“Don’t you know who it was?” and Eve’s voice was intense and strained.
“Not positively,” Zizi answered. “Well, he picked me up like I was a feather, and how he got out of the house I’ve no idea, but I felt a breeze of night air, and there was I by the bank of the lake, and there was he, busily engaged in tying a load of bricks to my ankles!”
“Did you scream?” asked the Professor, absorbed in the account.
“My dear man, how could I, with my mouth chock-a-block with a large and elegant bundle of gag? I was thankful that my wits were workin’, let alone my lung power! Well, he tossed me in the nasty, black lake, and that’s where he spilled the beans! For ground and lofty tumbling into lakes is my specialty. I’m the humble disciple of Miss Annette Kellerman, and not so awful humble, either! So, I held my breath under water long enough to wriggle my feet out of those ropes, the old stupid didn’t know how to tie anything but a granny slip knot! and I scrambled out, just as my windpipe was beginning to go back on me.”
“You make light of it, Zizi, but it was a narrow squeak,” said Wise, looking at her gravely.
“You bet it was! If he’d had a softer rope, I’d been done for. It was the stiffness of that rope, and—well, the stiffness of my upper lip,—that rescued your little Ziz from a watery grave, and horrid dirty old water, too!”
Wise slipped his arm round the child, and told her to go on with the story.
“Then,” she proceeded, “I squz out what wetness I could from my few scanty robes, in which I was bedecked, and I borrowed the long cloak, which friend Kidnapper had kindly wrapped me in.”
“What kind of a cloak?” asked Eve.
“Nothing very smart,” said Zizi, nonchalantly, “looked to me like an old-fashioned waterproof,—the kind they wore, before raincoats came in. Only, it wasn’t waterproof, not by several jugs full! But I wrung it out all I could, and then I tried to get in the house. But,—it was all locked up, and as it seemed a pity to disturb all you sound sleepers, I ran to the village and begged a lodging with my friend, Mr. Peterson. He and his wife were most kind, and put me in a nice dry, little bed, that had no tassels or ghosts attached to it. I sent Mr. Wise a note, as soon as I could, so he wouldn’t worry.”