‘I’m very tired, and so cold,’ said Dolores.
‘Yes,’ said Gillian, ‘we ought to go home now.’
Not me! not me;’ cried the other two girls; ‘Uncle Regie will take care of us.’
‘I think you must come,’ said Gillian, ‘mamma said you had better come home when I do.’
‘Yes,’ said Wilfred, ‘we don’t want a pack of girls to go and get tired.’
‘We shall go into all sorts of places not fit for you,’ said Jasper; ‘you wouldn’t come back with a whole petticoat among you.’
‘And Val would be left stodged in a ditch for a month of Sundays,’ added Wilfred.
‘I am afraid we had better part company, Gill,’ said the colonel. ‘I would take you on a little further, but this poor little Londoner won’t have a leg to stand upon by the time she gets home.’
‘More shame for her to come out to spoil our fun,’ muttered Valetta, too low for her uncle to hear.
‘Mamma will think we have gone quite far enough, thank you, uncle,’ said the sage Gillian, ‘and I think Fergus had better come too.’