the country and the
moors and rocks and great hills were all new to them. They had not found
the canal till some days later. The other reason was that everyone on
the railway had been kind to them--the Station Master, the Porter, and
the old gentleman who waved. And the people on the canal were anything
but kind.

The people on the canal were, of course, the bargees, who steered the
slow barges up and down, or walked beside the old horses that trampled
up the mud of the towing-path, and strained at the long tow-ropes.

Peter had once asked one of the bargees the time, and had been told
to "get out of that," in a tone so fierce that he did not stop to say
anything about his having just as much right on the towing-path as the
man himself. Indeed, he did not even think of saying it till some time
later.

Then another day when the children thought they would like to fish in
the canal, a boy in a barge threw lumps of coal at them, and one of
these hit Phyllis on the back of the neck. She was just stooping down to
tie up her bootlace--and though the coal hardly hurt at all it made her
not care very much about going on fishing.

On the bridge, however, Roberta felt quite safe, because she could look
down on the canal, and if any boy showed signs of meaning to throw coal,
she could duck behind the parapet.

Presently there was a sound of wheels, which was just what she expected.

The wheels were the wheels of the Doctor's dogcart, and in the cart, of
course, was the Doctor.

He pulled up, and called out:--

"Hullo, head nurse! Want a lift?"

"I wanted to see you," said Bobbie.

"Your mother's not worse, I hope?" said the Doctor.

"No--but--"

"Well, skip in, then, and we'll go for a drive."

Roberta climbed in and the brown horse was made to turn round--which it
did not like at all, for it was looking forward to its tea--I mean its
oats.

"This IS jolly," said Bobbie, as the dogcart flew along the road by the
canal.

"We could throw a stone down any one of your three chimneys," said the
Doctor, as they passed the house.

"Yes," said Bobbie, "but you'd have to be a jolly good shot."

"How do you know I'm not?" said the Doctor. "Now, then, what's the
trouble?"

Bobbie fidgeted with the hook of the driving apron.

"Come, out with it," said the Doctor.

"It's rather hard, you see," said Bobbie, "to out with it; because of
what Mother said."

"What DID Mother say?"

"She said I wasn't to go telling eve