"Look here, Jane," said the grown-up Lamb, putting his hands in his pockets and looking down at her, "little girls should be seen and not heard. You kids must learn not to make yourselves a nuisance. Run along home now—and perhaps, if you're good, I'll give you each a penny to-morrow."
"Look here," said Cyril, in the best "man to man" tone at his command, "where are you going, old man? You might let Bobs and me come with you—even if you don't want the girls."
This was really rather noble of Cyril, for he never did care much about being seen in public with the Lamb, who of course after sunset would be a baby again.
The "man to man" tone succeeded.
"I shall run over to Maidstone on my bike," said the new Lamb airily, fingering the little black mustache. "I can lunch at The Crown—and perhaps I'll have a pull on the river; but I can't take you all on the machine—now, can I? Run along home, like good children."
The position was desperate. Robert exchanged a despairing look with Cyril. Anthea detached a pin from her waistband, a pin whose withdrawal left a gaping chasm between skirt and bodice, and handed it furtively to Robert—with a grimace of the darkest and deepest meaning. Robert slipped away to the road. There, sure enough, stood a bicycle—a beautiful new one. Of course Robert understood at once that if the Lamb was grown up he must have a bicycle.
There, sure enough, stood a bicycle
This had always been one of Robert's own reasons for wishing to be grown-up. He hastily began to use the pin—eleven punctures in the back tyre, seven in the front. He would have made the total twenty-two but for the rustling of the yellow hazel-leaves, which warned him of the approach of the others. He hastily leaned a hand on each wheel, and was rewarded by the "whish" of the what was left of air escaping from eighteen neat pin-holes.