“If you don’t mind, please,” said Duke, “us’d rather go home.  It doesn’t matter about the bowl, for sister’s foot’s so sore and it’s getting late.  I’ll give you all the money—­oh please, where have you put my money-box?”

Greatly to his surprise, the gipsy pulled it out of some slouching inner pocket of his jacket and gave it to him.

“Here it is, master; but it’d a’ been lost but for me—­a-laying on the ground there.”

Duke opened it.

“I’ll give you——­” he began again, but he suddenly stopped short.  “The little gold guinea’s not here,” he cried, “only the shilling and the sixpence and the pennies.”

“Must have rolled out on the ground if ever it was there,” said Mick sullenly. “I never see’d it.”

“It was there,” cried Duke angrily.  “Do you think I’d tell a story?  I must go back and look for it.  Let me down, I say, let me down.”

Then Mick turned on him with a very evil expression on his face.

“Stop that, d’ye hear?  Stop that,” and he lifted his fist threateningly.  “D’ye think I’m going to waste any more time on such brats and their nonsense?  Catch me a-taking you home for you to go and say I’ve stolen your money, and get me put in prison by your grandpapas and grandmammas as likely as not,” he went on in a half-threatening, half-whining tone.

Duke was going to answer, but Pamela pulled his sleeve.

“Be quiet, bruvver,” she said in a whisper.  “Tim said us must wait a bit.”

Almost as she said the words a voice was heard whistling at a little distance—­they were now out of the wood on a rough bridle path.  Mick looked round sharply and descried a figure coming near them.

“What have you been about, you good-for-nothing?” he shouted.  “Why didn’t you stay with the others?  You might have lent me a hand with the donkey and the brats.”

Tim stood still in the middle of the path, and stared at them without speaking.  Then he turned round and walked beside Mick, who was leading the donkey.

“What are ye a-doing with the little master and missy?” he asked coolly.

“Mind yer business,” muttered the gipsy gruffly.  Then he added in a louder tone, “Master and missy has lost their way, don’t ye see?  They’re ever so far from home.  It was lucky I met them.”

“Are ye a-going to take them home?” continued Tim.

“For sure, when I can find the time.  But that won’t be just yet a bit.  There’s the missus a-waiting for us.”

And, turning a corner, they came suddenly in sight of the other gipsies—­the two women and the big sulky-looking boy—­gathered round a tree, the donkey’s panniers and the various bundles the party had been carrying lying on the ground beside them.  If the panniers had been unpacked and their contents spread out, as Mick had told the children, they had certainly been quickly packed up again.  But there was no time for wondering about how this could be; the woman whom the pedlar called “the missus” came up to her husband as soon as she saw them, and said a few words hastily, and with a look of great annoyance, in the queer language she had spoken before, to which he replied with some angry expression which it was probably well the children did not understand.