“I believe in money-making,” asserted Willie. “Some day I’m going to start and make a big lot of it.”
“Good luck to you,” laughed Colin. “You’re thinking of it early.”
“A man has to start young,” answered Willie, as he strode off with his fishing line. He would have dearly loved to have a game of chasings with the two little boys and Doris, but just on the first meeting he wanted to appear dignified.
“He’s a queer little chap,” laughed Colin to Mollie.
“He thinks he’s a man when he talks like that,” said Mollie, hastily. “He’s a real nice little boy when he’s natural.”
Meanwhile the two little boys were becoming unmanageable. They would race backwards and forwards over the bridge, like two young horses, and up and down the steep banks of the river, until they became more daring, and started to jump from one stone to another across the water.
“Come out at once, you young rascals!” commanded Colin, “and don’t attempt to go in there again.”
So for a time there was peace while they played at making houses with sticks with Doris and Baby. Then Mollie looked up and saw a sight that made her blood run cold, for, perched high on a tree overhanging the deepest part of the river, were the twins far out on a slender branch that swayed with their weight. One false move, and they would be dashed into the gurgling water that lapped round the cruel sharp stones just beneath them. Colin saw them, too, and his face blanched.
“Not a word, Mollie,” he gasped. “Go and talk to Meta. Talk for all you’re worth, and don’t let her see them, whatever you do.”
Mollie never quite knew how she reached Meta, and what she talked about to make her laugh so; but she caught hold of the invalid’s chair and wheeled it away down the road and around the bend, out of sight of the fatal tree, after she had whispered to Edith and Eileen to go to Colin.