"Nothing without work," was what they meant. They had been carved there by the old Dutchman who had built the farmhouse, afterwards turned into the pretty quaint "Arbitt Lodge."
"A good and true saying," added Grandpapa, and so the three children to whom he was speaking found it. For all three in their different ways worked hard and well, and when in my childhood I knew them as old people, I felt, even before I quite understood it, that "the Colonel," as he then had become, and his sweet white-haired sister deserved the love and respect they seemed everywhere to receive. And I could see that it was no common tie which bound to them their faithful servant Timothy, whose roses were the pride of all the country-side, when, after many years of separation, he came to end his life in their service, after Duke's "fighting days" were over and his widowed sister was, but for him, alone in the world.
One question may be asked. Did they ever hear of Diana again? Yes, though not till Tim had grown into a strapping young fellow, and the twins were tall and thin, and had long since left off talking of "us."
There came along the lanes one summer's day a covered van hung over at the back with baskets, such as the children well remembered. A good-humoured looking man was walking by the horse, a handsome woman was sitting by the door plaiting straw.
"Gipsies," cried the children, who were on their way to the village, and, big as they were, they were a little frightened when, with a cry, the woman jumped down and flew towards them.
"Master and missy, don't you know me? I'm Diana!" she exclaimed.
And Diana it was, though very much changed for the better. She had married one of her own tribe, but a very good specimen, and the husband and wife travelled about on their own account making their living "honestly," as she took care to tell. "For there's good and there's bad of us, and it's been my luck to get a good one. Thank God for it," she added, "for I've never forgot master and missy's pretty telling me even poor Diana might think God cared for her."
She was taken to see Grandpapa and Grandmamma of course, and they would have helped her and her husband to a settled life had they wished it. But no—gipsies they were, and gipsies they must remain. "It'd choke me to live inside four walls," said Diana, "and we must travel about so as we can see our own folk from time to time. But whenever we pass this way we'll come to see master and missy and Tim."
And so they did.