At last we heard the gate, but he did not come in, so we looked out and saw that there he was talking to a distracted-looking man on a piebald horse--one of the miller's horses.
A shiver of doubt coursed through our veins. We could not remember having done anything wrong at the miller's. But you never know.
And it seemed strange his sending a man up on his own horse. But when we had looked a bit longer our fears went down and our curiosity got up. For we saw that the distracted one was a gentleman.
Presently he rode off, and Albert's uncle came in. A deputation met him at the door--all the boys and Dora, because the baby was her idea.
'We've found something,' Dora said, 'and we want to know whether we may keep it.'
The rest of us said nothing. We were not so very extra anxious to keep it after we had heard how much and how long it could howl.
Even Noel had said he had no idea a baby could yell like it. Dora said it only cried because it was sleepy, but we reflected that it would certainly be sleepy once a day, if not oftener.
'What is it?' said Albert's uncle. 'Let's see this treasure-trove.
Is it a wild beast?'
'Come and see,' said Dora, and we led him to our room.
Alice turned down the pink flannelette petticoat with silly pride, and showed the youthful heir fatly and pinkly sleeping.
'A baby!' said Albert's uncle. 'THE Baby! Oh, my cat's alive!'
That is an expression which he uses to express despair unmixed with anger.
'Where did you?-- but that doesn't matter. We'll talk of this later.'
He rushed from the room, and in a moment or two we saw him mount his bicycle and ride off.
Quite shortly he returned with the distracted horse- man.
It was HIS baby, and not titled at all. The horseman and his wife were the lodgers at the mill. The nursemaid was a girl from the village.
She SAID she only left the Baby five minutes while she went to speak to her sweetheart who was gardener at the Red House. But we knew she left it over an hour, and nearly two.
I never saw anyone so pleased as the distracted horseman.
When we were asked we explained about having thought the Baby was the prey of gipsies, and the distracted horseman stood hugging the Baby, and actually thanked us.
But when he had gone we had a brief lecture on minding our own business. But Dora still thinks she was right. As for Oswald and most of the others, they agreed that they would rather mind their own business all their lives than mind a baby for a single hour.
If you have never had to do with a baby in the frenzied throes of sleepiness you can have no idea what its screams are like.
If you have been through such a scene you will understand how we managed to bear up under having no baby to adopt.
Oswald insisted on having the whole thing written in the Golden Deed book. Of course his share could not be put in without telling about Dora's generous adopting of the forlorn infant outcast, and Oswald could not and cannot forget that he was the one who did get that baby to sleep.
What a time Mr and Mrs Distracted Horseman must have of it, though--especially now they've sacked the nursemaid.
If Oswald is ever married--I suppose he must be some day--he will have ten nurses to each baby. Eight is not enough. We know that because we tried, and the whole eight of us were not enough for the needs of that deserted infant who was not so extra high-born after all.
