Harding's luck

"What does he want to talk that way for?" the old man asked. "'E can talk like a little gentleman all right 'cause we 'eard 'im."

"Oh, that's the way we talks up London way," said Dickie. "I learned to talk fine out o' books."

Mr. Beale said nothing, but that night he actually read for nearly ten minutes in a bound volume of the Wesleyan Magazine. And he was asleep over the same entertaining work when Lord Arden came the next afternoon.

You will be able to guess what he came about. And Dickie had a sort of feeling that perhaps Lord Arden might have seen by his face, as old Beale had, that he was an Arden. So neither he nor you will be much surprised. The person to be really surprised was Mr. Beale.

"You might a-knocked me down with a pickaxe," said Beale later, "so help me three men and a boy you might. It's a rum go. My lord 'e says there's some woman been writing letters to 'im this long time saying she'd got 'old of 'is long-lost nephew or cousin or something, and a-wanting to get money out of him—though what for, goodness knows. An' 'e says you're a Arden by rights, you nipper you, an' 'e wants to take you and bring you up along of his kids—so there's an end of you and me, Dickie, old boy. I didn't understand more than 'arf of wot 'e was saying. But I tumbled to that much. It's all up with you and me and Amelia and the dogs and the little 'ome. You're a-goin' to be a gentleman, you are—an' I'll have to take to the road by meself and be a poor beast of a cadger again. That's what it'll come to, I know."

"Don't you put yourself about," said Dickie calmly. "I ain't a-goin' to leave yer. Didn't Lady Talbot ask me to be her boy—and didn't I cut straight back to you? I'll play along o' them kids if Lord Arden'll let me. But I ain't a-goin' to leave you, not yet I ain't. So don't you go snivelling afore any one's 'urt yer, farver. See?"

But that was before Lord Arden had his second talk with Mr. Beale. After that it was—

"Look 'ere, you nipper, I ain't a-goin' to stand in your light. You're goin' up in the world, says you. Well, you ain't the only one. Lord Arden's bought father's cottage an' 'e's goin' to build on to it, and I'm to 'ave all the dawgs down 'ere, and sell 'em through the papers like. And you'll come an' 'ave a look at us sometimes."

"And what about Amelia?" said Dickie, "and the little ones?"

"Well, I did think," said Beale, rubbing his nose thoughtfully, "of asking 'Melia to come down 'ere along o' the dawgs. Seems a pity to separate 'em somehow. It was Lord Arden put it into my 'ed. 'You oughter be married you ought,' 'e says to me pleasant like, man to man; 'ain't there any young woman I could give a trifle to, to set you and her up in housekeeping?' So then I casts about, and I thinks of 'Melia. As well 'er as anybody, and she's used to the dawgs. And the trifle's an hundred pounds. That's all. That's all! So I'm sending to her by this post, and it's an awful toss up getting married, but 'Melia ain't like a stranger, and it couldn't ever be the same with us two and nipper after all this set out. What you say?"

I don't know what Dickie said; what he felt was something like this:—

"I have tried to stick to Beale, and help him along, and I did come back from the other old long-ago world to help him, and I have been sticking to things I didn't like so as to help him and get him settled. He was my bit of work, and now some one else comes along and takes my work out of my hands, and finishes it. And here's Beale provided for and settled. And I meant to provide for him myself. And I don't like it!"

That was what he felt at first. But afterwards he had to own that it was "a jolly lucky thing for Beale." And for himself too. He found that to be at Arden Castle with Edred and Elfrida all day, at play and at lessons, was almost as good as being with them in the beautiful old dream-life. All the things that he had hated in this modern life, when he was Dickie of Deptford, ceased to trouble him now that he was Richard Arden. For the difference between being rich and poor is as great as the difference between being warm and cold.

After that first day a sort of shyness came over the three children, and they spoke no more of the strange adventures they had had together, but just played at all the ordinary every-day games, till they almost forgot that there was any magic, had ever been any. The fact was, the life they were leading was so happy in itself that they needed no magic to make them contented. It was not till after the wedding of 'Melia and Mr. Beale that Dickie remembered that to find the Arden Treasure for his cousins had been one of his reasons for coming back to this, the Nowadays world.

I wish I had time to tell you about the wedding. I could write a whole book about it. How Amelia came down from London and was married in Arden Church. How she wore a white dress and a large hat with a wreath of orange blossoms, a filmy veil, and real kid gloves—all gifts of Miss Edith Arden, Lord Arden's sister. How Lord Arden presented an enormous wedding cake and a glorious wedding breakfast, and gave away the bride, and made a speech saying he owed a great debt to Mr. Beale for his kindness to his nephew Richard Arden, and how surprised every one was to hear Dickie's new name. How all the dogs wore white favors and had each a crumb of wedding cake; and how when the wedding feast was over and the guests gone, the bride tucked up her white dress under a big apron and set about arranging in the new rooms the "sticks" of furniture which Dickie and Beale had brought together from the little home in Deptford, and which had come in a van by road all the way to Arden.

The Ardens had gone back to the Castle, and Dickie with them, and old Beale was smoking in his usual chair by his front door—so there was no one to hear Beale's compliment to his bride. He came behind her and put his arm round her as she was dusting the mantelpiece. "Go on with you," said the new Mrs. Beale; "any one 'ud think we was courting."

"So we be," said Beale, and kissed 'Melia for the first time. "We got all our courtin' to do now. See? I might a-picked an' choosed," he added reflectively, "but there—I dare say I might a-done worse."

'Melia blushed with pleasure at the compliment, and went on with the dusting.

It was as the Ardens walked home over the short turf that Lord Arden said to his sister, "I wish all the cottages about here were like Beale's. It didn't cost so very much. If I could only buy back the rest of the land, I'd show some people what a model village is like. Only I can't buy it back. He wants far more than we can think of managing."

And Dickie heard what he said. That was why, when next he was alone with his cousins, he began—

"Look here—you aren't allowed to use your magic any more, to go and look for the treasure. But I am. And I vote we go and look for it. And then your father can buy back the old lands, and build the new cottages and mend up Arden Castle, and make it like it used to be."

"Oh, let's," said Elfrida, with enthusiasm. But Edred unexpectedly answered, "I don't know." The three children were sitting in the window of the gate-tower looking down on the green turf of the Castle yard.

"What do you mean you don't know?" Elfrida asked briskly.

"I mean I don't know," said Edred stolidly; "we're all right as we are, I think. I used to think I liked magic and things. But if you come to think of it something horrid happened to us every single time we went into the past with our magic. We were always being chased or put in prison or bothered somehow or other. The only really nice thing was when we saw the treasure being hidden, because that looked like a picture and we hadn't to do anything. And we don't know where the treasure is, anyhow. And I don't like adventures nearly so much as I used to think I did. We're all right and jolly as we are. What I say is, 'Don't let's.'"

This cold water damped the spirit of the others only for a few minutes.

"You know," Elfrida explained to Dickie, "our magic took us to look for treasure in the past. And once a film of a photograph that we'd stuck up behaved like a cinematograph, and then we saw the treasure being hidden away."

"Then let's just go where that was—mark the spot, come home and then dig it up."

"It wasn't buried," Elfrida explained; "it was put into a sort of cellar, with doors, and we've looked all over what's left of the Castle, and there isn't so much as a teeny silver ring to be found."

"I see," said Dickie. "But suppose I just worked the magic and wished to be where the treasure is?"

"I won't," cried Edred, and in his extreme dislike to the idea he kicked with his boots quite violently against the stones of the tower; "not much I won't. I expect the treasure's bricked up. We should look nice bricked up in a vault like a wicked nun, and perhaps forgotten the way to get out. Not much."

"You needn't make such a fuss about it," said Elfrida, "nobody's going to get bricked up in vaults." And Dickie added, "You're quite right, old chap. I didn't think about that."

"We must do something," Elfrida said impatiently.

"How would it be," Dickie spoke slowly, "if I tried to see the Mouldierwarp? He is stronger than the Mouldiwarp. He might advise us. Suppose we work the magic and just ask to see him?"

"I don't want to go away from here," said Edred firmly.

"You needn't. I'll lay out the moon-seeds and things on the floor here—you'll see."

So Dickie made the crossed triangles of moon-seeds and he and his cousins stood in it and Dickie said, "Please can we see the Mouldierwarp?" just as you say, "Please can I see Mr. So-and-so?" when you have knocked at the door of Mr. So-and-so's house and some one has opened the door.

Immediately everything became dark, but before the children had time to wish that it was light again a disc of light appeared on the curtain of darkness, and there was the Mouldierwarp, just as Dickie had seen him once before.

He bowed in a courtly manner, and said—

"What can I do for you to-day, Richard Lord Arden?"

"He's not Lord Arden," said Edred. "I used to be. But even I'm not Lord Arden now. My father is."

"Indeed?" said the Mouldierwarp with an air of polite interest. "You interest me greatly. But my question remains unanswered."

"I want," said Dickie, "to find the lost treasure of Arden, so that the old Castle can be built up again, and the old lands bought back, and the old cottages made pretty and good to live in. Will you please advise me?"

The Mouldierwarp in the magic-lantern picture seemed to scratch his nose thoughtfully with his fore paw.

"It can be done," he said, "but it will be hard. It is almost impossible to find the treasure without waking the Mouldiestwarp, who sits on the green-and-white checkered field of Ardens' shield of arms. And he can only be awakened by some noble deed. Yet noble deeds may chance at any time. And if you go to seek treasure of one kind you may find treasure of another. I have spoken."

It began to fade away, but Elfrida cried, "Oh, don't go. You're just like the Greek oracles. Won't you tell us something plain and straightforward?"

"I will," said the Mouldierwarp, rather shortly.

"And father was lost and found again," said Edred, "so that's all right."

And with that it vanished altogether, and the darkness with it; and there were the three children and Tinkler and the white seal and the moon-seeds and the sunshine on the floor of the room in the tower.

"That's useful," said Edred scornfully. "As if it wasn't just as difficult to know the unlikely places as the likely ones."

"I'll tell you what," said Dickie. And then the dinner bell rang, and they had to go without Dickie's telling them what, and to eat roast mutton and plum-pie, and behave as though they were just ordinary children to whom no magic had ever happened. There was little chance of more talk that day.

Edred and Elfrida were to be taken to Cliffville immediately after dinner to be measured for new shoes, and Dickie was to go up to spend the afternoon with Beale and 'Melia and the dogs. Still, in the few moments when they were all dressed and waiting for the dog-cart to come round, Dickie found a chance to whisper to Elfrida—

"Let's all think of unlikely places as hard as ever we can. And to-morrow we'll decide on the unlikeliest and go there. Edred needn't be in it if he doesn't want to. You're keen, aren't you?"

"Rather!" was all there was time for Elfrida to say.

The welcome that awaited Dickie at Beale's cottage from Beale, Amelia, and, not least, the dogs, was enough to drive all thoughts of unlikely places out of anybody's head. And besides, there were always so many interesting things to do at the cottage. He helped to wash True, cleaned the knives, and rinsed lettuce for tea; helped to dry the tea-things, and to fold the washing when Mrs. Beale brought it in out of the yard in dry, sweet armfuls of white folds.

It was dusk when he bade them good-night, embracing each dog in turn, and set out to walk the little way to the crossroads, where the dog-cart returning from Cliffville would pick him up. But the dog-cart was a little late, because the pony had dropped a shoe and had had to be taken to the blacksmith's.

So when Dickie had waited a little while he began to think, as one always does when people don't keep their appointments, that perhaps he had mistaken the time, or that the clock at the cottage was slow. And when he had waited a little longer, it seemed simply silly to be waiting at all. So he picked up his crutch and got up from the milestone where he had been sitting and set off to walk down to the Castle.

As he went he thought many things, and one of the things he thought was that the memories of King James's time had grown dim and distant—he looked down on Arden Castle and loved it, and felt that he asked no better than to live there all his life with his cousins and their father, and that, after all, the magic of a dream-life was not needed, when life itself was so good and happy.

And just as he was thinking this a twig cracked sharply in the hedge. Then a dozen twigs rustled and broke, and something like a great black bird seemed to fly out at him and fold him in its wings.

It was not a bird—he knew that the next moment—but a big, dark cloak, that some one had thrown over his head and shoulders, and through it strong hands were holding him.

"Hold yer noise!" said a voice; "if you so much as squeak it'll be the worse for you."

"Help!" shouted Dickie instantly.

He was thrown on to the ground. Hands fumbled, his face was cleared of the cloak, and a handkerchief with a round pebble in it was stuffed into his mouth so that he could not speak. Then he was dragged behind a hedge and held there, while two voices whispered above him. The cloak was over his head again now, and he could see nothing, but he could hear. He heard one of the voices say, "Hush! they're coming." And then he heard the sound of hoofs and wheels, and Lord Arden's jolly voice saying, "He must have walked on; we shall catch him up all right." Then the sound of wheels and hoofs died away, and hard hands pulled him to his feet and thrust the crutch under his arm.

"Step out!" said one of the voices, "and step out sharp—see?—or I'll l'arn you! There's a carriage awaiting for you."

He stepped out; there was nothing else to be done. They had taken the cloak from his eyes now, and he saw presently that they were nearing a coster's barrow.

They laid him in the barrow, covered him with the cloak, and put vegetable marrows and cabbages on that. They only left him a little room to breathe.

"Now lie still for your life!" said the second voice. "If you stir a inch I'll lick you till you can't stand! And now you know."

So he lay still, rigid with misery and despair. For neither of these voices was strange to him. He knew them both only too well.

CHAPTER X

THE NOBLE DEED

When Lord Arden and Elfrida and Edred reached the castle and found that Dickie had not come back, the children concluded that Beale had persuaded him to stay the night at the cottage. And Lord Arden thought that the children must be right. He was extremely annoyed both with Beale and with Dickie for making such an arrangement without consulting him.

"It is impertinent of Beale and thoughtless of the boy," he said; "and I shall speak a word to them both in the morning."

But when Edred and Elfrida were gone to bed Lord Arden found that he could not feel quite sure or quite satisfied. Suppose Dickie was not at Beale's? He strolled up to the cottage to see. Everything was dark at the cottage. He hesitated, then knocked at the door. At the third knock Beale, very sleepy, put his head out of the window.

"Who's there?" said he.

"I am here," said Lord Arden. "Richard is asleep, I suppose?"

"I suppose so, my lord," said Beale, sleepy and puzzled.

"You have given me some anxiety. I had to come up to make sure he was here."

"But 'e ain't 'ere," said Beale. "Didn't you pick 'im up with the dog-cart, same as you said you would?"

"No," shouted Lord Arden. "Come down, Beale, and get a lantern. There must have been an accident."

The bedroom window showed a square of light, and Lord Arden below heard Beale blundering about above.

"'Ere's your coat," Mrs. Beale's voice sounded; "never mind lacing up of your boots. You orter gone a bit of the way with 'im."

"Well, I offered for to go, didn't I?" Beale growled, blundered down the stairs and out through the wash-house, and came round the corner of the house with a stable lantern in his hand. He came close to where Lord Arden stood—a tall, dark figure in the starlight—and spoke in a voice that trembled.

"The little nipper," he said; and again, "the little nipper. If anything's happened to 'im! Swelp me! gov'ner—my lord, I mean. What I meanter say, if anything's 'appened to 'im! One of the best!"

The two men went quickly towards the gate. As they passed down the quiet, dusty road Beale spoke again.

"I wasn't no good—I don't deceive you, guv'ner—a no account man I was, swelp me! And the little 'un, 'e tidied me up and told me tales and kep' me straight. It was 'is doing me and 'Melia come together. An' the dogs an' all. An' the little one. An' 'e got me to chuck the cadgin'. An' worse. 'E don't know what I was like when I met 'im. Why, I set out to make a blighted burglar of 'im—you wouldn't believe!"

And out the whole story came as Lord Arden and he went along the gray road, looking to right and left where no bushes were nor stones, only the smooth curves of the down, so that it was easy to see that no little boy was there either.

They looked for Dickie to right and left and here and there under bushes, and by stiles and hedges, and with trembling hearts they searched in the little old chalk quarry, and the white moon came up very late to help them. But they did not find him, though they roused a dozen men in the village to join in the search, and old Beale himself, who knew every yard of the ground for five miles round, came out with the spaniel who knew every inch of it for ten. But True rushed about the house and garden whining and yelping so piteously that 'Melia tied him up, and he stayed tied up.

And so, when Edred and Elfrida came down to breakfast, Mrs. Honeysett met them with the news that Dickie was lost and their father still out looking for him.

"It's that beastly magic," said Edred as soon as the children were alone. "He's done it once too often, and he's got stuck some time in history and can't get back."

"And we can't do anything. We can't get to him," said Elfrida. "Oh! if only we'd got the old white magic and the Mouldiwarp to help us, we could find out what's become of him."

"Perhaps he has fallen down a disused mine," Edred suggested, "and is lying panting for water, and his faithful dog has jumped down after him and broken all its dear legs."

Elfrida melted to tears at this desperate picture, melted to a speechless extent.

"We can't do anything," said Edred again; "don't snivel like that, for goodness' sake, Elfrida. This is a man's job. Dry up. I can't think, with you blubbing like that."

"I'm not," said Elfrida untruly, and sniffed with some intensity.

"If you could make up some poetry now," Edred went on, "would that be any good?"

"Not without the dresses," she sniffed. "You know we always had dresses for our magic, or nearly always; and they have to be dead and gone people's dresses, and you'll only go to the dead and gone people's time when the dresses were worn. Oh! dear Dickie, and if he's really down a mine, or things like that, what's the good of anything?"

"I'm going to try, anyway," said Edred, "at least you must too. Because I can't make poetry."

"No more can I when I'm as unhappy as this. Poetry's the last thing you think of when you're mizzy."

"We could dress up, anyway," said Edred hopefully. "The bits of armor out of the hall, and the Indian feather head-dresses father brought home, and I have father's shooting-gaiters and brown paper tops, and you can have Aunt Edith's Roman sash. It's in the right-hand corner drawer. I saw it on the wedding day when I went to get her prayer-book."

"I don't want to dress up," said Elfrida; "I want to find Dickie."

"I don't want to dress up either," said Edred; "but we must do something, and perhaps, I know it's just only perhaps, it might help if we dressed up. Let's try it, anyway."

Elfrida was too miserable to argue. Before long two most miserable children faced each other in Edred's bedroom, dressed as Red Indians so far as their heads and backs went. Then came lots of plate armor for chest and arms; then, in the case of Elfrida, petticoats and Roman sash and Japanese wickerwork shoes and father's shooting-gaiters made to look like boots by brown paper tops. And in the case of Edred, legs cased in armor that looked like cricket pads, ending in jointed foot-coverings that looked like chrysalises. (I am told the correct plural is chrysalides, but life would be dull indeed if one always used the correct plural.) They were two forlorn faces that looked at each other as Edred said—

"Now the poetry."

"I can't," said Elfrida, bursting into tears again; "I can't! So there. I've been trying all the time we've been dressing, and I can only think of—

"I should think not," said Edred. "Why, it isn't your own poetry at all. It's Felicia M. Hemans'. I'll try." And he got a pencil and paper and try he did, his very hardest, be sure. But there are some things that the best and bravest cannot do. And the thing Edred couldn't do was to make poetry, however bad. He simply couldn't do it, any more than you can fly. It wasn't in him, any more than wings are on you.

That was the best Edred could do, and I tell it to his credit, he really did feel doubtful whether what he had so slowly and carefully written was indeed genuine poetry. So much so, that he would not show it to Elfrida until she had begged very hard indeed. At about the thirtieth "Do, please! Edred, do!" he gave her the paper. No little girl was ever more polite than Elfrida or less anxious to hurt the feelings of others. But she was also quite truthful, and when Edred said in an ashamed, muffled voice, "Is it all right, do you think?" the best she could find by way of answer was, "I don't know much about poetry. We'll try it."

And they did try it, and nothing happened.

"I knew it was no good," Edred said crossly; "and I've made an ass of myself for nothing."

"Well, I've often made one of myself," said Elfrida comfortingly, "and I will again if you like. But I don't suppose it'll be any more good than yours."

Elfrida frowned fiercely and the feathers on her Indian head-dress quivered with the intensity of her effort.

"Is it coming?" Edred asked in anxious tones, and she nodded distractedly.

"I don't see that it's so much better than mine," said Edred, "and it ought to be swear, not swore."

"I don't think it is. But you didn't finish yours. And it couldn't be 'swear,' because of rhyming," Elfrida explained. "But I'm sure if the Mouldiestwarp hears it he won't care tuppence whether it's swear or swore. He is much too great. He's far above grammar, I'm sure."

"I wish every one was," sighed Edred, and I dare say you have often felt the same.

"Well, fire away! Not that it's any good. Don't you remember you can only get at the Mouldiestwarp by a noble deed? And wanting to find Dickie isn't noble."

"No," she agreed; "but then if we could get Dickie back by doing a noble deed we'd do it like a shot, wouldn't we?"

"Oh! I suppose so," said Edred grumpily; "fire away, can't you?"

Elfrida fired away, and the next moment it was plain that Elfrida's poetry was more potent than Edred's; also that a little bad grammar is a trifle to a mighty Mouldiwarp.

For the walls of Edred's room receded further and further, till the children found themselves in a great white hall with avenues of tall pillars stretching in every direction as far as you could see. The hall was crowded with people dressed in costumes of all countries and all ages—Chinamen, Indians, Crusaders in armor, powdered ladies, doubleted gentlemen, Cavaliers in curls, Turks in turbans, Arabs, monks, abbesses, jesters, grandees with ruffs round their necks, and savages with kilts of thatch. Every kind of dress you can think of was there. Only all the dresses were white. It was like a redoute, which is a fancy-dress ball where the guests may wear any dress they choose, only all the dresses must be of one color.

Elfrida saw the whiteness all about her and looked down anxiously at her clothes and Edred's, which she remembered to have been of rather odd colors. Everything they wore was white now. Even the Roman sash, instead of having stripes blue and red and green and black and yellow, was of five different shades of white. If you think there are not so many shades of white, try to paper a room with white paper and get it at five different shops.

The people round the children pushed them gently forward. And then they saw that in the middle of the hall was a throne of silver, spread with a fringed cloth of checkered silver and green, and on it, with the Mouldiwarp standing on one side and the Mouldierwarp on the other, the Mouldiestwarp was seated in state and splendor. He was much larger than either of the other moles, and his fur was as silvery as the feathers of a swan.

Every one in the room was looking at the two children, and it seemed impossible for them not to advance, though slowly and shyly, right to the front of the throne.

Arrived there, it seemed right to bow, very low. So they did it.

Then the Mouldiwarp said—

"What brings you here?"

"Kind magic," Elfrida answered.

And the Mouldierwarp said—

"What is your desire?"

And Edred said, "We want Dickie, please."

Then the Mouldiestwarp said, and it was to Edred that he said it—

"Dickie is in the hands of those who will keep him from you for many a day unless you yourself go, alone, and rescue him. It will be difficult, and it will be dangerous. Will you go?"

"Me? Alone?" said Edred rather blankly. "Not Elfrida?"

"Dickie can only be ransomed at a great price, and it must be paid by you. It will cost you more to do it than it would cost Elfrida, because she is braver than you are."

Here was a nice thing for a boy to have said to him, and before all these people too! To ask a chap to do a noble deed and in the same breath to tell him he is a coward!

Edred flushed crimson, and a shudder ran through the company.

"Don't turn that horrible color," whispered a white toreador who was close to him. "This is the white world. No crimson allowed."

Elfrida caught Edred's hand.

"Edred is quite as brave as me," she said. "He'll go. Won't you?"

"Of course I will," said Edred impatiently.

"Then ascend the steps of the throne," said the Mouldiestwarp, very kindly now, "and sit here by my side."

Edred obeyed, and the Mouldiestwarp leaned towards him and spoke in his ear.

So that neither Elfrida nor any of the great company in the White Hall could hear a word, only Edred alone.

"If you go to rescue Richard Arden," the Mouldiestwarp said, "you make the greatest sacrifice of your life. For he who was called Richard Harding is Richard Arden, and it is he who is Lord Arden and not you or your father. And if you go to his rescue you will be taking from your father the title and the Castle, and you will be giving up your place as heir of Arden to your cousin Richard who is the rightful heir."

"But how is he the rightful heir?" Edred asked, bewildered.

"Three generations ago," said the Mouldiestwarp, "a little baby was stolen from Arden. Death came among the Ardens and that child became the heir to the name and the lands of Arden. The man who stole the child took it to a woman in Deptford, and gave it in charge to her to nurse. She knew nothing but that the child's clothes were marked Arden, and that it had, tied to its waist, a coral and bells engraved with a coat of arms. The man who had stolen the child said he would return in a month. He never returned. He fought in a duel and was killed. But the night before the duel he wrote a letter saying what he had done and put it in a secret cupboard behind a picture of a lady who was born an Arden, at Talbot Court. And there that letter is to this day."

"I hope I shan't forget it all," said Edred.

"None ever forgets what I tell them," said the Mouldiestwarp. "Finding that the man did not return, the Deptford woman brought up the child as her own. He grew up, was taught a trade and married a working girl. The name of Arden changed itself, as names do, to Harding. Their child was the father of Richard whom you know. And he is Lord Arden."

"Yes," said Edred submissively.

"You will never tell your father this," the low, beautiful voice went on; "you must not even tell your sister till you have rescued Dickie and made the sacrifice. This is the one supreme chance of all your life. Every soul has one such chance, a chance to be perfectly unselfish, absolutely noble and true. You can take this chance. But you must take it alone. No one can help you. No one can advise you. And you must keep the nobler thought in your own heart till it is a noble deed. Then, humbly and thankfully in that you have been permitted to do so fine and brave a thing and to draw near to the immortals of all ages who have such deeds to do and have done them, you may tell the truth to the one who loves you best, your sister Elfrida."

"But isn't Elfrida to have a chance to be noble too?" Edred asked.

"She will have a thousand chances to be good and noble. And she will take them all. But she will never know that she has done it," said the Mouldiestwarp gravely. "Now—are you ready to do what is to be done?"

"It seems very unkind to daddy," said Edred, "stopping his being Lord Arden and everything."

"To do right often seems unkind to one or another," said the Mouldiestwarp, "but think. How long would your father wish to keep his house and his castle if he knew that they belonged to some one else?"

"I see," said Edred, still doubtfully. "No, of course he wouldn't. Well, what am I to do?"

"When Dickie's father died, a Deptford woman related to Dickie's mother kept the child. She was not kind to him. And he left her. Later she met a man who had been a burglar. He had entered Talbot Court, opened a panel, and found that old letter that told of Dickie's birth. He and she have kidnapped Dickie, hoping to get him to sign a paper promising to pay them money for giving him the letter which tells how he is heir to Arden. But already they have found out that a letter signed by a child is useless and unlawful. And they dare not let Richard go for fear of punishment. So, if you choose to do nothing your father is safe and you will inherit Arden."

"What am I to do?" Edred asked again—"to get Dickie back, I mean."

"You must go alone and at night to Beale's cottage, open the door and you will find Richard's dog asleep before the fire. You must unchain the dog and take him to the milestone by the crossroads. Then go where the dog goes. You will need a knife to cut cords with. And you will need all your courage. Look in my eyes."

Edred looked in the eyes of the Mouldiestwarp and saw that they were no longer a mole's eyes but were like the eyes of all the dear people he had ever known, and through them the soul of all the brave people he had ever read about looked out at him and said, "Courage, Edred. Be one of us."

"Now look at the people on the Hall," said the Mouldiestwarp.

Edred looked. And behold, they were no longer strangers. He knew them all. Joan of Arc and Peter the Hermit, Hereward and Drake, Elsa whose brothers were swans, St. George who killed the dragon, Blondel who sang to his king in prison, Lady Nithsdale who brought her husband safe out of the cruel Tower. There were captains who went down with their ships, generals who died fighting for forlorn hopes, patriots, kings, nuns, monks, men, women, and children—all with that light in their eyes which brightens with splendor the dreams of men.

And as he came down off the throne the great ones crowded round him, clasping his hand and saying—

"Be one of us, Edred. Be one of us."

Then an intense white light shone so that the children could see nothing else. And then suddenly there they were again within the narrow walls of Edred's bedroom.

"Well," said Elfrida in tones of brisk commonplace, "what did it say to you? I say, you do look funny."

"Don't!" said Edred crossly. He began to tear off the armor. "Here, help me to get these things off."

"But what did it say?" Elfrida asked, helpfully.

"I can't tell you. I'm not going to tell any one till it's over."

"Oh, just as you like," said Elfrida; "keep your old secrets," and left him.

That was hard, wasn't it?

"I can't help it, I tell you. Oh! Elfrida, if you're going to bother it's just a little bit too much, that's all."

"You really mustn't tell me?"

"I've told you so fifty times," he said. Which was untrue. You know he had really only told her twice.

"Very well, then," she said heroically, "I won't ask you a single thing. But you'll tell me the minute you can, won't you? And you'll let me help?"

"Nobody can help, no one can advise me," Edred said. "I've got to do it off my own bat if I do it at all. Now you just shut up, I want to think."

This unusual desire quite awed Elfrida. But it irritated her too.

"Perhaps you'd like me to go away," she said ironically.

And Edred's wholly unexpected reply was, "Yes, please."

So she went.

And when she was gone Edred sat down on the box at the foot of his bed and tried to think. But it was not easy.

"I ought to go," he told himself.

"But think of your father," said something else which was himself too.

He thought so hard that his thoughts got quite confused. His head grew very hot, and his hands and feet very cold. Mrs. Honeysett came in, exclaimed at his white face, felt his hands, said he was in a high fever, and put him to bed with wet rags on his forehead and hot-water bottles to his feet. Perhaps he was feverish. At any rate he could never be sure afterwards whether there really had been a very polite and plausible black mole sitting on his pillow most of the day saying all those things which the part of himself that he liked least agreed with. Such things as—

"Think of your father.

"No one will ever know.

"Dickie will be all right somehow.

"Perhaps you only dreamed that about Dickie being shut up somewhere and it's not true.

"Anyway, it's not your business, is it?" And so on. You know the sort of thing.

Elfrida was not allowed to come into the room for fear Edred should be ill with something catching. So he lay tossing all day, hearing the black mole, or something else, say all these things and himself saying, "I must go.

"Oh! poor Dickie.

"I promised to go.

"Yes, I will go."

And late that night when Lord Arden had come home and had gone to bed, tired out by a long day's vain search for the lost Dickie, and when everybody was asleep, Edred got up and dressed. He put his bedroom candle and matches in his pocket, crept down-stairs and out of the house and up to Beale's. It was a slow and nervous business. More than once on the staircase he thought he heard a stair creak behind him, and again and again as he went along the road he fancied he heard a soft footstep pad-padding behind him, but of course when he looked round he could see no one was there. So presently he decided that it was cowardly to keep looking round, and besides, it only made him more frightened. So he kept steadily on and took no notice at all of a black patch by the sweetbrier bush by Beale's cottage door just exactly as if some one was crouching in the shadow.

He pressed his thumb on the latch and opened the door very softly. Something moved inside and a chain rattled. Edred's heart gave a soft, uncomfortable jump. But it was only True, standing up to receive company. He saw the whiteness of the dog and made for it, felt for the chain, unhooked it from the staple in the wall, and went out again, closing the door after him, and followed very willingly by True. Again he looked suspiciously at the shadow of the great sweetbrier, but the dog showed no uneasiness, so Edred knew that there was nothing to be afraid of. True, in fact, was the greatest comfort to him. He told Elfrida afterwards that it was all True's doing; he could never, he was sure, have gone on without that good companion.

True followed at the slack chain's end till they got to the milestone, and then suddenly he darted ahead and took the lead, the chain stretched taut, and the boy had all his work cut out to keep up with the dog. Up the hill they went on to the downs, and in and out among the furze bushes. The night was no longer dark to Edred. His eyes had got used to the gentle starlight, and he followed the dog among the gorse and brambles without stumbling and without hurting himself against the million sharp spears and thorns.

Suddenly True paused, sniffed, sneezed, blew through his nose and began to dig.

"Come on, come on, good dog," said Edred, "come on, True," for his fancy pictured Dickie a prisoner in some lonely cottage, and he longed to get to it and set him free and get safe back home with him. So he pulled at the chain. But True only shook himself and went on digging. The spot he had chosen was under a clump of furze bigger than any they had passed. The sharp furze-spikes pricked his nose and paws, but True was not the dog to be stopped by little things like that. He only stopped every now and then to sneeze and blow, and then went on digging.

Edred remembered the knife he had brought. It was the big pruning-knife out of the drawer in the hall. He pulled it out. He would cut away some of the furze branches. Perhaps Dickie was lying bound, hidden in the middle of the furze bush.

"Dickie," he said softly, "Dickie."

But no one answered. Only True sneezed and snuffed and blew and went on digging.

So then Edred took hold of a branch of furze to cut it, and it was loose and came away in his hand without any cutting. He tried another. That too was loose. He took off his jacket and threw it over his hands to protect them, and seizing an armful of furze pulled, and fell back, a great bundle of the prickly stuff on top of him. True was pulling like mad at the chain. Edred scrambled up; the furze he had pulled away disclosed a hole, and True was disappearing down it. Edred saw, as the dog dragged him close to the hole, that it was a large one, though only part of it had been uncovered. He stooped to peer in, his foot slipped on the edge, and he fell right into it, the dog dragging all the time.

"Stop, True; lie down, sir!" he said, and the dog paused, though the chain was still strained tight.

Then Edred was glad of his bedroom candle. He pulled it out and lighted it and blinked, perceiving almost at once that he was in the beginning of an underground passage. He looked up; he could see above him the stars plain through a net of furze bushes. He stood up and True went on. Next moment he knew that he was in the old smugglers' cave that he and Elfrida had so often tried to find.

The dog and the boy went on, along a passage, down steps cut in the rock, through a rough, heavy door, and so into the smugglers' cave itself, an enormous cavern as big as a church. Out of an opening at the upper end a stream of water fell, and ran along the cave clear between shores of smooth sand.

And, lying on the sand near the stream, was something dark.

True gave a bound that jerked the chain out of Edred's hand, and leaped upon the dark thing, licking it, whining, and uttering little dog moans of pure love and joy. For the dark something was Dickie, fast asleep. He was bound with cords, his poor lame foot tied tight to the other one. His arms were bound too. And now he was awake.

"Down, True!" he said. "Hush! Ssh!"

"Where are they—the man and woman?" Edred whispered.

"Oh, Edred! You! You perfect brick!" Dickie whispered back. "They're in the further cave. I heard them snoring before I went to sleep."

"Lie still," said Edred; "I've got a knife. I'll cut the cords."

He cut them, and Dickie tried to stand up. But his limbs were too stiff. Edred rubbed his legs, while Dickie stretched his fingers to get the pins and needles out of his arms.

Edred had stuck the candle in the sand. It made a ring of light round them. That was why they did not see a dark figure that came quietly creeping across the sand towards them. It was quite close to them before Edred looked up.