"The safe? You mean the safe?"
"Mrs. Brace-Gideon's!" contributed Lucy.
"Oh, brother!" Julian shouted. "But I have to go home to get the paper with the combination on it. I'll hurry back—I've got my bike—and I'll meet you at your house—" Halfway through the door he turned back. "Where did you find it, though?"
When Portia told him he said, "See? What did I say?" Then he vanished.
"You come with us, Uncle Pin," Portia said. "And let's get Aunt Minnehaha, too. We should all be there together when he opens it."
Julian, on reaching home, leaped from his bike, allowing it to fall, leaped into the house, shouting the news to his mother, and attained his room without having touched the stairs; or so it seemed.
There followed a few minutes of panic because he could not remember what he had done with the slip. Collections of birds' nests and sea shells were toppled about, drawers were pulled out and their contents clawed into a muddle, the pockets of his coats and trousers were searched; and then, of course, he found the slip exactly where he had put it: in plain sight, on his worktable, with a fossil stone to hold it down.
"I'll drive you back, Julian," his mother said. "It will save time, and besides I wouldn't miss this event for anything!"
It was a peculiar gathering to assemble in anybody's bathroom: two pretty women, five biggish children, assorted; five smallish ones, boys, wearing war feathers; one elderly lady dressed in the fashion of the Gay Nineties; one elderly gentleman with a distinguished beard and clothes not much more recent. Also two dogs and one small kitten. Though the room was large, it wasn't really large enough. The Indians obligingly removed their shoes and stood in the bathtub.