I was roused up by my daughter Penelope running out at me as if the house was on fire.  What do you think she wanted?  She wanted to have the three Indian jugglers instantly taken up; for this reason, namely, that they knew who was coming from London to visit us, and that they meant some mischief to Mr. Franklin Blake.

Mr. Franklin’s name roused me.  I opened my eyes, and made my girl explain herself.

It appeared that Penelope had just come from our lodge, where she had been having a gossip with the lodge-keeper’s daughter.  The two girls had seen the Indians pass out, after I had warned them off, followed by their little boy.  Taking it into their heads that the boy was ill-used by the foreigners—­for no reason that I could discover, except that he was pretty and delicate-looking—­the two girls had stolen along the inner side of the hedge between us and the road, and had watched the proceedings of the foreigners on the outer side.  Those proceedings resulted in the performance of the following extraordinary tricks.

They first looked up the road, and down the road, and made sure that they were alone.  Then they all three faced about, and stared hard in the direction of our house.  Then they jabbered and disputed in their own language, and looked at each other like men in doubt.  Then they all turned to their little English boy, as if they expected him to help them.  And then the chief Indian, who spoke English, said to the boy, “Hold out your hand.”

On hearing those dreadful words, my daughter Penelope said she didn’t know what prevented her heart from flying straight out of her.  I thought privately that it might have been her stays.  All I said, however, was, “You make my flesh creep.” (Nota bene:  Women like these little compliments.)

Well, when the Indian said, “Hold out your hand,” the boy shrunk back, and shook his head, and said he didn’t like it.  The Indian, thereupon, asked him (not at all unkindly), whether he would like to be sent back to London, and left where they had found him, sleeping in an empty basket in a market—­a hungry, ragged, and forsaken little boy.  This, it seems, ended the difficulty.  The little chap unwillingly held out his hand.  Upon that, the Indian took a bottle from his bosom, and poured out of it some black stuff, like ink, into the palm of the boy’s hand.  The Indian—­first touching the boy’s head, and making signs over it in the air—­then said, “Look.”  The boy became quite stiff, and stood like a statue, looking into the ink in the hollow of his hand.

(So far, it seemed to me to be juggling, accompanied by a foolish waste of ink.  I was beginning to feel sleepy again, when Penelope’s next words stirred me up.)

The Indians looked up the road and down the road once more—­and then the chief Indian said these words to the boy; “See the English gentleman from foreign parts.”

The boy said, “I see him.”