read for the travelers, a room was provided for Uncle
William, and Iris and Apollo slept once more in the dear old nursery.

How very sound Iris did sleep that night! How happy she felt once
more!

Fortune had dragged in her bed, and laid it on the floor close to the
little girl's side, and the sound of Fortune's snores was the sweetest
music Iris had listened to for a long time.

"Fortune will find the others, and I can be a real mother once more,"
she whispered over and over to herself.

And so she slept sweetly and dreamed happily, and awoke in the morning
with color in her cheeks and hope in her eyes.

CHAPTER XXIV.

ON THE TRAIL.

It was on the very evening that Orion and Diana had left the great
circus that Uncle William and the two children arrived at Delaney
Manor, for Delaney Manor was only five miles distant from the
prosperous seaside town of Madersley.

Now, Uncle Ben had very little idea, when he brought the two children
to the southwest of England, that he was really taking them back to
their native country. These things, however, are ordered, and the
wisest man in the world cannot go against the leadings of Providence.
Uncle Ben thought to hide the children from their best friends,
whereas, in reality, he was taking them home once more.

But two little circus children might wander about at their own sweet
will at Madersley, and be heard nothing whatever of at Delaney Manor,
and these little children might never have been found, and this story
might have had a totally different ending, but for Fortune.

When Fortune, however, lay down on her mattress by Iris' side, she
thought a great deal before she went to sleep. She thought, as she
expressed it to herself, all round the subject, to the right of it,
and to the left of it. She thought of it in its breadth, and she
thought of it in its height, and, having finally settled the matter to
her own satisfaction, she went to sleep, and soothed little Iris with
the comforting music of her snores.

On the following morning she had an interview with Mr. Dolman.

"I want to ask you a straight question, sir," she said. "What is it
the police are doing? It seems a mighty strange thing to me that two
little children should be lost in the middle of a civilized country
like England."

"It seems a stranger thing to me," replied Uncle William. "I am
dreadfully puzzled over the whole matter. We have now four detectives
at work, but up to the present