But Dina was not listening. She was thinking.
Presently she said, "That money's quite ours, isn't it, Gerry?"
"Rather!" replied Gerald with assurance. "But what have you got in your head, Dina?"
"Gerry," replied the child, "for ever so long I've had such a big want just here—" and she laid a small brown hand on her heart—"to see mother and ask and tell her all sorts of things. We've done without her too long, and things at home will be going wronger and wronger now we've fallen out with dad. She can't come to us; she isn't well enough, but, Gerry, why shouldn't—"
"Oh, I see, Twinnie!" cried Gerald. "I see! You want awfully to see mother, and so do I; and you think we had better run away."
"Yes," said Dina in a mysterious whisper, "just run away to mother."
The next morning found the twins with their plans made. Indeed they had been chattering half the night making their final arrangements. The money-box was opened, and, much to the children's delight, the contents proved to be about five pounds, in coins varying in value from a rare half-sovereign to a frequent halfpenny.
From an early tip-toe visit to Mr. Ellis's study, while the rest of the household was asleep, Gerald and Dina brought upstairs the big atlas where even small towns were easy to find, and the twins soon found on the map the place by the sea where their mother had for some time been staying. Then they put down on a slip of paper the names of all the towns in the direct line of travel between their home and the town for which they were bound.
"There," said Gerald, "that will be a guide to us. When we are able to walk, we will do so and save our money, and when we are tired, we can go by train or tramcar, if we can get one. I heard dad say the other day that it was only about a hundred and fifty miles, as the crow flies."
"It will be more for us, as we are not crows!" replied Dina.