had better not make a noise. The van inside was
divided in two--something after the manner of a bathing-machine, such as
I daresay most children have often seen. The door in the middle was not
locked, and Diana pushed it softly open; then, advancing with the light
held high so as to show the children's faces without flaring painfully
upon them, stood at one side and signed to the Signor to come forward.
And he was too much startled and impressed--ugly, cold-hearted little
wretch though he was--by the sight before him to notice the strange,
half-triumphant, half-defiant expression on Diana's dark beautiful face.

[Illustration: "UPON MY WORD THEY ARE SOMETHING QUITE OUT OF THE
COMMON," HE SAID;

"I WOULDN'T HAVE MISSED THEM FOR A GOOD DEAL. WHAT A KING AND QUEEN OF
THE PIGMIES, OR 'BABES IN THE WOOD,' THEY'D MAKE."--p. 173.]

"There they are," it seemed to say, "and could anything be lovelier?
_Wouldn't_ you like to have them?"

They lay there--the delicate little faces flushed with "rosy sleep"--the
fair fluffy hair like a golden shadow on the rough cushion which served
as a pillow, each with an arm thrown round the other; they looked so
like each other that even Diana was not sure which was which. No pair of
fairies decoyed from their own country could have been prettier.

The Signor was startled into speaking the truth for once.

"Upon my word they are something quite out of the common," he said; "I
wouldn't have missed them for a good deal. What a king and queen of the
pigmies, or 'babes in the wood,' they'd make! I'll have to get something
set up on purpose for them. And they're sharp at learning and speak
plain you say?--at least he did," he added, turning round to look for
Mick, who by this time had lurched up to the middle door of the van and
was leaning on the lintel, looking in stupidly.

"Ay, they're sharp enough, and pretty spoken too," said Diana.

"Sharp and pretty spoken," echoed Mick.

"Then I'm your man," said the Signor; "I'll----"

But the girl interrupted him.

"There's one thing to be said," she began. "You must not think of
letting them be seen hereabouts. You might get yourself and us too into
trouble. It's too near where they come from."

The Signor held up his hands warningly.

"Hush," he said, "I don't want to know nothing of all that. They're two
desolate orphans, picked up by you out of charity, and I take them to
teach them a way of gaining a livelihood. That's all about it."