THE WOULDBEGOODS
seen half or a quarter. The room we had breakfast in was exactly like in a story—black oak panels and china in corner cupboards with glass doors. These doors were locked. There were green curtains, and honeycomb for breakfast. After brekker my father went back to town, and Albert's uncle went too, to see publishers. We saw them to the station, and father gave us a long list of what we weren't to do. It began with "Don't pull ropes unless you're quite sure what will happen at the other end," and it finished with "For goodness' sake, try to keep out of mischief till I come down on Saturday." There were lots of other things in between.
We all promised we would. And we saw them off, and waved till the train was quite out of sight. Then we started to walk home. Daisy was tired, so Oswald carried her home on his back. When we got home she said:
"I do like you, Oswald."
She is not a bad little kid; and Oswald felt it was his duty to be nice to her because she was a visitor. Then we looked all over everything. It was a glorious place. You did not know where to begin.
We were all a little tired before we found the hay-loft, but we pulled ourselves together to make a fort with the trusses of hay—great square things—and we were having a jolly good time, all of us, when suddenly a trap-door opened and a head bobbed up with a straw in its mouth. We knew nothing about the country then, and the head
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