"Men are about the same as any other machine, I think, you get out rather less than you put in. Breed simply means efficiency and reliability."
"Yes. By Jove, that's so. Look here, come up to my digs, will you? What! an engagement. Oh, I see. Well, ta-ta for the present."
They were quite close to the caravan, and the little man looked at Carstairs curiously as he saw where he was going. He made no comment, but turned and made his way back to the village.
The camp was quite silent, the vans were all drawn up together in the form of a square. The dogs and children all seemed to have disappeared. Carstairs went up the steps of the caravan, and knocked at the little door. He began to wonder vaguely if the gipsies had all deserted the place, till he caught sight of the crown of a hat and the muzzle of a gun on the roof of a caravan.
The door was very quietly opened by the old woman (she was in ragged male attire), and her eyes gleamed like an eagle's in the sunlight as she looked at Carstairs. She put a hand on his shoulder. "Well done, well done," she said.
He put her hand gently aside. "Where is your daughter?" he asked.
"Gone to London," she answered.
Carstairs frowned like a thunder-storm. "Confound it! She gave me this ring about two minutes ago."
The woman smiled and looked at the ring. "Yes, that's her mother's. Don't lose it."
"Yours?" he said. "What's she bolted away again for?"