“He’s had everything to do with it,” said David; “but you see, we helped him first to find his jackdaw. That’s how it all began.”
“Well,” said Mr Hawthorne putting his hand on Ambrose’s shoulder, “I think it all began in another way. I hear that Dr Budge has had a good and industrious pupil while I have been away, and that has made him so willing to help you. I know now that I can trust Ambrose to do his best, even though he cannot quite learn Latin in a month.”
There was only just room in the museum for the two boys and their father and mother, but the other children stood outside peeping in at the open door, and adding remarks from time to time.
“You didn’t present mother with the key,” said Nancy, “and she hasn’t declared it open.”
“Here it is!” said David hurriedly. He pulled a large rusty key out of his pocket.
“It’s the apple-closet key really,” he said in a low tone to his mother, “this door hasn’t got one. You must just pretend to give it a sort of twist.”
The party squeezed itself into the passage again, and Mrs Hawthorne with a flourish of the big key threw open the door and exclaimed:
“I declare this museum to be open, and that it is to be henceforth known as the Mary Hawthorne Museum.”
The evening that followed the opening of the museum was counted by the children as one of the very nicest they had ever had. It was celebrated by sitting up to supper with their father and mother, and by telling and hearing all that had passed while they had been away.
“Nancy,” said Pennie to her sister when it was all over and the two little girls were in bed, “all our plans are finished; we’ve done all we can for Kettles, and the boys have opened the museum. What shall we think of next?”