ould see the deep
dejection of their friend.

"There's not really any reason for him to be frightened. He was never
in the wood at all; and he never touched the pheasant," said the Terror.

"What does that matter? He _will_ be frightened out of his life; he's
so young," cried Erebus in a tone of acute distress, gazing after their
receding friend with very anxious eyes. "He's not like us; he won't
cheek the keeper all the way like we should."

"Oh, Wiggins has plenty of pluck," said the Terror in a reassuring tone.

"But he won't understand he's all right. He's only ten. And there's
no saying how that beastly foreigner who shoots nightingales will bully
him," cried Erebus with unabated anxiety.

This was her womanly irrational conception of a Pomeranian Briton.

"Well, the sooner we go and fetch his father the sooner he'll be out of
it," said the Terror, making as if to mount his bicycle.

"No, no! That won't do at all!" cried Erebus fiercely. "We've got to
rescue him now--at once. We got him into the mess; and we've got to
get him out of it. You've got to find a way."

"It's all very well," said the Terror, frowning deeply; and he took off
his cap to wrestle more manfully with the problem.

Erebus faced him, frowning even more deeply.

Never had the Twins been so hopelessly at a loss.

Then the Terror said in his gloomiest tone: "I can't see what we can
do."

"Oh, I'm going to get him out of it somehow!" cried Erebus in a furious
desperation.

With that she mounted her bicycle and rode swiftly up the drive.

The Terror mounted, started after her, and stopped at the end of fifty
yards. It had occurred to him that, after all, he was the only poacher
of the three, the only one in real danger. As he leaned on his
machine, watching his vanishing sister, he ground his teeth. For all
his natural serenity, inaction was in the highest degree repugnant to
him.

Erebus reached Great Deeping Court but a few minutes after Wiggins and
the keeper. She was about to ride on round the house, thinking that
the keeper would, as befitted his station, enter it by the back door,
when she saw Wiggins' bicycle standing against one of the pillars of
the great porch. In a natural elation at having captured a poacher,
and eager to display his prize without delay, the keeper had gone
straight into the great hall.

Erebus dismounted and stood considering for perhaps half a minute; then
she moved Wiggins' bicycle so