Chapter 9 - Page 2

"He thought he saw a Coach-and-Four
That stood beside his bed:
He looked again, and found it was
A Bear without a Head.
'Poor thing,' he said, 'poor silly thing!
It's waiting to be fed!'"

"No, I ca'n't let you out again!" he said, before the children could
speak. "The Vice-warden gave it me, he did, for letting you out last
time! So be off with you!" And, turning away from them, he began
digging frantically in the middle of a gravel-walk, singing, over and
over again, "'Poor thing,' he said, 'poor silly thing! It's waiting to
be fed!'" but in a more musical tone than the shrill screech in which
he had begun.

The music grew fuller and richer at every moment: other manly voices
joined in the refrain: and soon I heard the heavy thud that told me the
boat had touched the beach, and the harsh grating of the shingle as the
men dragged it up. I roused myself, and, after lending them a hand in
hauling up their boat, I lingered yet awhile to watch them disembark a
goodly assortment of the hard-won 'treasures of the deep.'

When at last I reached our lodgings I was tired and sleepy, and glad
enough to settle down again into the easy-chair, while Arthur
hospitably went to his cupboard, to get me out some cake and wine,
without which, he declared, he could not, as a doctor, permit my going
to bed.

And how that cupboard-door did creak! It surely could not be Arthur,
who was opening and shutting it so often, moving so restlessly about,
and muttering like the soliloquy of a tragedy-queen!

No, it was a female voice. Also the figure half-hidden by the
cupboard-door--was a female figure, massive, and in flowing robes,

Could it be the landlady? The door opened, and a strange man entered
the room.

"What is that donkey doing?" he said to himself, pausing, aghast,
on the threshold.

The lady, thus rudely referred to, was his wife. She had got one of
the cupboards open, and stood with her back to him, smoothing down a
sheet of brown paper on one of the shelves, and whispering to herself
"So, so! Deftly done! Craftily contrived!"

Her loving husband stole behind her on tiptoe, and tapped her on the
head. "Boh!" he playfully shouted at her ear. "Never tell me again I
ca'n't say 'boh' to a goose!"

My Lady wrung her hands. "Discovered!" she groaned. "Yet no--he is
one of us! Reveal it not, oh Man! Let it bide its time!"

"Reveal what not?" her husband testily replied, dragging out the sheet
of brown paper. "What are you hiding here, my Lady? I insist upon
knowing!"

My Lady cast down her eyes, and spoke in the littlest of little voices.