“You’re to take the pony round again this afternoon, Wyn,” said his mother when he got back, “and don’t you be careless and drop any more letters about, anyhow.”
Florence was very much interested in the mysterious strangers in the wood, and in the lost letter. She went for a stroll with Wyn before it was time for him to fetch the pony, and they worked themselves up into a state of excitement, and a general idea that their keen observation of suspicious characters was highly to their credit. In the course of their walk they met two of the under-keepers, and Wyn stopped and asked them if they had seen anybody about. He described his man with the red beard much as if he had been a giant, and Florence chimed in with her suspicions of the dark man who had spoken to Miss Geraldine, till her description of him would have befitted the villain in a melodrama. The boy and girl succeeded in setting the young men on the look-out, and preparing discomfort for the strangers if they were seen. Florence found a chat with the young keepers a pleasant variety in her quiet life, especially when it was so justifiable, and she lingered, talking and joking, till Wyn pulled her skirts, and said Mr Edgar would be ready.
“You see what we’ll bring you, Miss,” said one of the lads as he went off.
“You ain’t men enough to get them there poachers,” said Florence.
“Ain’t we though?” cried the other youth.
“They’d best not come our way in a hurry.”
Florence laughed, and ran off after Wyn, who remarked virtuously:
“We’ve done our duty, I’m sure, in spreading about all we’ve noticed.”
“Your father knows too,” said Florrie.
“Yes,” said Wyn, with a slight suspicion that his father could have warned his own under-keepers for himself; “but father can’t be everywhere at once. They might rob Mr Edgar.”