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Dicky, and Oswald said:
"Oh yes, if you like. But you'll see we sha'n't be allowed to keep it."
"You talk as if he was rabbits or white rats," said Dora, "and he's not—he's a little man, he is."
"All right, he's no rabbit, but a man. Come on and get some grub, Dora," rejoined the kind-hearted Oswald, and Dora did, with Oswald and the other boys. Only Noël stayed with Alice. He really seemed to like the baby. When I looked back he was standing on his head to amuse it, but the baby did not seem to like him any better whichever end of him was up.
Dora went back to the shepherd's house on wheels directly she had had her dinner. Mrs. Pettigrew was very cross about her not being in to it, but she had kept her some mutton hot all the same. She is a decent sort. And there were stewed prunes. We had some to keep Dora company. Then we boys went fishing again in the moat, but we caught nothing.
Just before tea-time we all went back to the hut, and before we got half across the last field we could hear the howling of the Secret.
"Poor little beggar," said Oswald, with manly tenderness. "They must be sticking pins in it."
We found the girls and Noël looking quite pale and breathless. Daisy was walking up and down with the Secret in her arms. It looked like Alice in Wonderland nursing the baby that turned into a pig. Oswald said so, and added that its screams were like it too.
"What on earth is the matter with it?" he said.
"I don't know," said Alice. "Daisy's tired, and Dora and I are quite worn out. He's been crying for hours and hours. You take him a bit."
"Not me," replied Oswald, firmly, withdrawing a pace from the Secret.
Dora was fumbling with her waistband in the furthest corner of the hut.
"I think he's cold," she said. "I thought I'd take off my flannelette petticoat, only the horrid strings got into a hard knot. Here, Oswald, let's have your knife."
With the word she plunged her hand into Oswald's jacket pocket, and next moment she was rubbing her hand like mad on her dress, and screaming almost as loud as the Baby. Then she began to laugh and to cry at the same time. This is called hysterics.
Oswald was sorry, but he was annoyed too. He had forgotten that his pocket was half full of the meal-worms the miller had kindly given him. And, anyway, Dora ought to have known that a man always carries his knife in his trousers pocket and not in his jacket one.
Alice and Daisy rushed to Dora. She had thrown herself down on the pile of sacks in the corner. The titled infant delayed its screams for a moment to listen to Dora's, but almost at once it went on again.
"Oh, get some water!" said Alice. "Daisy, run!"
The White Mouse, ever docile and obedient, shoved the baby into the arms of the nearest person, who had to take it or it would have fallen a wreck to the ground. This nearest person was Oswald. He tried to pass it on to the others, but they wouldn't. Noël would have, but he was busy kissing Dora and begging her not to.
So our hero, for such I may perhaps term him, found himself the degraded nursemaid of a small but furious kid.
He was afraid to lay it down, for fear in its rage it should beat its brains out against the hard earth, and he did not wish, however innocently, to be the cause of its hurting itself at all. So he walked earnestly up and down with it, thumping it unceasingly on the back, while the others attended to Dora, who presently ceased to yell.
Suddenly it struck Oswald that the High-born also had ceased to yell. He looked at it, and could hardly believe the glad tidings of his faithful eyes. With bated breath he hastened back to the sheep-house.
The others turned on him, full of reproaches about the meal-worms and Dora, but he answered without anger.
"Shut up," he said, in a whisper of imperial command. "Can't you see it's gone to sleep?"
As exhausted as if they had all taken part in all the events of a very long Athletic Sports, the youthful Bastables and their friends dragged their weary limbs back across the fields. Oswald was compelled to go on holding the titled infant, for fear it should wake up if it changed hands, and begin to yell again. Dora's flannelette petticoat had been got off somehow—how I do not seek to inquire—and the Secret was covered with it. The others surrounded Oswald as much as possible, with a view to concealment if we met Mrs. Pettigrew. But the coast was clear. Oswald took the Secret up into his bedroom. Mrs. Pettigrew doesn't come there much; it's too many stairs.
With breathless precaution Oswald laid it down on his bed. It sighed, but did not wake. Then we took it in turns to sit by it and see that it did not get up and fling itself out of bed, which, in one of its furious fits, it would just as soon have done as not.
We expected Albert's uncle every minute.
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 Noël 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 horseman.
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 any one so pleased as the distracted horseman.
When we were asked we explained about having thought the Baby was the prey of gypsies, 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