This argument seemed to decide the criminal. Jane fetched the wash-bowl from the sink, and he spat on his hands and prepared to milk the cow. At this instant boots were heard on the stairs.
‘It’s all up,’ said the man, desperately, ‘this ‘ere’s a plant. ‘ERE’S the police.’ He made as if to open the window and leap from it.
‘It’s all right, I tell you,’ whispered Jane, in anguish. ‘I’ll say you’re a friend of mine, or the good clergyman called in, or my uncle, or ANYTHING—only do, do, do milk the cow. Oh, DON’T go—oh—oh, thank goodness it’s only the boys!’
It was; and their entrance had awakened Anthea, who, with her brothers, now crowded through the doorway. The man looked about him like a rat looks round a trap.
‘This is a friend of mine,’ said Jane; ‘he’s just called in, and he’s going to milk the cow for us. ISN’T it good and kind of him?’
She winked at the others, and though they did not understand they played up loyally.
‘How do?’ said Cyril, ‘Very glad to meet you. Don’t let us interrupt the milking.’
‘I shall ‘ave a ‘ead and a ‘arf in the morning, and no bloomin’ error,’ remarked the burglar; but he began to milk the cow.
Robert was winked at to stay and see that he did not leave off milking or try to escape, and the others went to get things to put the milk in; for it was now spurting and foaming in the wash-bowl, and the cats had ceased from mewing and were crowding round the cow, with expressions of hope and anticipation on their whiskered faces.
‘We can’t get rid of any more cats,’ said Cyril, as he and his sisters piled a tray high with saucers and soup-plates and platters and pie-dishes, ‘the police nearly got us as it was. Not the same one—a much stronger sort. He thought it really was a foundling orphan we’d got. If it hadn’t been for me throwing the two bags of cat slap in his eye and hauling Robert over a railing, and lying like mice under a laurel-bush—Well, it’s jolly lucky I’m a good shot, that’s all. He pranced off when he’d got the cat-bags off his face—thought we’d bolted. And here we are.’