ourse of their maraudings,
the Madigans were not unaccustomed to a stern-chase and a lively one,
yet now it seemed to her that strategy was the watchword. Perched high
up in the tree, hidden by its foliage, who would notice her--if only
Crosby would go away!

But Crosby would not budge. He begged, he implored, he became confused
in trying to explain to her her danger, and at last burst into bitter
tears as he felt Lally's fat, moist hand upon his collar, and saw a
hereafter peopled with wrathful motherly faces in various stages of
disgust and despair.

"You come vid me. I gif you to Riddle. He lock you oop, you bat boy!"

A suppressed giggle of pleasure, at the thought of neat little Crosby
in the hands of the constable, shook Sissy, perched snugly like a
malicious little bird in the tree. It served him right, she said to
herself gleefully, ascribing the basest motives to Crosby, as one loves
to do when one's friends are not in good standing with one's self. He
had had no business to hang around and point the way to her
hiding-place!

"Oh, I say, Jan, let me off!" begged Crosby, white with terror of the
jail--and his lady mother. "I'll never peek again, sure I won't!"

"Nu! You come vid me. And _you_, too!"

Sissy looked down. Was it possible there was another laggard whom she
had not seen?

"I say--you, too!" bellowed Lally. "Vill you come now?"

In the very certainty of security a sudden panic fell upon Sissy. If she
only dared to move, to reassure herself! Of course it couldn't mean
herself--oh!

She felt a sudden tug that almost dislodged her. "You t'ink I don't
see--huh?" shouted the perspiring Teuton below. "What for you leave dis
trail hang down den--hey?" And he tugged again.

With a sickly remnant of dignity Sissy stepped down and out. She had
forgotten her train--the train that had been at once her pride and her
undoing.

"We--I was playing lady," she explained, trembling.

"Oop a tree--huh? Peeking t'rough knot-holes--yes? A fine lady! I fix
you."

A glow of defiance came to Sissy's cheeks. "I don't care," she cried,
stamping her foot as she stood enthroned on the dry-goods box, her train
about her. "It's a nasty, cruel show, anyway, and you couldn't hire me
to come and see it. You ought to be ashamed, Mr. Lally! How'd you like
it if your wife was staggering along in there without sleeping or eating
for six days?"

Mr. Jan Lally's purple face looked as though it had been slapped. What
had