Part 34 (1/2)

'That's different,' he said vaguely. 'Jill's not a girl, exactly.'

'What is she, anyway?' demanded Peter.

Kit's genius was hard pressed. It was so stupid of people to take him literally. Robin saved his embarra.s.sment by suddenly rus.h.i.+ng helter-skelter into the yard, from the direction of the carriage-drive.

'He's just driven in at the lodge gates,' he panted. 'An' Jill's waiting on the front doorstep. If you don't look sharp you won't cob them in time.'

The conspirators glanced hastily at one another. 'It's your turn, Kit,'

said Wilfred.

Kit started uncomfortably. 'I don't think so,' he objected. 'I'm not in the mood, and I should make a mess of it. You go, Peter.'

'All right, I'm on,' said Peter, and he strode briskly towards the front of the house, swinging his long arms as he went.

Robin danced round the other two gleefully. 'Silly old Doctor won't marry Jill, won't marry Jill, all on a summer's morning!' he chanted in a kind of refrain he made up on the spur of the moment.

Kit turned upon him sternly. 'Chuck it, Bobbin, unless you want your head cuffed!' he commanded, and walked off before he could be provoked into carrying out his threat.

Upstairs Barbara lay on the sofa by the window and waited for the Doctor's visit. Her leg was in plaster of Paris now, and she could be lifted on to the sofa by Egbert, every morning. It was less wearisome than lying in bed all day, but even the fun of pretending she was enchanted by an evil fairy did not make up for the dulness of staying in one room all through her first holidays. To be sure, she was going to Crofts the day after to-morrow, and Auntie Anna had promised that Jean and Angela should come and see her the very next Sat.u.r.day; but that did not make up for everything, and she hoped that if her bad fairy ever bewitched her again, she would manage to do it in term-time instead of when the boys came home.

The Doctor drove up just below as she came to this conclusion, and she forgot her own enchantment in the more thrilling amus.e.m.e.nt of thinking about his.

It was rather stupid of the Doctor, she reflected, to be such a long time working out the rest of his spell. Any one who had gone round the world seven times, as easily and as cheerfully as he had, might at least take the trouble to find a princess to rescue. He must really want to go on being a beast, she decided, as she craned her neck over the window-sill and watched him dismount from his gig. The princes in the fairy tales never wanted to go on being beasts; and it was very confusing. Just then, Jill came out on the doorstep, and she patted the horse and began to talk to the Doctor. Barbara laughed softly to herself. If only the cruel giant would come along now and clap Jill into a dungeon, the Doctor could rescue her on the spot and then stand before her in his real shape.

A prince and princess, who had no giant to bring them together, did not make the right sort of fairy tale at all.

'Hullo! There _is_ the giant!' exclaimed Babs, immediately afterwards, as Peter came striding across the lawn to interrupt the conversation on the doorstep. 'He must be the giant,' she continued, watching the trio below her with great interest, 'because the Doctor is looking so angry and Jill has such a funny, frightened look on her face. Besides, Peter looks like a giant; he's so big and dangerous looking. I wonder if the Doctor will kill the giant _now_, or--oh, dear! they've both come indoors and left the giant outside. I don't think I ever heard of the prince and princess running _away_ from the giant before. I'm sure that's wrong. How Peter is grinning--just like a horrid old giant. _Coo-ey_, Peter!'

The prince and princess came into the room, talking busily.

'If you don't come to-morrow,' Dr. Hurst was saying, 'I am afraid it will have to be put off indefinitely, as I am going away for ten days. When I come back, you will have gone to Crofts, you see.'

'I will ask Auntie Anna,' answered Jill.

Barbara seized the first opportunity to interrupt them. 'What's going to happen to-morrow, Dr. Hurst?' she demanded. 'Are you going to carry off the princess at last?'

'I--I don't think so,' said Dr. Hurst, sitting down beside her.

'Why don't you?' demanded the child.

'Well,' said Dr. Hurst, smiling, 'I don't know whether the princess is ready to be carried off. Are you so anxious to get rid of her?'

Both he and Jill were used by this time to her fancy for weaving the people she liked best into a fairy tale. But Jill was not smiling so much as usual this morning.

'I don't want to be carried off by anybody, thank you, Babs,' she said demurely.

'Oh, that doesn't make any difference,' Babs a.s.sured her. 'If you're a princess, you just have to be carried off whether you like it or not.'

'Then I'll be a new kind of princess, and refuse to have anything to do with the prince when he comes. Shall I, Babs?' suggested Jill, lightly.