"Is this your hen-house?"

"No, it's not the hen-house, it's--just a kind of stable."

"It reminds me of the Swiss Family Robinson, or Robin Hood's shanty in the depths of Sherwood Forest. You could climb up that tree if you got on to the roof."

As Avelyn's eyes glanced up the bole of the huge oak Pamela's followed with a look of strained anxiety. She laid her hand on her friend's arm and drew her inside the stable. She seemed ill at ease.

"What's the matter, Pam?"

"Oh, nothing!"

"You're not yourself at all."

"Yes, indeed I am."

"I don't believe you're pleased to see me!"

"Ave! I've been dreaming of you all the morning."

"Then what is it?"

Pamela was silent.

"Something's worrying you. I can see that plainly enough."

"Yes. I own I'm worried."

"Won't you tell me?"

"I can't."

"Is it a secret?"

"It is just at present. I want to think it over."

While she spoke Pamela kept glancing anxiously out at the door. She suddenly turned with frightened eyes.

"Ave! Uncle Fritz is coming! You must hide, quick! He mustn't catch you here for all the world! Run behind this stall. Don't move till he's gone."

[Ill.u.s.tration: AVELYN, CROUCHED UNDER THE MANGER, COULD HEAR THE BULLYING TONE IN HIS VOICE]

She hustled Avelyn into the darkest corner of the stable, then herself sat down on the foot of the ladder that led to the floor above. A sound of footsteps brushing the gra.s.s was heard from outside, and in another moment Mr. Hockheimer entered.

"What are you doing down here?" he asked sharply. "I told you to stop upstairs."

"I've only just come down."

"Any message?"

"No, none at all."

"One might come just when you are fooling about here," he frowned. "Why don't you do as I tell you?"

Avelyn, crouched under the manger, could not see his face, but she could hear the bullying tone in his voice.

"Do you think I feed you and educate you for you to do just as you like?" continued Mr. Hockheimer angrily. "What would become of you if it weren't for me, I should like to know? Another time when I set you to do anything you'll do it, or I'll know the reason why. Here, get up and let me pa.s.s!"

He pulled her roughly off the ladder and walked up himself. His footsteps creaked on the boarded floor above, then all was silence.

Pamela crept softly up the ladder, peeped into the room above, and descended as quietly as she came; then, crossing to the stall where Avelyn was hidden, put her finger on her lips for silence and beckoned her friend towards the door. She led her hurriedly along the garden.

Neither spoke a word till they reached the palings.

"I'm awfully sorry I came, Pam!" apologized Avelyn.

"Never mind, you couldn't help it. How should you know Uncle Fritz would be here?"

"I certainly shouldn't have come if I had known."

"Who would? Ave, have you ever seen a little wild linnet get into a bird-catcher's net?"

"No."

"I have. It runs and struggles and beats its wings, and the more it tries to escape the worse it gets caught in the meshes. Ave, at present I feel like that linnet."

"Can't I help you, Pam?"

"Not yet. I want to think. When I really feel you can help me, I shall come and ask you. You wouldn't fail me?"

"I'd help you for all I'm worth, if it's against your uncle."

Pamela's eyes filled with tears.

"I'm so utterly alone," she faltered. "Mother doesn't understand. Since Father died she has never cared for anything. She's content to live here on Uncle's bounty. She's so absolutely trusting and unsuspicious, just like a child. I never can get her to see things as I do. Although I'm hardly fourteen, I often feel that I know more of the world than she does. Just at present Mother is going about with her eyes closed."

"And you?"

"I'm keeping my eyes particularly wide open, and my mouth tight shut,"

replied Pamela, as she kissed her friend good-bye and helped her to climb the palings.

Avelyn went home very thoughtfully. She found the boys digging in the kitchen garden, and confided to them her morning's experience. They decided that something mysterious must be going on at Moss Cottage.

"It looks fishy!" said David, slowly sc.r.a.ping the earth off his boots with the edge of his spade.

"What has that old Hun got up his sleeve?" enquired Anthony, shaking his head.

"I don't know. After what we saw in the wood I'd believe anything of him."

"Shall we tell the Vicar, or somebody?" suggested Avelyn.