n
with him, to see his father, who is old Mr. Beale, and we are staying at
his cottage."

Lord Arden sat down beside them on the turf and asked Dickie a good many
questions about where he was born, and who he had lived with, and what
he had seen and done and been.

Dickie answered honestly and straightforwardly. Only of course he did
not tell about the magic, or say that in that magic world he and Lord
Arden's children were friends and cousins. And all the time they were
talking Lord Arden's eyes were fixed on his face, except when they
wandered to Tinkler and the white seal. Once he picked these up, and
looked at the crest on them.

"Where did you get these?" he asked.

Dickie told. And then Lord Arden handed the seal and Tinkler to him and
went on with his questions.

At last Elfrida put her arms round her father's neck and whispered. "I
know it's not manners, but Dickie won't mind," she said before the
whispering began.

"Yes, certainly," said Lord Arden when the whispering was over; "it's
tea-time. Dickie, you'll come home to tea with us, won't you?"

"I must tell Mr. Beale," said Dickie; "he'll be anxious if I don't."

"Shall I hurt you if I put you on my back?" Lord Arden asked, and next
minute he was carrying Dickie down the slope towards Arden Castle, while
Edred went back to Beale's cottage to say where Dickie was. When Edred
got back to Arden Castle tea was ready in the parlor, and Dickie was
resting in a comfortable chair.

"Isn't old Beale a funny old man?" said Edred. "He said Arden Castle was
the right place for Dickie, with a face like that. What could he have
meant? What are you doing that for?" he added in injured tones, for
Elfrida had kicked his hand under the table.

Before tea was over there was a sound of horses' hoofs and carriage
wheels in the courtyard. And the maid-servant opened the parlor door and
said, "Lady Talbot." Though he remembered well enough how kind she had
been to him, Dickie wished he could creep under the table. It was too
hard; she must recognize him. And now Edred and Elfrida, and Lord Arden,
who was so kind and jolly, they would all know that he had once been a
burglar, and that she had wanted to adopt him, and that he had been
ungrateful and had run away. He trembled all over. It was too hard.

Lady Talbot shook hands with the others, and then turned to him. "And
who is your little friend?" she asked Edred, and in the same breath
cried out--"Why, it's my little