‘Not if I know it,’ said Diamond Jubilee, who as a town-bred boy felt terrors of the gathering dusk in the lonely wood which stirred him to unwonted resolution. ‘You’ll be giving me the slip if I let you out of my sight.’
‘Ladies and gentlemen always keep their word,’ said Emmeline, with much dignity; ‘you needn’t be afraid of Micky’s not coming back.’
‘I’m coming home along of you,’ said Diamond Jubilee firmly; ‘then you can give me something to eat. I’m about ready for it, I can tell you.’
‘You’re the most unreasonable boy I ever met,’ said Emmeline, at the end of her patience. ‘You can’t possibly come home with us. Aunt Grace would be most awfully angry. And I think it’s extremely greedy of you to want anything more to eat after what you had at the shop.’
Emmeline herself had had one tea, and was just going home to another, but that, she felt, was different.
‘I aren’t never going to stop alone in this here wood,’ repeated Diamond Jubilee doggedly.
‘I know what!’ cried Kitty. ‘Let’s hide him in the summer-house just for this evening. He’ll be quite safe from being found, for no one goes there except us, and he won’t be frightened if he can see the lights from the windows. You’ll like the summer-house, won’t you, Diamond Jubilee?’
‘Well, I don’t mind trying,’ said Diamond Jubilee not ungraciously.
And so it had to be settled, though Emmeline would have felt much easier in her mind if only he would have stayed in the Feudal Castle, half a mile away from Aunt Grace. However, there was clearly no time for further argument; as it was, they would have to put their best feet forward if they were to reach home before it was suspiciously late even for the 5.25 train. Diamond Jubilee was certainly very trying.
Her heart softened to him again when they reached their own garden, and he quite meekly consented to go into hiding in the summer-house. She had been half afraid that he might insist on coming into the house with them in search of something to eat, so it was a great relief that he suddenly became so obedient.