nd thorn-bundles, and had trimmed up the hedges where the blackberries
were setting.

'It can't be time for the gipsies to come along,' said Una. 'Why, it was
summer only the other day!'

'There's smoke in Low Shaw!' said Dan, sniffing. 'Let's make sure!'

They crossed the fields towards the thin line of blue smoke that leaned
above the hollow of Low Shaw which lies beside the King's Hill road.
It used to be an old quarry till somebody planted it, and you can look
straight down into it from the edge of Banky Meadow.

'I thought so,' Dan whispered, as they came up to the fence at the edge
of the larches. A gipsy-van--not the show-man's sort, but the old black
kind, with little windows high up and a baby-gate across the door--was
getting ready to leave. A man was harnessing the horses; an old woman
crouched over the ashes of a fire made out of broken fence-rails; and a
girl sat on the van-steps singing to a baby on her lap. A wise-looking,
thin dog snuffed at a patch of fur on the ground till the old woman put
it carefully in the middle of the fire. The girl reached back inside the
van and tossed her a paper parcel. This was laid on the fire too, and
they smelt singed feathers.

'Chicken feathers!' said Dan. 'I wonder if they are old Hobden's.'

Una sneezed. The dog growled and crawled to the girl's feet, the old
woman fanned the fire with her hat, while the man led the horses up to
the shafts, They all moved as quickly and quietly as snakes over moss.

'Ah!' said the girl. 'I'll teach you!' She beat the dog, who seemed to
expect it.

'Don't do that,' Una called down. 'It wasn't his fault.'

'How do you know what I'm beating him for?' she answered.

'For not seeing us,' said Dan. 'He was standing right in the smoke, and
the wind was wrong for his nose, anyhow.'

The girl stopped beating the dog, and the old woman fanned faster than
ever.

'You've fanned some of your feathers out of the fire,' said Una.
'There's a tail-feather by that chestnut-tot.'

'What of it?' said the old woman, as she grabbed it.

'Oh, nothing!' said Dan. 'Only I've heard say that tail-feathers are as
bad as the whole bird, sometimes.'

That was a saying of Hobden's about pheasants. Old Hobden always burned
all feather and fur before he sat down to eat.

'Come on, mother,' the man whispered. The old woman climbed into the
van, and the horses drew it out of the deep-rutted shaw on to the hard
road.

The girl waved her hands and sh