'Oh, if you please, Mr Police,' said Meg, in a plaintive voice, 'I want
to get these two little children over to the other side, and I don't
know how to do it, except you'd please to hold baby while I take Robbie
across.'

The policeman looked down from his great height, without bending his
stiff neck, upon the childish creature who spoke to him, and Meg's
spirit sank with the fear of being ordered back again. But he picked
up Robin under his arm, and bidding her keep close beside him, he
threaded his way through the throng of carriages. This was the last
danger; and now with restored gaiety Meg travelled on with her two
children.

[Illustration: The policeman picked up Robin under his arm, and
threaded his way through the throng of carriages.]

By-and-by they turned from the busy Fleet Street under a low archway,
and in a minute they were out of the thunder of the streets which had
almost drowned their voices, and found themselves in a place so quiet
and so calm, with a sort of grave hush in the very air, that Robin
pressed close to Meg's side, with something of the silent and subdued
awe with which he might have entered a church. There were houses here,
and courts, but not houses and courts like those from which they had
come. Here and there they came upon a long corridor, where the sun
shone between the shadows of the pillars supporting the roof; and they
looked along them with wondering eyes, not knowing where they could
lead to, and too timid to try to find out. It was not a deserted
place, but the number of people passing to and fro were few enough to
make it seem almost a solitude to these poor children, who had
travelled hither from the over-crowded slums of the East End. They
could hear their own voices, when they spoke, ring out in such clear,
echoing tones, that Meg hushed Robin, lest some of the grave, stern,
thoughtful gentlemen who passed them should bid them begone, and leave
the Temple to its usual stillness. The houses seemed to them so large
and grand, that Meg, who had heard once of the Queen, and had a dim
notion of her as a lady of extraordinary greatness and grandeur,
whispered to Robin confidentially that she thought the Queen must live
here.

They came upon a fountain in the centre of a small plot of grass and
flowers, enclosed within high railings; and Robin uttered a shrill cry
of delight, which rang noisily through the quiet court where its waters
played in the sunshine. But at la