"Oh yes, if you like. But you'll see we sha'n't be allowed to keep it."
"You talk as if he was rabbits or white rats," said Dora, "and he's not—he's a little man, he is."
"All right, he's no rabbit, but a man. Come on and get some grub, Dora," rejoined the kind-hearted Oswald, and Dora did, with Oswald and the other boys. Only Noël stayed with Alice. He really seemed to like the baby. When I looked back he was standing on his head to amuse it, but the baby did not seem to like him any better whichever end of him was up.
Dora went back to the shepherd's house on wheels directly she had had her dinner. Mrs. Pettigrew was very cross about her not being in to it, but she had kept her some mutton hot all the same. She is a decent sort. And there were stewed prunes. We had some to keep Dora company. Then we boys went fishing again in the moat, but we caught nothing.
Just before tea-time we all went back to the hut, and before we got half across the last field we could hear the howling of the Secret.
"Poor little beggar," said Oswald, with manly tenderness. "They must be sticking pins in it."
We found the girls and Noël looking quite pale and breathless. Daisy was walking up and down with the Secret in her arms. It looked like Alice in Wonderland nursing the baby that turned into a pig. Oswald said so, and added that its screams were like it too.
"What on earth is the matter with it?" he said.
"I don't know," said Alice. "Daisy's tired, and Dora and I are quite worn out. He's been crying for hours and hours. You take him a bit."
"Not me," replied Oswald, firmly, withdrawing a pace from the Secret.