opefully. "I am sure she can trust Mr.
Dod to take care of himself--and of us, too, for the matter of that."

"Mr. Dod!" exclaimed Mrs. Portheris with indignation. "My poor child's
anxiety will be for her mother."

And we let it go at that. But Dicky put the rose petals in his pocket
with the toe-bone, and hopefully remarked that there would be no
difficulty about finding her now. I mentioned that I had parents also,
at that moment, lost in the Catacombs, but he did not apologize.

The midnight of the place, as we walked on, seemed to deepen, and its
silence to grow more profound. The tombs passed us in solemn grey
ranges, one above the other--the long tombs of the grown-up people, and
the shorter ones of the children, and the very little ones of the
babies. The air held a concentrated dolor of funerals sixteen centuries
old, and the four dim stone walls seemed to have crept closer together.
"I think I will take your arm, Mr. Dod," said Mrs. Portheris, and "I
think I will take your other arm, Mr. Dod," said I.

"Thank you," replied Dicky, "I should be glad of both of yours," which
may look ambiguous now, but we quite understood it at the time. It made
rather uncomfortable walking in places, but against that overwhelming
majority of the dead it was comforting to feel ourselves a living unit.
We stumbled on, taking only the most obvious turnings, and presently the
passage widened into another little square chamber. "More bishops!"
groaned Dicky, holding up his candle.

"Perhaps," I replied triumphantly, "but Jonah, anyway," and I pointed
him out on the wall, in two shades of brown, a good deal faded, being
precipitated into the jaws of a green whale with paws and horns and a
smile, also a curled body and a three-forked tail. The wicked deed had
two accomplices only, who had apparently stopped rowing to do it.
Underneath was a companion sketch of the restitution of Jonah, in
perfect order, by the whale, which had, nevertheless, grown considerably
stouter in the interval, while an amiable stranger reclined in an arbor,
with his hand under his head, and looked on.

"As a child your intelligence promised well," said Dicky; "that _is_
Jonah, though not of the Revised Version. I don't think Bible stories
ought to be illustrated, do you, Mrs. Portheris? It has such a bad
effect on the imagination."

"We can talk of that at another time, Mr. Dod. At present I wish to be
restored to my daughter. Let us push on at once. And