Twenty minutes had passed before peace was restored, and the leopard’s-bane lay drooping in the sun, the delicate gold and green heaps of it growing flatter and flatter.
‘Well, then,’ said Charles suddenly, ‘if you’re not afraid, let’s go. No one’s forbidden us to, except William.’
‘I will if you will,’ said Charlotte, turning red.
‘So will I,’ said Caroline, turning pale.
‘Rupert said it was nonsense about the leopard’s-bane when you read it this morning.’
‘That doesn’t make it nonsense,’ said Charlotte sharply.
‘But suppose you meet it?’
‘You can’t—if you keep to the road. Leopards get into trees. They never walk about in roads like elephants do. Not even when the circus man is moving. It’s serious what we’re going to do,’ said Caroline; ‘and what’ll people say about it, depends how it turns out. If we parrylise the leopard and save the village, we shall be heroines like——’
(‘And heroes,’ said Charles.)