waft a delicate
film of spray about the figure of the child moving forlornly on the edge
of the foam. She was not playing or running races with the waves, but
walking soberly and anon halting to scan the beach ahead. Her legs were
bare to the knee, and she had hitched up her short skirt high about her
like a cockle-gatherer's. In the roar and murmur of the surf she did not
hear the Elder approaching, but faced around with a start as he called to
her.

"What are you doing here?" he asked.

For answer she held up a billet of wood, bleached and frayed with long
tossing on the seas, worthless except for firewood, and almost worthless
for that. The Elder frowned. "Look here," he said, "you ought to be in
school at this moment instead of minchin[1] idle after a few bits o'
stick, no good to anyone. A girl of your age, too! What's your name?"

"Please, sir, Liz," the child stammered, looking down.

"You're Sam Tregenza's grandchild, hey?"

"Please, sir."

"Then do you go home an' tell your grandfather, with my compliments, he
ought to know better than to allow it. It's robbin' the ratepayers,
that's what it is."

"Yes, sir," she murmured, glancing down dubiously at the piece of wood in
her hand.

"You don't understand me," said the Elder. "The ratepayers spend money on
a school here that the children of Ardevora mayn't grow up into little
dunces. Now, if the children go to school as they ought, the Government
up in London gives the ratepayers--me, for instance--some of their money
back: so much money for each child. If a child minches, the money isn'
paid. 'Tisn' the wood you pick up--that's neither here nor there--but the
money you're takin' out of folks' pockets. Didn' you know that?"

"No, sir."

"Your grandfather knows it, anyway--not," went on the Elder with sudden
anger in his voice, "that Sam Tregenza cares what folks he robs!"
He pulled himself up, slightly ashamed of this outburst. The child,
however, did not appear to resent it, but stood thoughtful, as if working
out the logic of his argument.

"It's the money," he insisted. "As for the wood, why you might come to my
yard and steal as much as you can carry, an' 'twouldn' amount to what you
rob by playin' truant like this; no, nor half of it. That's one thing for
you to consider; and here's another: There's a truant-school, up to
Plymouth; a sort of place that's half a school and half a prison, where
the magistrates send children that w