“Do you think I could joke upon such a subject?” said Iris.  “You say I am like a feather—­that is because I have all wasted away from—­from fretting, from—­from misery.  Yes, Fortune, they are lost, and I wish I were dead.  I feel it here so dreadfully.”  The child pressed both her hands against her heart.  “I have not been a mother,” she continued.  “Oh, Fortune! what is to be done?”

“You jest sit down on my lap and stop talking nonsense,” said Fortune.  “Why, you are trembling like an aspen.  You jest rest yourself a bit alongside o’ me.  Now then, Master Apollo, tell me the whole truth, from beginning to end.  The two children lost?  Now, I don’t believe it, and that’s a fact.”

“You’ll have to believe it, Fortune,” said Apollo, “for it’s true.  They went out one day about a month ago—­we think they must have gone to some woods not far from that horrid Rectory, but nobody seems to know for certain—­and they just never came back.  We missed them at tea-time, and we began to look for ’em, and we went on looking from that minute until now, and we have never found either of ’em.  That’s about all.  They are both quite lost.  What I think,” continued the little boy, speaking in a wise tone, “is that Diana must have met the great Diana of long ago, and gone right away with her, and perhaps Orion has been turned into one of the stars that he’s called after.  I don’t really know what else to think,” continued Apollo.

“Fudge!” said Fortune.  “Don’t you waste your time talking any more such arrant nonsense.  Now, the two of you are as cold and shivery as can be, and I doubt not, as hungry also.  Come straight away to the house.  This thing has got to be inquired into.”

“Oh, Fortune! can you do anything?” asked Iris.

“Can I do anything?” said Fortune.  “I have got to find those blessed children, or my name’s not Fortune Squeers.  Did your mother bring me all the way from America to be of no use in an emergency like the present?  You needn’t fret any more, Iris; nor you either, Apollo.  Just come right along to the house and have your cozy, warm supper, the two of you, and then let me undress you and put you into your old little beds, and I’ll sleep in the room alongside of you, and in the morning we’ll see about getting back those two children.  Lost, is it?  Not a bit of it.  They are mislaid, if you like, but lost they aint—­not while Fortune is above ground.”

Fortune’s strong words were of the greatest possible comfort to Iris.  It is true that Aunt Jane had told her somewhat the same, day by day—­Aunt Jane was also sure that the children were certain to be found—­but, as far as Iris could gather, she only spoke, and never did anything to aid their recovery; for Iris had no faith in detectives, nor secret police, nor any of the known dignitaries of the law.  But she put the greatest possible faith in the strong, cheery words of her old nurse, and she returned to the house clasping Fortune’s hand, and feeling as if the worst of her troubles were at an end.