“You thief!  You know I didn’t.  They are far too small for your big feet.  Come along—­let’s see what you’ve got upstairs.”

That hour Mrs. Harries summoned a policeman, and in due time Winnie was put in prison.

Tim and Martha did not speak to any one of this that had been done to their daughter.

“Punished must a thief be,” said Tim.  “Bad is the wench.”

“Bad is our little daughter,” answered Martha.

Sabbath morning came and she wept.

“Showing your lament you are, old fool,” cried Tim.

“For sure, no.  But the mother am I.”

Tim said:  “My inside shivers oddly.  Girl fach too young to be in jail.”

A fire was set in the preacher’s parlor and the doors of the Tabernacle were opened.  Tim, the Bible in his hands, stepped up to the pulpit, his eyes closed in prayer, and as he passed up he stumbled.

Eylwin Jones heard the noise of his fall and ran into the chapel.

“What’s the matter?” he cried.  “Comic you look on your stomach.  Great one am I for to see jokes.”

“An old rod did catch my toe,” Tim explained.

Eylwin changed the cast of his countenance.  “Awful you are,” he reproved Tim.  “Suppose that was me.  Examine you the stairs.  Now indeed forget a handkerchief have I for to wipe the flow of the nose.  Order Winnie to give me one of Enoch Harries.  Handkerchiefs white and smelly he has.”

“Ill is Winnie fach,” said Martha.

“Gone she has for brief weeks to Wales,” Tim added.

In the morning Eylwin came to the Tabernacle.

“Not healthy am I,” he said.  “Shock I had yesterday.  Fancy I do a rabbit from Wales for the goiter.”

“Tasty are rabbits,” Tim uttered.

“Clap up, indeed,” said Martha.  “Too young they are to eat and are they not breeding?”

“Rabbits very young don’t breed,” remarked Eylwin.

“They do,” Martha avowed.  “Sometimes, iss; sometimes, no.  Poison they are when they breed.”

“Not talking properly you are,” said Eylwin.  “Why for you palaver about breeding to the preacher?  Cross I will be.”

“Be you quiet now, Martha,” said Tim.  “Lock your tongue.”

“Send a letter to Winnie for a rabbit; two rabbits if she is small,” ordered Eylwin.  “And not see your faults will I.”

Tim and Martha were perplexed and communed with each other; and Tim walked to Wimbledon where he was not known and so have his errand guessed.  He bought a rabbit and carried it to the door of the minister’s house.  “A rabbit from Winnie fach in Wales,” he said.

“Eat her I will before I judge her,” replied Eylwin; and after he had eaten it he said:  “Quite fair was the animal.  Serious dirty is the capel.  As I flap my hand on the cushion Bible in my eloquence, like chimney smoke is the dust.  Clean you at once.  For are not the anniversary meetings on the sixth Sabbath?  All the rich Welsh will be there, and Enoch Harries and the wife of him.”