"It wasn't a sovereign; it was a half-sovereign," corrected Floss.
"I don't under'tand how it could be a half-sovereign," said Carrots. "But I never touched nurse's drawer, nor nucken in it."
"Then where did you find the half-sovereign?" began Floss, "and why—oh, Carrots," she broke off, "I do believe that's the front door bell. It'll be mamma coming. I must run down."
"All right," called out Carrots again. "Don't be long, Floss; but please tell mamma all about it. I don't under'tand."
He gave a little sigh of perplexity, and lay down on the floor near the window, where the room was lightest, for the darkness was now beginning to creep in, and he felt very lonely.
Poor Mrs. Desart hardly knew what to think or say, when, almost before she had got into the house, she was seized upon by Maurice and Floss, each eager to tell their own story. Carrots naughty, Carrots in disgrace, was such an extraordinary idea!
"Nurse," she exclaimed, perceiving her at the end of the passage, whence she had been watching as anxiously as the children for her mistress's return, "nurse, what is the meaning of it all?"
"Indeed, ma'am," nurse was beginning, but she was interrupted. "Come in here, Lucy," said Captain Desart to his wife, opening the study door, "come in here before you go upstairs."
And Mrs. Desart did as he asked, but Floss again managed to creep in too, almost hidden in the folds of her mother's dress.
"I can't believe that Carrots is greedy, or cunning, or obstinate," said his mother, when she had heard all. "I cannot think that he understood what he was doing when he took the half-sovereign."