"Oh, that's all right," said Christian. "No one knows of that."
She started up, although she felt very faint and giddy. She began to feel under her dress. The next minute she uttered a cry.
"Oh, Rosy, it's gone! It's gone altogether. See! the string is cut," she added, lifting her skirt. "And I had two shillings in my upper pocket, and that is gone too. All our money, Rosy—it's all gone."
"Then I understand," said Rosy briskly. "It's bad, but it might be worse. We'll go straight home. We have been robbed. I don't know how they did it, but they have done it. We'll go straight home, and at once."
She had scarcely uttered the words before a good-natured-looking man of the working-class, but with a very different expression from that of the so-called respectable man, came towards them. He was holding a bulldog in leash; and the bulldog, suddenly catching sight of the children, strained to get near them and began to bark loudly.
"Hold that noise, Tiger," said the man; and then he came to the children and looked at them.
Notwithstanding their torn and draggled and tired appearance, neither Christian nor Rose looked like ordinary tramps. The man continued to gaze at them attentively.
"However did you get here?" he said.
"Please, sir," said Rose, "will you be kind to us? We are two most unhappy girls. We ran away from home yesterday, both of us—me from a very humble home, and Miss Christian Mitford from her grand one. We don't pretend that we are not the very worst young girls in the world, but we're that sorry, and we want to get back home again. We're so sorry that we can't even speak of it."
"And we've been robbed," said Christian. "I had over seven pounds when I left home, and it is gone. A man took it, I think, in an eating-house."