into sight
full-grown. It was as though they had fallen wrapped in invisibility
until the great Magician had uttered the word. That was Bobby's secret
thought, which he told nobody. Often he imagined he could hear the word
repeated all about him, _presto! presto! presto! presto!_ like the
distant hushed falling of waters. And as the charm was said, he, looking
skyward, could see the big soft flakes flash into view out of nothing.

XXII

THE MURDER

So successful did the friendship between the two boys turn out to be
that next autumn Johnny English was invited to visit the Ordes at
Monrovia. He accepted very promptly, and, as the distance was short,
brought with him the cart and pony. The country around Monrovia was very
interesting to them. Riverland, marshland, swampland, shore and meadow,
all offered themselves in the most diversified forms. The sandy roads
wound over the hills, down the ravines, along the corduroys and
float-bridges. Life was varied. The boys, armed with their Flobert
rifle, wandered far afield.

They did not get very much, it is true, but they popped away steadily,
and did a grand amount of sneaking and looking. And they managed first
and last to see a great deal. In the snipe marshes they knew when the
first flight dropped in--and murdered a killdeer as he stood. Out in the
sloughs they marked the earnest red-heads from the north--and
accomplished two mud-hens, a ruddy duck, and a dozen blackbirds. In the
uplands they knew almost to a feather how many partridge each thicket
had bred; to a covey where the quail used; and once in a great while, by
strategy on their own side and foolishness on the part of the quarry,
they caught one sitting and brought it down. What is quite as much to
the point, they felt the season as it changed. The gradual
transformation from the green of summer to the brown and lilac of late
autumn, the low swinging of the sun, the mellowing of the days, the
broad-hung curtain of sweet smoke-breeze, the hushing of the vital
forces of the world in anticipation of winter--all these passed near
them and, passing, touched their eyes. They were too busy to notice such
things consciously, however. The influence sank deep and became part of
the permanent background against which their lives were to be thrown.

At first some doubt was expressed as to the wisdom of that Flobert
rifle. To turn two small boys loose with a deadly weapon seemed to Mrs.
Orde a rather strong temp