Aunt Amanda did not sleep very well that night.
In the morning, after a breakfast of fried bacon, prepared by Mr. Leatherbread, the company resumed its march.
At noon, a halt was made beside a spring for rest and food, and here Mr. Leatherbread prepared a luncheon of fried bacon.
In the evening, as the travellers were plodding onward, Ketch walked for a time at the head of Aunt Amanda's mule. Aunt Amanda leaned forward and said to him:
"Ketch, are we going to have more bacon tonight?"
"No, ma'am," said he, in a low voice. "We'll have supper in High Dudgeon. My old mother's the cook there. You heard me mention her yesterday morning. I've an idea there'll be pigeon pies for supper. And mark what I'm saying to you, ma'am." His voice sank to a whisper. "If you get a pigeon pie for supper, look careful to see what's inside of it before you eat it."
"Mercy on us!" said Aunt Amanda. "Are they going to poison us?"
But Ketch slipped away in the gathering darkness, and said no more.
They had gone but a few hundred yards further, when, at the moment when the darkness of night was making ready to blot out everything, they suddenly emerged into a round grassy clearing enclosed by the forest, where the light was better, and over which a
star or two could be seen glimmering in a pale blue sky. In the midst of this clearing rose a tower.