"I don't care what they do to me. It was worth it--jolly well worth it."
"That _was_ a circus, William! I saw a fine one when I was a boy too. I didn't care what I did to get to a circus."
William felt that he had found a kindred spirit.
"Did you learn dancin'?" he asked with interest.
"_No_," said Grandfather Moore emphatically.
The hall and staircase were empty as they crept cautiously in through the front-door. Mr. Brown, Mrs. Brown, Ethel and Aunt Lilian were still playing bridge in the drawing-room. Silently, on tiptoe, they crept upstairs to bed.
"I was so sorry about the circus, dear," she said to William. "It just came on an awkward day when no one could take you. There's sure to be one again soon. You shall go to that."
"Thank you, Mother," said William, his eyes fixed upon his plate.
"You didn't mind very much, did you, dear?" she continued.
"_Doesn't_ he look well this morning? I don't know _when_ I remember him looking so well. A good long night does him no end of good. I'm so glad I persuaded him to go to bed directly after tea."
William's eyes and Grandfather Moore's eyes met for a second across the table.
WILLIAM and Ginger, William's faithful friend and ally, were in a state of bankruptcy. They lacked even the paltry twopence necessary to buy sweets in these days of inflated prices, and life was unendurable. They had approached the adult members of their respective families, only to meet that callousness and indifference so characteristic of adults in their dealings with the young....
They sat in the open space of ground behind Ginger's house, and solemnly considered their assets.
_Asset_ 1.--An indiarubber ball with a hole in it, which they had offered to the boy next door for sixpence and which he had refused.
_Asset_ 2.--A pansy root surreptitiously taken from William's father's garden. They had taken this to the local nursery gardener and offered it to him for fivepence-halfpenny. They had afterwards retrieved it from the gutter whither that irascible man had flung it in indignant fury.
The twins _really_ belonged to Ginger. That is to say, they were Ginger's cousins and were paying a visit to Ginger's family. They had been there a week now, and to Ginger it had been a very long week. On their arrival, he had found to his horror that he was expected to take an interest in them, even to the extent of taking them about with him wherever he went.