for you not to know it. Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis
folly to find a burglar, especially as he would be armed to the teeth as
likely as not. However, there is not much worth being a burglar about,
in houses where the motto is plain living and high thinking, and there
never was anyone in the cupboards or under the beds.

Then we put out all the lights very carefully in
case of fire--all except Noel's. He does not like the dark. He says
there are things in it that go away when you light a candle, and however
much you talk reason and science to him, it makes no difference at all.

Then we got into our pyjamas. It was Oswald who asked father to let us
have pyjamas instead of nightgowns; they are so convenient for dressing
up when you wish to act clowns, or West Indian planters, or any
loose-clothed characters. Then we got into bed, and then we got into
sleep.

Little did the unconscious sleepers reck of the strange destiny that was
advancing on them by leaps and bounds through the silent watches of the
night.

Although we were asleep, the rain went on raining just the same, and the
wind blowing across the marsh with the fury of a maniac who has been
transformed into a blacksmith's bellows. And through the night, and the
wind, and the rain, our dreadful destiny drew nearer and nearer. I wish
this to sound as if something was going to happen, and I hope it does. I
hope the reader's heart is now standing still with apprehensionness on
our account, but I do not want it to stop altogether, so I will tell you
that we were not all going to be murdered in our beds, or pass
peacefully away in our sleeps with angel-like smiles on our young and
beautiful faces. Not at all. What really happened was this. Some time
must have elapsed between our closing our eyes in serene slumber and the
following narrative:

Oswald was awakened by Dicky thumping him hard in the back, and saying
in accents of terror--at least, he says not, but Oswald knows what they
sounded like:

'What's that?'

Oswald reared up on his elbow and listened, but there was nothing to
listen to except Dicky breathing like a grampus, and the giggle-guggle
of the rain-water overflowing from the tub under the window.

'What's what?' said Oswald.

He did not speak furiously, as many elder brothers would have done when
suddenly awakened by thumps.

'_That!_' said Dicky. 'There it is again!'

And this time, certainly, there it was, and it sounded like somebody
ha