"It was a shell," he said slowly, "a blue and bwown shell. Nobody was looking and I took it home."
He confessed calmly and without shame, and his sister said—
"The guardian was cleaning the cases. I think they trusted us, Cousin Antony, we were alone here, and it makes it much worse. When we got home Gardiner showed it to me, and we have had to wait a week to come back and restore it."
"I westored it," repeated the boy, "Bella made me."
With his diminutive hand he made a shell and discoursed regretfully—
"It was a perfectly lovely shell. It's over there in its place. Bella made me put it back again."
"The worst of it is," said the sister, "that he doesn't seem to care. He doesn't mind being a thief."
"Well," laughed Antony, "don't you trouble about it, Bella honey, you have been a policeman and a judge and a benefactor all in one, and you have brought the booty back. Come," said Fairfax, "there's the man that shuts us out and the shells in, and we must go." And they were all three at the park gate in the early twilight before the children asked him—
"Cousin Antony, where have you been all these days?"