of it for you,’ said the aunt. And for the first time in their lives Edward said ‘No’ to his aunt.
It was a terrible moment.
Edward, quite frenzied by his own courage, turned the glass on one object after another – the furniture grew as he looked, and when he lowered the glass the aunt was pinned fast between a monster table-leg and a great chiffonier.
‘There!’ said Edward. ‘And I shan’t let you out till you say you won’t take it to take care of either.’
‘Oh, have it your own way,’ said the aunt, faintly, and closed her eyes. When she opened them the furniture was its right size and Edward was gone. He had twinges of conscience, but the aunt never mentioned the subject again. I have reason to suppose that she supposed that she had had a fit of an unusual and alarming nature.
Next day the boys in the camp were to go back to their slums. Edward and Gustus parted on the seashore and Edward cried. He had never met a boy whom he liked as he liked Gustus. And Gustus himself was almost melted.
‘I will say for you you’re more like a man and less like a snivelling white rabbit now than what you was when I met you. Well, we ain’t done nothing to speak of with that there conjuring trick of yours, but we’ve ’ad a right good time. So long. See you ’gain some day.’
Edward hesitated, spluttered, and still weeping flung his arms round Gustus.
‘‘Ere, none o’ that,’ said Gustus, sternly. ‘If you ain’t man enough to know better, I am. Shake ’ands like a Briton; right about face – and part game.’
He suited the action to the word.
Edward went back to his aunt snivelling, defenceless but happy. He had never had a friend except Gustus, and now he had given Gustus the greatest treasure that he possessed.
For Edward was not such a white rabbit as he seemed. And in that last embrace he had managed to slip the little telescope into the pocket of the reefer coat which Gustus wore, ready for his journey.
It was the greatest treasure that Edward had, but it was also the greatest responsibility, so that while he felt the joy of self-sacrifice he also felt the rapture of relief. Life is full of such mixed moments.
And the holidays ended and Edward went back to his villa. Be sure he had given Gustus his home address, and begged him to write, but Gustus never did.
Presently Edward’s father came home from India, and they left his aunt to her villa and went to live at a jolly little house on a sloping hill at Chiselhurst, which was Edward’s father’s very own. They were not rich, and Edward could not go to a very good school, and though there was enough to eat and wear, what there was was very plain. And Edward’s father had been wounded, and somehow had not got a pension.
Now one night in the next summer Edward woke up in his bed with the feeling that there was some one in the room. And there was. A dark figure was squeezing itself through the window. Edward was far too frightened to scream. He simply lay and listened to his heart. It was like listening to a cheap American clock. The next moment a lantern flashed in his eyes and a masked face bent over him.
‘Where does your father keep his money?’ said a muffled voice.
‘In the b-b-b-b-bank,’ replied the wretched Edward, truthfully.
‘I mean what he’s got in the house.’
‘In his trousers pocket,’ said Edward, ‘only he puts it in the dressing-table drawer at night.’
‘You must go and get it,’ said the burglar, for such he plainly was.
‘Must I?’ said Edward, wondering how he could get out of betraying his father’s confidence and being branded as a criminal.
‘Yes,’ said the burglar in an awful voice, ‘get up and go.’
‘No,’ said Edward, and he was as much surprised at his courage as you are.
‘Bravo!’ said the burglar, flinging off his mask. ‘I see you aren’t such a white rabbit as what I thought you.’
‘It’s Gustus,’ said Edward. ‘Oh, Gustus, I’m so glad! Oh, Gustus, I’m so sorry! I always hoped you wouldn’t be a burglar. And now you are.’
‘I am so,’ said Gustus, with pride, ‘but,’ he added sadly, ‘this is my first burglary.’
‘Couldn’t it be the last?’ suggested Edward.
‘That,’ replied Gustus, ‘depends on you.’
‘I’ll do anything,’ said Edward, ‘anything.’
‘You see,’ said Gustus, sitting down on the edge of the bed in a confidential attitude, with the dark lantern in one hand and the mask in the other, ‘when you’re as hard up as we are, there’s not much of a living to be made honest. I’m sure I wonder we don’t all of us turn burglars, so I do. And that glass of yours – you little beggar – you did me proper – sticking of that thing in my pocket like what you did. Well, it kept us alive last winter, that’s a cert. I used to look at the victuals with it, like what I said I would. A farden’s worth o’ pease-pudden was a dinner for three when that glass was about, and a penn’orth o’ scraps turned into a big beef-steak almost. They used to wonder how I got so much for the money. But I’m always afraid o’ being found out – or of losing the blessed spy-glass – or of some one pinching it. So we got to do what I always said – make some use of it. And if I go along and nick your father’s dibs we’ll make our fortunes right away.’
‘No,’ said Edward, ‘but I’ll ask father.’
‘Rot.’ Gustus was crisp and contemptuous. ‘He’d think you was off your chump, and he’d get me lagged.’
‘It would be stealing,’ said Edward.
‘Not when you’ll pay it back.’
‘Yes, it would,’ said Edward. ‘Oh, don’t ask me – I can’t.’
‘Then I shall,’ said Gustus. ‘Where’s his room.’
‘Oh, don’t!’ said Edward. ‘I’ve got a half-sovereign of my own. I’ll give you that.’
‘Lawk!’ said Gustus. ‘Why the blue monkeys couldn’t you say so? Come on.’
He pulled Edward out of bed by the leg, hurried his clothes on anyhow, and half-dragged, half-coaxed him through the window and down by the ivy and the chicken-house roof.
They stood face to face in the sloping garden and Edward’s teeth chattered. Gustus caught him by his hand, and led him away.
At the other end of the shrubbery, where the rockery was, Gustus stooped and dragged out a big clinker – then another, and another. There was a hole like a big rabbit-hole. If Edward had really been a white rabbit it would just have fitted him.
‘I’ll go first,’ said Gustus, and went, head-foremost. ‘Come on,’ he said, hollowly, from inside. And Edward, too, went. It was dreadful crawling into that damp hole in the dark. As his head got through the hole he saw that it led to a cave, and below him stood a dark figure. The lantern was on the ground.
‘Come on,’
