'm thinking, all of you. Ah, it's a strange world, and a very gay one when you're rich. I was rich once, me darlin'."
"Were you?" Janet asked in surprise.
"Oh, yes," said the old woman, "I was rich once. Me husband was a licensed victualler in Harrow, and we kept our own wagonette. Many's the time I've driven it meself into London, to a stable in the Edgeware Road, where I left it to do me shopping. It was an elegant carriage, and a white horse not so unlike your own, only smaller."
Janet handed her the tea.
"Thank you, me darlin'," said the old woman. "I'm feeling better already. That's a beautiful locket you're wearing—it is the very image of one that belonged to me poor little Clara that died."
The old woman began to cry. Janet was greatly distressed. "I can't help it," said the old woman. "Me poor little Clara! I kept it for years and years, and then it was taken from me by my landlady's son, a good-for-nothing blackguard, in lodgings off the Pentonville Road." She sobbed afresh. "I've never been happy since," she said.
"Oh," Janet exclaimed, "do take this. I don't want it, I'm sure, if it would make you happy."
"But it's robbing you of it I am," said the old woman, as her hand closed on it.
"I'd much rather you had it," Janet replied.
"Heaven bless your kind heart!" said the old woman.
They jogged on, and she continued to look around her and to ask questions. She asked all about Janet's home and parents.
"Could you," she said at last, "lend me a shilling, my dear? It's to buy the little baby some mittens, his poor hands get that cold. I don't want you to give it, but couldn't you lend it me only for to-day? I'll post you a beautiful postal order to-night, which my daughter's husband will get for me, or a beautiful row of stamps, if you'll give me the address of the grand house you'll be staying in at Stratford."
But Janet was firm; she had promised Kink.
"Not for the poor little mite's cold hands?" said the old woman.
It was very hard, but Janet had to say no.
The old woman said no more for some time. Then suddenly, "Did you ever see the late King, God bless him?" she asked.
"Yes," said Janet, "I saw him once. It was at the opening of Parliament."
"Then you can tell me," said the old woman, "something I want to know; for I was arguing it with my daughter's husband the last time I was here, and I want to convince him. He says—my daughter's husband, that is—that the King had thick hair on the top of his head, God bless him! and I say he hadn't. What I say is, he'd got all the hair he needed. So if you ever saw him, you could tell me."
"Oh, no, I can't," Janet said. "When I saw him he was in a carriage."
"What a pity!" said the old woman. "But haven't you a portrait of him anywhere?"
"No, I'm sure we haven't," said Janet. "Perhaps we ought to have! It would be more loyal, wouldn't it?"
"Never mind," said the old woman; "only it would put my mind at rest." And then suddenly she began to laugh. "Why," she said, "how silly we are! Of course you've got portraits of him—lashin's of them, darlin'."
"Where?" Janet exclaimed.
"In your purse," said the old woman. "On the blessed money. On the shillings and sixpences, my dear."
"Of course," said Janet, laughing too; and she drew out her purse and looked at the money it contained. There was half a sovereign and half a crown and some smaller coins; but none were new ones: all were of Victoria's reign.
"What a pity!" said the old woman again—"perhaps one of your brothers or sisters has some more. Not the old blackguard driving, of course."
"Yes," said Janet; "I'll see;" and descended the steps, and soon after returned with an Edward shilling.
The old woman took it and examined head. "I was right," she said, "God bless him! He was as thin on the top as my own poor father was, rest his soul! Well, dear, and now I'll say good-bye," she added soon after, as she rose to her feet and gave the shilling back. "If you'll make that spalpeen stop, I'll get down, for me daughter's cottage is just over there, across fields. Thank you very kindly for the tea and your sweet company. Good-bye, good bye," she called, "and the saints protect you all!" and she hobbled off through a gate in the hedge.
At Alverminster Gregory insisted upon buying some acid-drops, and went to Janet for a penny. But when she came to feel for her purse it was not to be found. She hunted everywhere in the caravan, but in vain.
"When did you have it last?" Kink asked. "You haven't bought anything to-day."
"No," said Janet, "but I had it out when the old Irishwoman was there."
"I guessed she'd get some money out of you," said Kink.
"Oh, Kink!" said Janet; "she didn't. And after I had promised, too! All she wanted to see was King Edward's head on a coin."
"What for?" Kink asked.
"To see if he was bald on the top or not," said Janet. "She had had an argument with her daughter's husband about it. Which just proves that you were wrong in thinking she had no daughter."
Kink smiled an annoying smile. "Well," he said, "what then?"
"We found a coin," said Janet, "and found that the King was bald on the top. That's all."
"And shortly afterwards she got out?" Kink asked.
"Yes, soon afterwards."
Kink laughed very heartily. "Well," he said, "I could see she was an old fraud, but I didn't think she would steal anything, or I wouldn't have let her in the caravan at all."
"Steal!" Janet cried. "Why, do you think she stole it? It's very horrid and unjust of you."
"Then where is it?" Kink asked. "That stuff about the King's head was a trick. It's a clear case. We must go to the constable's house."
"Oh, no," said Janet, "we won't. She was a poor old thing, and her heart was bad, and she was very unhappy, and I don't mind about the money."
"She's an old vagabond," said Kink, "and her heart's as sound as mine. She wants locking up."
"I won't have it," said Janet again. "If she did steal it, it was very wrong; but she has had very bad luck. Don't let's think any more about it, but pay for the sweets and get on."
Poor Janet! no wonder she wanted the matter dropped, for there was her locket to be explained if any of the others noticed it and asked questions. She was very silent for some time, and walked alone, thinking hard. This was her first experience of theft, and it hurt her.
The children, as it happened, never did notice the absence of the locket, but they kept the memory of the old woman very green. Nothing after that could be missed without some reference to her.
"Where's the corkscrew?" Robert would say. "I suppose Kathleen Mavourneen's got it."
"It's no use," Jack would remark, "I can't find the salt. Erin go bragh!"
They reached Cirencester at five o'clock, and at once turned to the left to the Fairford road, intending to camp just outside the town till Monday; and it was here that Gregory had his first rebuff in his capacity as Requester of Camping Grounds. He brought it upon himself by refusing to let Mary accompany him, and, indeed, refusing advice altogether.
He marched off to the farmhouse, which could be seen in the distance across the meadows, full of assurance; but misfortunes began at once. No sooner was he well in the first meadow than a flock of geese suddenly appeared from nowhere and approached him. There is something very horrid about the approach of a flock of geese. They are not really dangerous, but they lower their heads and hiss and come on so steadily and are so impossible to deal with. A dog can be hit with a stick; but you can't hit a goose. There were no stones to throw, and the stupid, angry birds came every moment nearer.
Gregory did not wish to go back, and did not want to appear frightened in the eyes of the others, who were very likely watching, and he therefore had nothing to do but run as fast as he could for the farther gate and scramble over it.
Here he paused for a moment, to be in no way reassured by the sight, much too near the path, of a number of bullocks. In the ordinary way Gregory did not mind bullocks—did not, in fact, think about them—but just now he was flustered and rather nervous. However, he walked steadily forward and got safely past the first. Then, with his face kept straight and brave, but his eye anxiously peering through the back of his head to see what the first was doing, he approached the second and got past that all right. But the third gave him a wild and, as it seemed, furious look, and this turned him cold; and then he was perfectly certain that he could feel the others close behind him breathing hot on his neck, and once again he broke into a terrified run, and so gained the next gate, over which he may be said to have fallen rather than climbed.
On the other and safe side he paused again, and again looked for the enemy. Seeing none, he once more started forward.
This was the last meadow, and the farm was at the end of it, and Gregory was quite close to the farm, when suddenly there appeared, right in his path, with a challenging tail in air, a large dog—a collie.
Gregory stopped and the collie stopped, and the two looked at each other carefully.
Gregory remembered all that he had ever heard about collies being treacherous and fierce.
He advanced a step; the collie did not move.
He advanced another step; and then, to his horror, the collie began to advance too, lifting his feet high and dangerously.
Gregory forced himself to say, "Good dog!" but the collie still advanced.
Gregory said, "Poor fellow, then!" and the collie at once did something perfectly awful: he growled.
Gregory had no courage left. His tongue and lips refused to obey him. He felt his knees turning to water.
How he wished he had let Mary come too! Dogs always liked her. Why was it that dogs liked some people and not others? he asked himself. Ridiculous! No one liked dogs better than he, if this ass of a collie only knew it.
Meanwhile, the collie, still growling, drew nearer, and Gregory felt himself pricking all over. Where would it bite him first? he wondered.
But just as he had given up all hope, a voice called out sharply, "Caesar, come here!" and the collie turned and ran to where a tall, red-faced man was standing.
"What do you want?" the man then said to Gregory, with equal sharpness. "You're trespassing."
Gregory was frankly crying now—with relief; but he pulled himself together and said he wanted to see the farmer.
"I'm the farmer," said the man. "What is it?"
Gregory explained what he had come for.
"No," said the farmer, "not on my land."
Gregory said that other farmers had said yes.
"I don't care," said the farmer, "I say NO."
Gregory longed to ask if there was another way back, but he had not the courage, and he turned and made again for the gate of the bullock meadow.
The bullocks were still near the path, so he climbed softly over the gate, as he feared they might hear him, and crept round by the hedge to the next gate without attracting any notice.
Had he only known, he might have gone safely by the path, for one bullock was saying to another: "There's that little duffer going all that long way out of his course just for fear of us. What do you say to trotting down to the gate and giving him another scare?"
"No," said the other. "It's not worth while. He's very small, too, and these horns, you know—they are a bit startling. Besides, there are all those flies by the gate."
"True," said the other; "but it makes me smile, all the same."
So Gregory got out safely, and, performing the same manoeuvre with the geese, he reached the caravan and Janet's arms without further misfortune.
The others were of course disappointed at the result of his mission, and walked on another half-mile, much farther from Cirencester than they had wished to be, to the next farm.
There Mary and Hester made the request, which was at once granted; and the farmer and his wife were so much interested that they both walked down to the Slowcoach and examined it, and the farmer advised its being taken into a yard where there was a great empty barn and backed against that; so that they had the whole of the barn as a kind of anteroom, and a most enchanting smell of hay everywhere.
"All I ask," he said, "is that you don't burn the place down with your cooking."
The pot was then filled and placed on the fire. Kink skinned the rabbits and Janet and Mary put them in, while Jack and Robert and Horace walked into Cirencester to buy eatables and picture postcards and send off the telegram.
That evening after supper Janet suggested that it might be the best opportunity they would have to write the letters to X. of which they had often talked; so they made themselves comfortable in the caravan and on the barn floor, and each wrote something, not after the style of the Snarker's game at Oxford, but quite separately.
Janet wrote:
"Saturday Evening, July 8,"In a Barn near Cirencester.DEAR X.,"We thank you very much for the caravan, which is much the most beautiful present that anyone can ever have had. We have now been in it nearly ten days, and we like it more every day. We have called it the Slowcoach. The party is seven, and Kink, who drives. We have with us Mary and Jack Rotheram and Horace Campbell; but whether you know who they are or not, of course I don't know. I hope some day you will tell us who you are."I am,"Yours sincerely,JANET AVORY.
Mary Rotheram wrote:
DEAR MR. X.
Then she crossed out the "Mr." because, as she said, it might be a lady, and began again:
DEAR X.,"I am not one of the Avories, and the caravan was therefore not given to me, but my brother and I have been so happy in it that I want to say thank you for it quite as if I were an Avory all the time. We live near them at Chiswick, you know. It has been a supreme holiday, with hardly any rain and no real troubles, although even the strongest people must sometimes get a little tired of walking on dusty roads and having to wait for meals. We each have a special duty, and I am the head cook, but Janet is really better at it than I am. Our only real disappointment is that caravaning makes you so tired that there is no chance of cricket, for we brought cricket things with us, but have never been able to use them. We might have done so at Salford, perhaps, but the river was so very tempting that we rowed about instead."Yours sincerely and gratefully,MARY ROTHERAM.
Jack Rotheram wrote:
DEAR X.,"My sister Mary has said who I am, but she has not explained how it is I am here. It is because my brother William and I tossed up for it; He called 'Heads,' and it was tails, so I won at once. And then he said 'Threes,' which means the best out of three, and this time he called 'Tails' and it was heads, so that settled the thing absolutely. He was, of course, most frightfully sick about it, but the next time the Avories go out in the caravan they are going to ask him and not me, which will put the thing right. It is a ripping caravan, and I am sure I thank you very much, although it's not mine."Yours truly,"JOHN ILFORD ROTHERAM.
Robert, who was not a sprightly writer, merely described the course they had followed, which we all know. The only news he had to give was at the end: "So far, up to the time of writing, my pedometer registers fifty-six miles; which is, of course, only what I have walked, and not what we have done, for we all take turns to ride for fear of getting too tired and being seedy. The caravan has done altogether one hundred and forty miles, and since we were in it ninety miles exactly."
Horace, after great difficulty, wrote:
DEAR X.,"I am having a top-hole holiday in the caravan you gave the Avories. I am the Keeper of the Tin-opener."Yours truly,HORACE CAMPBELL.
Hester wrote:
DEAR X.,"I have long wanted to write to you and tell you that we adore the Slowcoach, which is the name we have given your caravan, and think you were awfully clever to think of it and to make it so complete.We have not had to buy anything, and the only thing you forgot was the license; but Uncle Christopher remembered. I love walking behind the Slowcoach and seeing the world pass by. But the evenings are the most alluring, and I like to wake up at night and hear the birds and animals just outside the window, although on the first night I was frightened. We had one evening with real gipsies, but Janet would not allow me to go inside their caravan, because of fleas and things. But I could see through the door that it was not so attractive as the Slowcoach. I wish this journey would never end, but I fear it has to do so on Tuesday, which draws nearer every moment."I am,"Your grateful and admiring friend,HESTER MARGARET AVORY.
"P.S.—I hope we shall never know who you are, because anonymous things are so much more exciting.
"P.S. 2.—We have met many motors, and they are always coming up behind us and making us jump and blinding us with dust, but we have never envied them."
Gregory wrote painfully:
DEAR X.,"Thank you most awfully for the Slowcoach. It is very good and suitable. I am the Keeper of the Corkscrew, and also the Requester of Camping-Grounds."Your affectionateGREGORY BRUCE AVORY.
ON the next morning, which was Sunday, Jack hurried through his dressing and washing at a great pace and instantly disappeared. The others were just beginning breakfast when he came rushing up in a state of wild excitement, calling, "Kink! Kink!"
"What is it?" said that leisurely man.
"It's a rabbit!" cried Jack. "I've caught it, and I don't know how to kill it."
"Oh, Jack," said Mary, running up, "don't kill it! Why should it be killed?"
"For supper, of course," said Jack. "Come on, Kink! Quick, or it will get away!"
They all left their breakfast and followed Jack, and when they came up to him he was kneeling over a kicking object.
"Oh, Kink," he said, "do hold it and kill it! How do you do it? The gipsy boy didn't show me properly."
"The gipsy boy?" said Mary.
"Yes, he gave me a wire. See, it's round its neck. That's how I caught him. Do kill him, Kink!"
"Please don't do anything of the kind," said Janet. "We don't want to eat rabbits we catch like that."
"No," said Hester, "please don't kill it. Please let it go."
"What mollycoddles you are!" said Jack. "How do you suppose rabbits are killed, anyway? You eat them all right when they're cooked."
"I couldn't eat a rabbit that I had seen struggling alive," said Janet.
"No," said Mary. "Oh, Jack, please let him go! You've caught him, and that's the great thing; and now be merciful."
Kink still held the struggling creature.
"I vote he's let loose again," said Robert. "I don't want any of him."
"No, and I'm sure I don't," said Gregory; "but wouldn't it be fun to keep him in a hutch?"
"Wild rabbits are no good in hutches," said Kink.
Jack was very sullen. "It's awful rot," he said. "You all ought to be vegetarians if you talk like that. But we'll let him go," and he loosened the wire and the rabbit dashed away.
"A nice return to the gipsy for his kindness," Jack muttered.
Kink watched the rabbit till it was out of sight. "Whose rabbit do you suppose that was?" he asked.
"Mine," said Jack.
"What about the farmer?" said Kink.
"A nice return for a night's lodging—poaching his rabbits."
"Poaching!" cried Horace. "Is that poaching? Is Jack a poacher? Oh, how splendid! Jack's a poacher! Jack's a poacher! I wish I was."
"I'd never thought of it as poaching," said Jack, who was not a little proud of his new character.
"When did you set the wire?" Horace asked him.
"Late last night," said Jack. "After you had turned in."
"Wasn't it pitch dark?" Horace asked.
"There was a moon," said Jack, feeling twice his ordinary size.
"But what did you do?" Horace asked.
"Well," said Jack, "I had noticed some rabbits in that field on our way back from Cirencester, so I just crept off in the dark and found a hole, and took a strong stick and drove that into the ground, and then fixed the wire to it with the noose open, like this, so that the rabbit would run right into it when it came out. And it did! Poaching's frightfully simple."
"Yes," said Horace, "but it wants courage."
"Oh, yes," said Jack lightly. "Of course one mustn't be a fool or a coward."
It was arranged that Janet and Jack and Robert and Hester should go to church, and Mary and the others stay behind to cook. The boys walked, but Janet and Hester were driven in by the farmer in his chaise. Janet had a rather uncomfortable moment at the beginning of the sermon, for the text was taken from Matthew xxii, where the piece of money is produced, and the question asked, "Whose is this image and superscription?" Of course they all thought simultaneously of the old Irishwoman, and gave Janet a quick glance. She was very glad that Kink (who was a Dissenter) was not with them to fix his old laughing eye upon her.
Mary had worked very hard over the Sunday dinner, and a great surprise was waiting for the four church-goers—nothing less than a beefsteak pudding with the most perfect soft crust and heaps of juice; and afterwards pancakes. The farmer's wife sent down some strawberries and cream, so that it was a real feast. The only one of them that was not hungry was Mary, who was too hot and tired of cooking to be able to eat much.
In spite of this huge and momentous dinner, all the children went out on Sunday afternoon to explore the neighbourhood, except Hester, who said she had something very important to do and begged to be allowed to remain alone in the Slowcoach. Kink said that he would stay there, too.
On the other side of Cirencester is a very beautiful park, with a broad avenue through it from the gates right in the town itself. The farmer's wife had told them of its attractions, and also of a ruined house known as Alfred's Hall, and a point called the Seven Ways where seven green avenues met, and a canal that ran through a tunnel, and, all within the possibilities of good walkers, the source of the Thames itself. "And," said she, "after you have seen that—the tiny spring which makes that wonderful river that runs right through London—oh, I've been to London in my time!—you can come back to Cirencester by the Fosse Way—the Roman road to Bath." They could not, of course, see all these things, but they went to the ruined house, which was very romantic and exactly the place for Hester had she only been with them; and they roamed about the park, which was very vast and wonderful.
They had a little adventure, too, for as they were walking along, on the way back—coming back, of course, by a different way, for Robert could not bear the thought of not doing so—Mary chanced to say, with reference to the plans for the future which Robert was describing:
"To-morrow to fresh fields and pastures new,"
that being her idea of the last line of Milton's "Lycidas," which they had all learned quite recently.
"Not 'fresh fields,'" Janet corrected, "'fresh woods.'"
"'Fields,'" said Mary.
"'Woods,'" said Janet.
"I'm sure it's 'fields,'" said Mary.
"But it's silly," said Janet, "to say 'fresh fields and pastures new,' because they mean the same thing. 'Fresh woods' would mean something different."
"I can't help it," said Mary; "that's Milton's affair. 'Fresh fields.'"
Janet called to Robert. "Is it 'fresh fields and pastures new,' or 'fresh woods and pastures new'?" she asked him.
"'Fresh fields,'" he said.
Janet asked Jack. "I don't know," he said, "but 'fresh woods' sounds more sensible."
"Oh, dear," said Janet, "I wish we had a Milton!"
"Well, we haven't," said Robert, "and you're not likely to find one at Cirencester to-day, unless, of course, the vicar has one."
"Oh, yes," said Janet, "of course—the vicar. He's certain to have one."
"But who'll ask him?" said Horace.
"Janet will," said Mary.
"Oh, no," said Janet.
"Well, it's your affair," said Robert.
"Not more than Mary's," said Janet. "Mary, will you ask him?"
"No," said Mary, "I don't think I could. Not the vicar. I might be willing to ask the curate."
"What a ripping idea!" said Jack. "Of course the curate would be much easier. We'll ask where he lives."
They did so at a small tobacconist's that was open, and found that the curate had rooms at Myrtle Villa, quite close by.
They therefore marched towards Myrtle Villa, but first arranged to draw lots to see who should ring the bell and make the inquiry. They tore up paper of different sizes, and it was agreed that the holders of the longest and the shortest pieces should go—the longest to put the question, the shortest to ring and lend support. The result was that Mary drew the longest and Gregory the smallest.
Gregory was furious. "I don't even know what it's all about," he complained.
They told him.
"How rotten!" he said. "What's it matter?"
Mary, however, led him off to the house, and he rang the bell with vigour.
A smiling girl opened the door and asked what they wanted.
"Is the curate at home?" Mary asked.
The girl said that he was.
"Will you ask him if he will speak to us for a moment?" said Mary.
"What about?" asked the girl. "He has a friend with him."
"I don't think you'd understand if we told you," said Mary.
"I must know what it's about," said the girl. "He doesn't like to be disturbed on Sunday afternoons."
"Has he got a lot of books—poetry books?" Gregory asked.
"Yes," said the girl, "heaps."
"Then it's about Milton," said Mary.
"Milton the baker!" exclaimed the girl. "He's not dead, is he?"
"Milton the poet," said Mary.
"I'm all in a maze," said the girl. "I don't know what you're talking about. But I suppose I'd better tell him."
The girl left them on the mat and knocked at a door just inside.
"Come in," said a man's voice.
"Please, sir," said the girl, "there are two children asking about someone named Milton."
The owner of the voice laughed. "Are they?" he said. "Well, they've come to the right shop." And then the door opened wider and a tall and handsome young man came out, dressed in a cricket blazer over a clergyman's waistcoat and collar, and smoking a large pipe.
"What's all this about Milton?" he said cheerily. "What Milton? Not the poet?"
"Yes," said Mary.
"Oh, I say, this is too good," said the young clergyman. "Vernon," he called out, "come here and see a deputation from Milton."
Another young man joined him, equally pleasant looking, and they all shook hands.
"Come inside," said the young clergyman.
"There are four others waiting in the road," said Gregory. "Then fetch them in too," said the young clergyman. And Janet and Robert and Jack and Horace were brought in.
"Now," said the young clergyman, "have some tea." And he rang the bell and ordered enough tea for eight.
When the girl had gone, he asked for full particulars, and then gave his verdict.
"'Fresh woods and pastures new.'"
"Oh, rubbish!" said Vernon. "I've always learned 'fresh fields and pastures new.'"
"That's what I say," said Mary.
"And so do I," said Robert and Horace.
"I think YOU'RE right," said Janet to the young clergyman.
"Well," he said, "I'll look it up." And he began to hunt for Milton on his shelves.
"Oh, not yet!" said Vernon. "Let's have some fun first. Let's see who are the 'fielders' and who are the 'wooders.' All 'fielders' this way."
Mary, Robert, and Horace ranged themselves beside him, leaving Janet and Jack with the young clergyman, whom Vernon called Rod.
Gregory looked at both sides, and did not move.
"Haven't you any views about it?" asked Vernon.
"No," said Gregory; "I never heard the thing before. What does it matter?"
"Very well, then," said Rod; "here's the tea. You pour it out for us. I like three lumps of sugar in mine. Now," he continued, "the rout of the 'fielders' is about to begin. Of course it's 'woods.' Why, I can see the word now in Milton's own handwriting, as I used to see it in the Library at Trinity."
"I'm so sure it's 'fields,'" said Vernon, "that I declare myself willing to go without cake for tea if it isn't."
"Will you put half a crown in the plate next Sunday if it's 'woods'?" said Rod.
"Oh, I say, that's a bit stiff," said Vernon. "Half a crown?"
"Very well, then," said Rod, "two bob. Will you put two bob in the plate next Sunday if it's 'woods'?"
"Yes, I will," said Vernon. "But if it's 'fields,' what will you do? You mayn't take a shilling out?"
"No," said Rod; "if it's 'fields' I'll eat my best hat."
"I hope it's fields,'" said Gregory.
"Horrid little boy!" said Rod. "But now we'll see."
He opened Milton slowly, and turned over the pages of "Lycidas." "Ha! ha!" he said; "no cake for Charles Vernon, Esquire, and two bob for Mother Church. And my best hat saved. Listen:
"'At last he rose and twitch'd his mantle blue:To-morrow to fresh woods, and pastures new.'"