Then Dick whistled, and Edred and Elfrida withdrew themselves from their passionate caresses of the only parts of their father that they could get at, and stood upon their white-hind-cat-feet.
“The minuet,” said Edred, in a rapid whisper. Dick whistled a tune that they had never heard, but the tune was right; and now was seen the spectacle of two white cats slowly and solemnly going through the figures of that complicated dance, to the music of Dick’s clear whistling, turning, bowing, pacing with all the graces that Aunt Edith had taught them when they were Edred and Elfrida and not white cats.
When the last bow and curtsey ended the dance, the King himself shouted some word that they were sure meant, “Well done!” All the people shouted the same word, and only father and Uncle Jim shouted “Bravo!”
Then the King questioned Dick.
No answer. He laid his finger on his lips.
Then the King spoke to father, and he in turn tried questions, in English and French and then in other languages. And still Dick kept on laying his finger on his lips, and the white bear shook its head quite sadly, and the white cats purred aloud with their eyes on their father.
Richard stooped. “When your father goes out, follow him,” he whispered.
And so, when the King rose from his throne and went out, and every one else did the same, the white cats, deserting Dick, followed close on their father’s footsteps. When the King saw this, he spoke to the men about him, who were leading Richard in another direction, and presently the cats and the bear that was the Mouldiwarp, and Richard found themselves alone with Uncle Jim and the father of Elfrida on a beautiful terrace shaded by trees, and set all along its edge with wonderful trailing flowers of red and white and purple that grew out of vases of solid silver.
And now, there being none of the brown people near, Richard looked full in the eyes of the father of Edred and Elfrida, and said in a very low voice—
“I am English. I’ve come to rescue you.”