So they set off under the starlit sky, Baby Jane on the Bear's shoulder, and the others close round her, all practising their voices and all very merry.
It was rather undignified of the Lion to sing falsetto, but he seemed to fancy that he did it well, and so he kept it up--a shrill squeal that now and then broke down suddenly into his own deep roar.
When they were still some way from the riverside avenue they heard distant sounds of a terrible riot.
'I do hope it is not the Flanagans,' said Baby Jane.
But unfortunately it _was_ the Flanagans. The screeching and hurrooing and thwack-slamming that was going on up that tree was marvellous.
Now and then down came a shower of cocoa-nuts and little Flanagans, but the little Flanagans went scuttling up the tree again to join once more in the fray.
Baby Jane was afraid and trembling, and longed to tell the Bear to gallop away with her; but that was not what she had come out to do, so she gathered her scraps of courage and said:
'Let us sing a carol: in the story-books bad people always turn good when they hear a carol'; and she struck up in a shaking voice, 'Heav'n rest you, merry gentlemen!'
And all the animals joined in--not properly of course, but still as each kept up one note--the Lion's falsetto rising high above the rest--it made a fairly good accompaniment to Baby Jane's tune.
After the first few notes the hullaballoo up in the palm tree ceased.
'Oh,' thought Baby Jane, 'it has made them gentle, and the story-books are right--oh, I am glad!'
But at that moment a storm of cocoa-nuts came pelting down upon them, and a voice exclaimed:
'Ah, it's no manners you have at all to come disturbing a decent family at this time of the night. Go away with you!'
'They all want to thrash little Patsey at once,' shouted the Lion in Baby Jane's ear; 'that is what they usually quarrel about.'
'Oh, how cruel!' she sobbed. 'I am going up to save him.'
And before any one could stop her, she was climbing up the tree with a skill only given her by her pity for little Patsey. The Light-Horse happened to be nearest to her, and though equally unused to climbing trees, up she went in hot pursuit of Baby Jane, with all the creatures after her.
The fight that followed, words will not describe. You must imagine for yourself a combat in the branches of a palm tree between a family of ourang-outangs and a lion, a light-horse, a bear, a rabbit, a crocodile, and two little mortals. Thrice were the invaders driven down the tree, and thrice, with Baby Jane and the Light-Horse in the van, they scaled it again. But with that last attack came victory.