aking them back, only I'm not rightly sure of the way, and I
thought--I thought, as it was the best to ax you, seeing as you've maybe
heard----" but here Tim's voice, which had been faltering somewhat, so
keen and hard was the look directed upon him, came altogether to an end;
and he grew so red and looked so uneasy that perhaps it was no wonder if
Superintendent Boyds thought him a suspicious character.

"Ah indeed!--just so--you thought maybe we'd heard something of some
children as had _strayed_--_strayed_; not been decoyed away--oh not at
all--away from their home. And of course, young man, _you'd_ heard
nothing. You, nor those that sent you, didn't know nothing of this here,
I suppose?" and Boyds unfolded a yellow paper lying on the table and
held it up before Tim's face. "This here is new to you, no doubt?"

Tim shook his head. The yellow paper with big black letters told him
nothing. Even the big figures, "L20 Reward," standing alone at the top,
had no meaning for him. "I can't read, sir," he said, growing redder
than before.

"Oh indeed! and who was it then that told you to come here about the
children to ask the way, so that you could take them home, you know, and
get the reward all nice and handy? You thought maybe you'd get it
straight away, and that we'd send 'em home for you--was that what father
or mother thought?"

Tim looked up, completely puzzled.

"I don't know anything about a reward," he said, "and I haven't no
father or mother. Di----" but here he stopped short. "Diana told me to
come to you," he was going to have said, when it suddenly struck him
that the gipsy girl had bid him beware of mentioning any names.

"Who?" said the superintendent sharply.

"I can't say," said Tim. "It was a friend o' mine--that's all I can
say--as told me to come here."

"A friend, eh? I'm thinking we'll have to know some more about some of
your friends before we're done with you. And where is these same
children, then? You can tell us that anyway!"

"No," said Tim, beginning to take fright, "I can't. They'd be
afeared--dreadful--if they saw one o' your kind. I'll find my own way to
Sandle'ham if you can't tell it me," and he turned to go.

But the policeman called Simpkins, at a sign from his superior, caught
hold of him.

"Not so fast, young man, not so fast," said Boyds. "You'll have to tell
us where these there children are afore you're off."

"I can't--indeed I can't--they'd be so frightened," said Tim