icularly good idea, as all their hands were aching
after sawing away for so long with their blunt knives at the hard wood.
So a procession set out, each child dragging a branch along the ground.
By doing it that way they could move good-sized branches which would
afterwards cut up into several sticks.

"Oh, Madge, it's perfect! It's quite perfect!" cried the twins some
time later, when, hot and panting, they at last dropped their burdens
beneath the great beech-tree by the wall.

"I really think it's pretty good," replied Madge modestly. She felt
that as she had invented this plan herself it would not be good manners
for her to admire it too freely. "You see those two boughs poking out
like great arms over the field? The sticks must be long enough to
stretch from one to the other, and the Eagle's Nest when it is built
will be between them."

"Oh, why did we never think of it before!" exclaimed Betty, rolling on
the ground in an ecstasy of admiration.

"Well, you know we don't often come into this corner of the field to
look about," Madge reminded her; "it's so far from the house. And
besides," she added frankly, "I used to be rather afraid of coming here
without Nurse when I was smaller, because of Mrs. Howard."

A shade of anxiety passed over the younger children's faces. They had
forgotten all about that mysterious old lady behind the wall, with her
terrible character for madness and crime. Yet she was possibly lurking
within a few yards of them, even listening to what they were saying.

"Do you think," began John seriously, "are you sure, that it's quite
safe here?"

"Quite safe," asserted Madge decidedly. "If Mrs. Howard tried to come
an inch this side of the wall she would be a trespasser, and we could
send a policeman after her."

An elder sister who has mastered the law of trespass to this extent is
really an invaluable possession. John's mind was quite set at rest,
and with a sigh of relief he again pulled out his knife and began
hacking away at a branch.

"I dare say you are both wondering how we are going to get up to the
Eagle's Nest," said Madge. "Now I will show you."

She went to the wall against which the beech-tree was growing, and
deliberately put her toe into a deep crack between the stones where the
mortar had fallen out. The others watched with the greatest
excitement, while, partly supported by inequalities on the trunk of the
tree, and partly taking advantage of projecting st