llow. Now, are you coming down?"

No reply.

Dan'l reflected.

If he went off to fetch the ladder from the stable-yard, the boy would
slide down the top of the vinery and escape.

That would not do.

If he called to Peter to fetch the ladder, the boy would wait till the
groom was gone, and slip over the wall, drop, and escape that way.

That would not do either.

Hah! There was the labourer. He could call him.

It was past twelve, and he had gone to his dinner, Dan'l, like Peter,
taking his at the more aristocratic hour of one.

Dan'l was in a fix. He meant to have that boy, and make an example of
him, but a great difficulty stared him in the face.

There was no one to call, unless he waited till the doctor came. If the
doctor came, he would perhaps take a lenient view of the matter, and let
the boy go, and, unless Dan'l could first give the prisoner a sound
thrashing with a hazel stick, one of a bundle which he had in his
tool-shed, all his trouble would have been in vain.

So he would not call the doctor.

He made two or three more feints of going, and each time the boy began
to descend, but only to dart back as the gardener turned.

"Oh, that's your game, is it!" said Dan'l. "Very well; come down, but
you can't get out of the garden if you do."

The next time, after a few minutes' thought, Dan'l turned and ran as
hard as he could, with every appearance now of going right off for the
ladder. But he had made his plans with no little calculation of
probabilities; and his idea was now to go right on till he had given the
boy time to descend, and make for one of the entrances, when he meant to
return, run him down, and seize him, before the young scamp, as he
called him, had time to clamber up any other place.

Dan'l ran on, and the boy watched him; and as soon as the gardener
showed by his movements that he was evidently going away, began to
descend.

Hardly, however, had he reached the ground than Dan'l turned, saw him,
and made a fresh dash to capture him.

If the gardener had waited a couple more minutes he would have had a
better chance. As it was, the boy had time to reach the dividing wall
of the vinery wall again, but just as he was scrambling up, Dan'l was
upon him, and was in the act of grasping one arm, when it was snatched
away.

In the effort the boy lost his composure, and the steady easy-going
confidence which had enabled him to trot along with such facility; and
the conseque