"At your service, madam," said he in very good English.
Nora lifted her great arms.
"And he does speak English! Who knows but he understood all I said, and what the parrot said too. Poll, you go into your cage! 'At your service, madam!' And did you hear it, Lucy? No errand-boy ever spoke in the loikes o' that before! I'd think h'd been brought up among the quality. It maybe he's a Fairy Shoemaker, spaking the queen's court-language, and no errand-boy at all!"
A bell sounded up-stairs, and the two children ran back.
"Oh, mother, never was there a boy like that!" said Charlie.
"Well," said Mrs. Van Buren, "you shall tell your father how you found little Sky-High—it will be a pretty after-supper story. I want you to think kindly of him, for if he does well he is to stay with us a year."
The children found their father in the dining-room; and as they kissed him they both cried, "Oh, oh!"
"What is it now?" asked Mr. Van Buren. "What has happened to-day?"
"Wait until after supper," said Mrs. Van Buren; "then they shall tell you of a curious event in the kitchen. There really is something to tell," she added, smiling.