e pink!" were the only words the children
could afterwards remember,--but he produced fifteen shillings, mainly in
sixpences and coppers, and handed it to Robert.

"We'll fix up about what you're to draw when the show's over to-night,"
he said with hoarse heartiness. "Lor' love a duck! you'll be that happy
with us you'll never want to leave us. Can you do a song now--or a bit
of a breakdown?"

"Not to-day," said Robert, rejecting the idea of trying to sing "As once
in May," a favourite of his mother's, and the only song he could think
of at the moment.

"Get Levi and clear them bloomin' photos out. Clear the tent. Stick out
a curtain or suthink," the man went on. "Lor', what a pity we ain't got
no tights his size! But we'll have 'em before the week's out. Young man,
your fortune's made. It's a good thing you came to me, and not to some
chaps as I could tell you on. I've known blokes as beat their giants,
and starved 'em too; so I'll tell you straight, you're in luck this day
if you never was afore. 'Cos I'm a lamb, I am--and I don't deceive you."

"I'm not afraid of anyone beating me," said Robert, looking down on the
"lamb." Robert was crouched on his knees, because the tent was not big
enough for him to stand upright in, but even in that position he could
still look down on most people. "But I'm awfully hungry--I wish you'd
get me something to eat."

"Here, 'Becca," said the hoarse Bill. "Get him some grub--the best
you've got, mind!" Another whisper followed, of which the children only
heard, "Down in black and white--first thing to-morrow."

Then the woman went to get the food--it was only bread and cheese when
it came, but it was delightful to the large and empty Robert; and the
man went to post sentinels round the tent, to give the alarm if Robert
should attempt to escape with his fifteen shillings.

"As if we weren't honest," said Anthea indignantly when the meaning of
the sentinels dawned on her.

Then began a very strange and wonderful afternoon.

Bill was a man who knew his business. In a very little while, the
photographic views, the spyglasses you look at them through so that they
really seem rather real, and the lights you see them by, were all packed
away. A curtain--it was an old red-and-black carpet really--was run
across the tent. Robert was concealed behind, and Bill was standing on a
trestle-table outside the tent making a speech. It was rather a good
speech. It began by saying that the gian