"I don't know. Yes, I think so."
"It's the same couple as before," said John to himself. "Now they've some object. Was they really going to take that child home, I wonder? Look here, Lily, how did they come to leave you alone at the station?"
Lily shook her head. "She wrapped me up on the seat, and told me not to stir till she come back. She said she wouldn't be a minute, but she was ever such a time, and Mr. and Mrs. Bland they come and took me away."
"Well—and so you're back again. How did those people get you away from the fair?"
There was a certain sternness in John's voice now.
"Was it naughty to dance under the tree?" Lily asked in rather frightened tones. "Mrs. Alfrick said I was a naughty girl 'cause I cried at all them murders, and then she sent Lizzie and me out of the theatre, and while we was waiting we heard the music and ran and danced a bit, and then Dick's wife she came out of the house and spoke to me and give me some candy, and then she got me to come along with her, and then I couldn't go back to Lizzie, and I cried ever so, and then they carried me and put me in the cart. Was I naughty, John?"
"No, dearie," the young man answered. "There was nothing to blame in you. Those that took you to the fair, it was all their doings, and no thanks to them as worse didn't come of it."
"She said you'd let me go," said Lily, with wide blue eyes fixed upon his face.
"She never said that, did she? Well, I never would have believed it of her."
His eyes fell, and his face became crimson. Lily stared at him in astonishment.