Dreamikins' eyes were full of tears; she was clenching her hands, as she did when she was much distressed. Freda and Daffy's faces were miserable as they stood each side of her.
"It's Michael," explained Freda. "We thought we could go to see him, and even his mother can't."
Dreamikins climbed upon her uncle's knees and clasped him firmly round his neck, then, resting her tear-stained cheek against his, she went on:
"You are the only hope we have, Fibo dear, the only hope! You're grown-up, and we feel you'll help us, won't you? We really must be helped. It will all be no good if we can't get into Michael's prison. And Er, Fibo,—" here she lifted her head and gazed into his eyes gravely,—"Er has been telling me it's nuffing to get into prison, and God likes people to be visited, and God will show you how to get us in."
"Oh, Fibo, do," pleaded Freda; and Daffy came up to his chair, and took hold of one of his hands and kissed it. "Do, do, do something to help us."
"Upon my word," said Fibo, shaking his head at them, "you take my breath away. I am not the governor of the prison, or the chaplain, or a prison visitor."
"Then there is a prison visitor?" said Freda eagerly. "Why can't we be prison visitors? The Bible says we are to be."
Fibo's kind heart was touched with the children's distress. He told them to be quite quiet while he put on his thinking cap, and they watched him eagerly, and anxiously, and silently, with big eyes and open mouths.
Then at last he said:
"Well, nothing venture, nothing have! The prison chaplain is a friend of mine, and I'll write to him and ask him if he could smuggle us in one day. I doubt if he can do it—but still there's a chance; only he will say there are too many of us."