n the other one, and the water jumped up and hit me in the face and
made my hat all wet. And there was a great black boat as big as Noah's
ark going by, and three horses drawing it, and a little chimney in
it, and two men, and they called out 'See-saw! see-saw!' and it was
awful rude of them."

"And what happened next?"

"Why, I thought I could get along better if I had one oar at a time;
and so I took up one and put both hands to it, and dipped it down deep
and pulled it hard in the water, and so the other one got loose
somehow and slipped away and fell into the water. And there was a boat
and people sitting in it on chairs with fishing-rods, and they did so
laugh at me; and some men on the bank they laughed too, and called out
something, but I don't know what they said. And then the boat went on
and on, and I saw some broad white posts like you have at Littlebourne
Weir, and the boat went up sideways tight against the posts, and I sat
still and waited until somebody come by to help me."

"And were you not frightened?"

"I was that frightened I could not have spoke if it was ever so."

"Well, well, well," said Mr. Burnet, "here you are safe, and very
thankful you must be that we came down just in time to save you. Had
the boat been carried over the weir you would have been drowned. But
when Roberts saw you he knew you were one of the Littlebourne
children, and my son felt sure that you were in distress."

As soon as Juliet had told her story she relapsed into silence; the
excitement of her rescue was passing off, and the terror of her danger
remained. She sat beside Mr. Burnet and heard the rain pattering on
his umbrella, and wished she was at the lock and wished she was in
London, and wished she was grown-up and doing for herself, and not so
stupid and always putting other people out and making things go wrong.
Juliet was quite sure that though she had got into trouble with the
boat, there were heaps of other things that she would be very clever
about.

The rain was pouring down when Mr. Burnet's boat arrived at
Littlebourne Lock.

Cries of joy greeted Juliet as soon as her relations saw her. Mr.
Rowles was full of gruff thanks to the gentlemen, and begged the whole
party to go inside the house until the rain should cease. For there
was bright sky beyond the black clouds, and the shower would soon be
over. So they all went into the "lodgers' rooms," as Mrs. Rowles
called those which she was in the habit of l