"Yes: I'll help! I'm a trusty ally!" cried Wiggins; and he spurned the earth joyfully at the thought.

They were silent a while, their faces grave and intent, cudgeling their brains for some signal exploit with which to open hostilities.

Presently Wiggins said: "You might make him an apple-pie bed. They're very annoying when you're sleepy."

He spoke with an air of experience.

"What's an apple-pie bed?" said Erebus scornfully.

Wiggins hung his head, abashed.

"It's a beginning, anyhow," said the Terror in an approving tone; and he added with the air of a philosopher: "Little things, and big things, they all count."

"I was trying to think how to break his leg; but I can't," said Erebus bitterly.

"By Jove! That cigarette-case! Come on!" cried the Terror; and he led the way swiftly out of the garden and took the path to Little Deeping.

"Where are we going?" said Erebus.

"We're going to make him that apple-pie bed. There's nothing like making a beginning. We shall think of heaps of other things. If we don't worry about them, they'll occur to us. They always do," said the Terror, at once practical and philosophical.

They walked briskly down to The Plough, the one inn of Little Deeping, where, as usual, Captain Baster was staying, and went in through the front door which stood open. At the sound of their footsteps in her hall the stout but good-humored landlady came bustling out of the bar to learn what they wanted.

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Pittaway," said the Terror politely. "We've come for Captain Baster's cigarette-case. He's left it somewhere in his room."

At the thought of handling the shining cigarette-case Mrs. Pittaway rubbed her hands on her ap.r.o.n; then the look of favor with which her eyes had rested on the fair guileless face of the Terror, changed to a frown; and she said: "Bother the thing! It's sure to be stuck somewhere out of sight. And the bar full, too."

"Don't you trouble; I'll get it. I know the bedroom," said the Terror with ready amiability; and he started to mount the stairs.

"Oh, thank you, sir," said Mrs. Pittaway, bustling back to the bar.

Erebus and Wiggins dashed lightly up the stairs after the Terror. In less than two minutes the deft hands of the Twins had dealt with the bed; and their intelligent eyes were eagerly scanning the hapless unprotected bedroom. Erebus sprang to the shaving-brush on the mantelpiece and thrust it under the mattress. The Terror locked Captain Baster's portmanteau; and as he placed the keys beside the shaving-brush, he said coldly:

"That'll teach him not to be so careless."

Erebus giggled; then she took the water-jug and filled one of Captain Baster's inviting dress-boots with water. Wiggins rocked with laughter.

"Don't stand giggling there! Why don't you do something?" said Erebus sharply.

Wiggins looked thoughtful; then he said: "A clothes-brush in bed is very annoying when you stick your foot against it."

He stepped toward the dressing-table; but the Terror was before him.

He took the clothes-brush and set it firmly, bristles outward, against the bottom of the folded sheet of the apple-pie bed, where one or the other of Captain Baster's feet was sure to find it. The Terror did not care which foot was successful.

Then inspiration failed them; the Terror took the cigarette-case from the dressing-table; they came quietly down the stairs and out of the inn.

As they turned up the street the Terror said with modest if somewhat vengeful triumph: "There! you see things _do_ occur to us." Then with his usual scrupulous fairness he added: "But it was Wiggins who set us going."

"I'm an ally; and he called me Freckles," said Wiggins vengefully; and once more he spurned the earth.

On their way home, half-way up the lane, where the trees arched most thickly overhead, they came to a patch of deepish mud which was too sheltered to have dried after the heavy rain of the day before.

"Mind the mud, Wiggins," said Erebus, mindful of his carelessness in the matter.

Wiggins walked gingerly along the side of it and said: "It wouldn't be a nice place to fall down in, would it?"

The Terror went on a few paces, stopped short, laughed a hard, sinister little laugh, and said: "Wiggins, you're a treasure!"

"What is it? What is it now?" said Erebus quickly.

"A little job of my own. It wouldn't do for you and Wiggins to have a hand in it, he'll swear so," said the Terror.

"Who'll swear?" said Erebus.

"The Cruncher. And you're a girl and Wiggins is too young to hear such language," said the Terror.

"Rubbish!" said Erebus sharply. "Tell us what it is."

The Terror shook his head.

"It's a beastly shame! I ought to help--I always do," cried Erebus in a bitterly aggrieved tone.

The Terror shook his head.

"All right," said Erebus. "Who wants to help in a stupid thing like that? But all the same you'll go and make a silly mull of it without me--you always do."

"You jolly well wait and see," said the Terror with calm confidence.

Erebus was still muttering darkly about piggishness when they reached the house.

They went into the drawing-room in a body and found Captain Baster still talking to their mother, in the middle, indeed, of a long story ill.u.s.trating his prowess in a game of polo, on two three-hundred-guinea and one three-hundred-and-fifty-guinea ponies. He laid great stress on the prices he had paid for them.

When it came to an end, the Terror gave him his cigarette-case.

Mrs. Dangerfield observed this example of the thoughtfulness of her offspring with an air of doubtful surprise.

Captain Baster took the cigarette-case and said with hearty jocularity: "Thank you, Error--thank you. But why didn't you bring it to me, Terebus? Then you'd have earned that kiss I'm going to give you."

Erebus gazed at him with murderous eyes, and said in a sinister tone: "Oh, I helped to get it."

CHAPTER II

GUARDIAN ANGELS

At seven o'clock Captain Baster took his leave to dine at his inn. Of his own accord he promised faithfully to return at nine sharp. He left the house a proud and happy man, for he knew that he had been shining before Mrs. Dangerfield with uncommon brilliance.