oesn't mean anything bad, sir,
and we'd like to take him back home with us."

"Enough," said the leader, changing his entire manner with the most
sudden and shameless inconsistency. "You shall go back together, and woe
betide the miscreant who would prevent it! What say you, brothers?
What shall be his fate who dares to separate our noble Queen from her
faithful Chinese henchman?"

"He shall die!" roared the others, with beaming cheerfulness.

"And what say you--shall we see them home?"

"We will!" roared the others.

Before the children could fairly comprehend what had passed, they were
again lifted into the truck and began to glide back into the tunnel they
had just quitted. But not again in darkness and silence; the entire band
of Red rovers accompanied them, illuminating the dark passage with the
candles they had snatched from the walls. In a few moments they were at
the entrance again. The great world lay beyond them once more with rocks
and valleys suffused by the rosy light of the setting sun. The past
seemed like a dream.

But were they really awake now? They could not tell. They accepted
everything with the confidence and credulity of all children who have
no experience to compare with their first impressions and to whom the
future contains nothing impossible. It was without surprise, therefore,
that they felt themselves lifted on the shoulders of the men who were
making quite a procession along the steep trail towards the settlement
again. Polly noticed that at the mouth of the other tunnels they were
greeted by men as if they were carrying tidings of great joy; that they
stopped to rejoice together, and that in some mysterious manner their
conductors had got their faces washed, and had become more like beings
of the outer world. When they neared the settlement the excitement
seemed to have become greater; people rushed out to shake hands with
the men who were carrying them, and overpowered even the children with
questions they could not understand. Only one sentence Polly could
clearly remember as being the burden of all congratulations. "Struck the
old lead at last!" With a faint consciousness that she knew something
about it, she tried to assume a dignified attitude on the leader's
shoulders, even while she was beginning to be heavy with sleep.

And then she remembered a crowd near her father's house, out of which
her father came smiling pleasantly on her, but not interfering with
her triumphal prog