"I'm afraid it's time for me to be going back. Nurse said I was to be in at four. Are you going to take me, Maxwell?"
"Don't I always see you safe and sound up at the house?" Maxwell said good-humoredly, "and do you know it has struck four ten minutes ago? When you and my old woman get together to have a crack, as the saying is, you don't know how time passes. We shall have to run for it."
Milly was being rapidly covered up in a thick plaid by Mrs. Maxwell.
"There now, my dearie, good-bye till next I see you, and don't be doleful in that big house by yourself. Your uncle will soon be well, and nurse will be better able to see after you. I don't know what all those servants are after that they can't amuse you a bit."
"Nurse doesn't like me ever to go near the servants' hall," said Milly; "I promised her I wouldn't. Sarah stays in the nursery with me, but she runs away downstairs pretty often. Good-bye, Mrs. Maxwell."
It was getting dark. Maxwell soon had the child in his strong arms, and was striding along at a great pace, when passing a rather dark corner, a man suddenly sprang out of the bushes and took to his heels.
Maxwell shouted out wrathfully: "Let me see you in here again, and it will be the worse for you, you scoundrel!"
"Oh, Maxwell," cried Milly, "who is it?"
"One of them skulking poachers—they're always in here after the rabbits. If I hadn't a-had you to look after and had my thick stick I would a-been after him."
"But you wouldn't have hurt him?"