“What’s that?” asked Mrs Penhaligon, sitting erect, as her ears caught the sound of a howl, muffled but prolonged.

’Beida set her back firmly against the oven.  “Bread takes longer than cakes,” she announced, making her voice carry.  “Cakes is soonest over.  We might try the old place first with a heavy cake, if Mr Nanjivell don’t mind waitin’ for a chat, an’ will excuse the flavour whatever it turns out.”

“We’re bewitched!” cried Mrs Penhaligon starting to her feet as the wailing was renewed, with a faint tunding on the iron door.

’Beida flung it open.  “Which I hope it has been a lesson to you,” she began, thrusting herself quickly in front of the aperture, and heading off the culprit before he could clamber out and run to his mother’s lap.  “No, you don’t!  The first thing you have to do, to show you’re sorry, is to creep back all the way you can go, an’ fetch forth what you can find at the very end.”

“You won’t shut the door on me again?” pleaded ’Biades.

“That depends on how slippy you look.  I make no promises,” answered ’Beida sternly. “’Twas you that first stole Mr Nanjivell’s money, and if you ben’t doin’ it again, well I can only say as appearances be against him—­eh, ’Bert?”

“Fetch it out, you varmint!” ’Bert commanded.

“But I don’t understand a word of this!” protested the mother.  “My precious worm!  What for be you two commandin’ him to wriggle up an’ down an oven on his tender little belly like a Satan in Genesis, when all the time I thought he’d taken hisself off like a good boy, to run along an’ mess his clothes ’pon the Quay. . . .  Come ’ee forth, my cherub, an’ tell your mother what they’ve a-been doin’ to ’ee? . . .  Eh?  Why, what’s that you’ve a-got clinched in your hand?”

“Sufferin’s!” sobbed ’Biades, still shaken by an after-gust of fright.

“What?”

“Sufferin’s!” echoed ‘Beida excitedly.  “Real coined an’ golden sufferin’s!  Unclinch your hand, ‘Biades, an’ show the company!”

As the child opened his palm, Mrs Penhaligon fell back, and put out a hand against the kitchen table for support.

“The good Lord in Heaven behear us! . . .  Whose money be this, an’ where dropped from?”

“There piles of it—­” panted ’Beida.

“Lashin’s of it—­” echoed ’Bert.

“An’ it all belongs to Mr Nanjivell, that we used to call Nicky-Nan, an’ wonder if we could get a pair o’ father’s old trousers on to him with a little tact—­an’ him all the while as rich as Squire Tresawna!”

“—­Rich as Squire Tresawna an’ holy Solomon rolled into one,” corroborated ’Bert, nodding vigorously.  “Pinch it ’tween your fingers, mother, if you won’t believe.”

But to her children’s consternation Mrs Penhaligon, after a swift glance at the gold, turned about on Nicky-Nan as he backed shamefacedly to the doorway, and opened on him the vials of unintelligible fury.