to be a very
brave boy, and knew the policeman on that beat very well indeed. So the
policeman backed him up, and the old gentleman said he was sorry, and
offered Oswald sixpence. Oswald refused it with polite disdain, and
nothing more happened at all.

When Oswald had tried by himself and it had not come off, he said to the
others, 'We're wasting our time, not trying to rescue the old gentleman
in deadly peril. Come--buck up! Do let's do something!'

It was dinner-time, and Pincher was going round getting the bits off
the plates. There were plenty because it was cold-mutton day. And Alice
said--

'It's only fair to try Oswald's way--he has tried all the things the
others thought of. Why couldn't we rescue Lord Tottenham?'

Lord Tottenham is the old gentleman who walks over the Heath every day
in a paper collar at three o'clock--and when he gets halfway, if there
is no one about, he changes his collar and throws the dirty one into the
furze-bushes.

Dicky said, 'Lord Tottenham's all right--but where's the deadly peril?'

And we couldn't think of any. There are no highwaymen on Blackheath now,
I am sorry to say. And though Oswald said half of us could be highwaymen
and the other half rescue party, Dora kept on saying it would be wrong
to be a highwayman--and so we had to give that up.

Then Alice said, 'What about Pincher?'

And we all saw at once that it could be done.

Pincher is very well bred, and he does know one or two things, though we
never could teach him to beg. But if you tell him to hold on--he will do
it, even if you only say 'Seize him!' in a whisper.

So we arranged it all. Dora said she wouldn't play; she said she thought
it was wrong, and she knew it was silly--so we left her out, and she
went and sat in the dining-room with a goody-book, so as to be able to
say she didn't have anything to do with it, if we got into a row over
it.

Alice and H. O. were to hide in the furze-bushes just by where Lord
Tottenham changes his collar, and they were to whisper, 'Seize him!' to
Pincher; and then when Pincher had seized Lord Tottenham we were to
go and rescue him from his deadly peril. And he would say, 'How can I
reward you, my noble young preservers?' and it would be all right.

So we went up to the Heath. We were afraid of being late. Oswald told
the others what Procrastination was--so they got to the furze-bushes a
little after two o'clock, and it was rather cold. Alice and H. O. and
Pincher hid