d
the rear--that being the most dangerous position. And I did it well,
for I declare I got crick in the neck just with looking over my
shoulder.

So we crept and crept, foot by foot, looking and testing everything.
And it was as well. Because, quite without warning, the thick bushes
ceased, and there we were on the edge of a deep trench with very black
water at the bottom. The sides were steep and green with grass. But
on the other bank all was green and yellow, with spreading lawns and
Lent lilies growing, and a woman in a short skirt, coming and going
among them, with a gardening spade in her hand.

Somehow I knew at once that that was Daft Jeremy's elder sister, Aphra
Orrin, the one who was not so mad as the others, and kept house for
Elsie's grandfather.

She came quite near. We could have tossed a dog biscuit to her
feet--could, that is--somehow, I didn't want to. It might have
startled the poor lady, and besides I hate making oneself conspicuous.

Over the lily patches and the flower beds we got glimpses of a
red-tiled house, low and old, all overgrown with ivy about the gables
and porches. It had small windows with criss-cross panes, and smoke
was coming out of one of the chimneys, though it was yet so early.
That I took to be the kitchen of Deep Moat Grange.

The canal seemed to go all the way round, and to join on to the pond
which we could see glimmering beyond the house, looking gray through a
fringe of willows.

The place was nested in woods and water, like a dabchick's nest, yet
for all that comfortable and fair to see with its lawns and greenery
set about it. I looked at Elsie to see if she was feared. But not
she. Instead, there was a queer, eager look, and her eyes kept
glittering, as if you could have struck a match at them. Then all at
once it struck me that Elsie was going to be pretty; but I resolved to
say nothing about that for the present.

It was thinking about her mother that did it, I expect. And that is a
funny thing, too. For I care about my mother, and sometimes look
eager, like Elsie; but it is when I tease her to tell me what we are
going to have for dinner. Elsie was different. She said "S-h-h-h-!"
whenever I moved; and once, when a stick cracked underfoot, turned and
gave me a look, which would have speaned a foal.

"You fidgety worm--_can't_ you be quiet," that look said.

We went on watching the house and the woman watering the flower beds.
Nance had told us