CHAPTER XXIII.

FORTUNE.

Uncle William took the children straight up to London.  They spent the night at a great big hotel, and in the morning he went alone to have a long consultation with one of the best detectives in New Scotland Yard.  When he returned after this interview, Iris came to meet him with a wise look on her face.

“I know what to do,” she exclaimed.

“Well, then, my dear, it’s more than I do,” replied Uncle William.

“It’s the only thing,” repeated Iris.  “Let’s go straight home.”

“Home?  Do you mean to the Rectory?  Why, we have just come from there.”

“I don’t mean the Rectory.  I mean our real home,” answered Iris.  “Let’s get back at once to Delaney Manor.”

“I don’t see much use in that,” answered Uncle William.

“It’s all a feel I have inside of me,” replied Iris.  “Often and often I get that feel, and whenever I obey it things come right.  I have a feel now that I shall be nearer to Diana and to Orion in the old garden than anywhere else.  I always try to obey my feel.  Perhaps it’s silly, but I can’t help it.  Do you ever get that sort of feel inside of you, Uncle William?”

“If I did,” replied Uncle William, “your Aunt Jane would say that I was the silliest old man she had ever come across.”

“But you aren’t, you know.  You are a right good sort,” answered Apollo, in a patronizing tone.

“I am glad you think so, my boy,” replied Uncle William.  “Well, now,” he added, “I always did hate London, and in the middle of summer it seems to me that it is wanting in air.  I once heard a countryman say that he believed people only breathed turn about in London, and it really seems something like that this morning.  The place is so close and so used-up that there is not a breath anywhere; so, Iris, if you have got that feel, and if you will promise not to tell your Aunt Jane that that is your reason for returning to the Manor, why, we may just as well do so—­only, I suppose, the place is all shut up.”

“Fortune, at any rate, is there,” replied Iris; “and if anybody can help us to find Diana and Orion, it’s Fortune; for she had them, you know, Uncle William, from the moment the angel brought them down from heaven.  She had to do for them and nurse them, and tend them from that moment until Aunt Jane took them away.  Oh, yes!” continued Iris; “if there is a person who will help us to find them, it’s Fortune.”

“She partakes of the strange names which seem to run in your family,” answered Uncle William.  “But there, it is as good an idea as any other, and we shall at least each of us have our proper number of breaths at Delaney Manor.  That certainly is in favor of the scheme.”

Accordingly, that very afternoon, Uncle William, Iris, and Apollo took the train into Devonshire.  They arrived at the Manor in the evening.  Nobody expected them, and the place looked, to Uncle William, at least, very dull and desolate.  But when Iris saw the quaint old gateway, and when Apollo felt his feet once again upon the well-known avenue, the sadness of heart which had oppressed both children seemed to lift itself as if it had wings and fly right away.