vexation. The
others would be all scattered about, and she would never get them to
listen to her plan. What did a stupid thimble matter in comparison? If
it were lost for ever, so much the better. Nancy at least might have
stayed to help. While she was peering and poking about, and fuming and
grumbling, Dickie came into the room ready for the garden, in her round
holland pinafore, and grasping a basket and spade.

Dickie, whose real name was Delicia, was only five years old and not yet
admitted to the school-room, but she was fond of escaping from the
nursery whenever she could and joining the others in their games. She
at once cast herself flat on the floor to help in the search, and in
this position not only spied the thimble under the fender, but by means
of the spade succeeded to her great delight in poking it out.

In another minute she and Pennie were running across the lawn to a part
of the garden called the Wilderness, where only Ambrose was to be found
soberly digging in his garden, and quite ready for conversation. But
Pennie would not unfold the plan unless the others heard it too. David
at any rate was sure to be in the barn feeding his rabbits, and perhaps
Nancy might be with him. So to the barn they all took their way.

The barn was large and roomy, quite unused except by the children, who
kept all their pets and a good deal of what Andrew the gardener called
"rubbage" there. At one end the boys had fixed a swing and some
rope-ladders, on which they practised all sorts of monkey-like feats.
At the other lived David's rabbits in numerous hutches, Ambrose's owl, a
jackdaw, a squirrel, and a wonderfully large family of white mice.
Besides those captives there were bats which lived free but retired
lives high up in the rafters, flapping and whirring about when dusk came
on. Pigeons also flew in and out, and pecked at the various morsels of
food left about on the ground, so that the barn was a thickly-peopled
place, with plenty of noise and flutter, and much coming and going
through its wide doors.

When the children entered, Nancy was lazily swinging herself backwards
and forwards while she watched David, who moved steadily from hutch to
hutch, with a box of bran under one arm and a huge bunch of green meat
under the other.

"Come and hear Pennie's plan," said Ambrose; "she won't tell it till you
all listen."

"I can't come," said David, "I've got to finish feeding the rabbits, and
after that