new that if the man paid for the rooms he must
have them to himself.

"He won't sleep in the kitchen," said Dora; "couldn't we sleep there?"

But we all said we couldn't and wouldn't.

Then Alice suddenly said--

"I know! The Mill. There are heaps and heaps of fishing-nets there, and
we could each take a blanket like Indians and creep over under cover of
the night after the Beale has gone, and get back before she comes in the
morning."

It seemed a sporting thing to do, and we agreed. Only Dora said she
thought it would be draughty.

Of course we went over to the Mill at once to lay our plans and prepare
for the silent watches of the night.

There are three stories to a windmill, besides the ground-floor. The
first floor is pretty empty; the next is nearly full of millstones and
machinery, and the one above is where the corn runs down from on to the
millstones.

We settled to let the girls have the first floor, which was covered with
heaps of nets, and we would pig in with the millstones on the floor
above.

We had just secretly got out the last of the six blankets from the house
and got it into the Mill disguised in a clothes-basket, when we heard
wheels, and there was the gentleman back again. He had only got one
portmanteau after all, and that was a very little one.

Mrs. Beale was bobbing at him in the doorway when we got up. Of course
we had told her he had rented rooms, but we had not said how many, for
fear she should ask where we were going to sleep, and we had a feeling
that but few grown-ups would like our sleeping in a mill, however much
we were living the higher life by sacrificing ourselves to get money for
Miss Sandal.

The gentleman ordered sheep's-head and trotters for dinner, and when he
found he could not have that he said--

"Gammon and spinach!"

But there was not any spinach in the village, so he had to fall back on
eggs and bacon. Mrs. Beale cooked it, and when he had fallen back on it
she washed up and went home. And we were left. We could hear the
gentleman singing to himself, something about woulding he was a bird
that he might fly to thee.

Then we got the lanterns that you take when you go "up street" on a dark
night, and we crept over to the Mill. It was much darker than we
expected.

We decided to keep our clothes on, partly for warmness and partly in
case of any sudden alarm or the fishermen wanting their nets in the
middle of the night, which sometimes happens if the t