But Gwendolyn fell back, taking up a position beside the little old gentleman. That Bird again! And it was evident that the Policeman thought well of him!
Pity swiftly merged into suspicion.
"I s'pose you mean the Bird that tells people things," she ventured—to be sure that she was not misjudging him.
He wiped his black eye on a coat-tail. "Aye," he answered. "That's the one. And, oh, but he could tell you things!"
Gwendolyn considered the statement. At last, "He's a tattletale!" she charged, and felt her cheeks crimson with sudden anger.
He nodded—so vigorously that some of his tears splashed over the rim of his cap. "That's why the Police can't get along without him," he declared. "And, oh, here I've gone and lost him! And They'll put me off the Force!" (Bump! bump! bump!)
"They?" she questioned. "Do you mean the soda-water They?"
"And They know so much," explained the little old gentleman, "because the Bird tells 'em."
"He tells 'em everything," grumbled the Officer. "They send him around the whole country hunting gossip—when he ought to be working exclusively in the interest of Law and Order."
Law and Order—Gwendolyn wondered who these two were.