The house was still.  Wee Willie Winkie reflected for a moment on the very terrible wrath of his father, and then—­broke his arrest!  It was a crime unspeakable.  The low sun threw his shadow, very large and very black, on the trim garden-paths, as he went down to the stables and ordered his pony.  It seemed to him in the hush of the dawn that all the big world had been bidden to stand still and look at Wee Willie Winkie guilty of mutiny.  The drowsy sais gave him his mount, and, since the one great sin made all others insignificant, Wee Willie Winkie said that he was going to ride over to Coppy Sahib, and went out at a foot-pace, stepping on the soft mould of the flower-borders.

The devastating track of the pony’s feet was the last misdeed that cut him off from all sympathy of Humanity.  He turned into the road, leaned forward, and rode as fast as the pony could put foot to the ground in the direction of the river.

But the liveliest of twelve-two ponies can do little against the long canter of a Waler.  Miss Allardyce was far ahead, had passed through the crops, beyond the Police-posts, when all the guards were asleep, and her mount was scattering the pebbles of the river-bed as Wee Willie Winkie left the cantonment and British India behind him.  Bowed forward and still flogging, Wee Willie Winkie shot into Afghan territory, and could just see Miss Allardyce a black speck flickering across the stony plain.  The reason of her wandering was simple enough.  Coppy, in a tone of too-hastily-assumed authority, had told her over night that she must not ride out by the river.  And she had gone to prove her own spirit and teach Coppy a lesson.

Almost at the foot of the inhospitable hills, Wee Willie Winkie saw the Waler blunder and come down heavily.  Miss Allardyce struggled clear, but her ankle had been severely twisted, and she could not stand.  Having fully shown her spirit, she wept, and was surprised by the apparition of a white, wide-eyed child in khaki, on a nearly spent pony.

“Are you badly, badly hurted?” shouted Wee Willie Winkie, as soon as he was within range.  “You didn’t ought to be here.”

“I don’t know,” said Miss Allardyce ruefully, ignoring the reproof.  “Good gracious, child, what are you doing here?”

“You said you was going acwoss ve wiver,” panted Wee Willie Winkie, throwing himself off his pony.  “And nobody—­not even Coppy—­must go acwoss ve wiver, and I came after you ever so hard, but you wouldn’t stop, and now you’ve hurted yourself, and Coppy will be angwy wiv me, and—­I’ve bwoken my awwest!  I’ve bwoken my awwest!”

The future Colonel of the 195th sat down and sobbed.  In spite of the pain in her ankle, the girl was moved.

“Have you ridden all the way from cantonments, little man?  What for?”

“You belonged to Coppy.  Coppy told me so!” wailed Wee Willie Winkie disconsolately.  “I saw him kissing you, and he said he was fonder of you van Bell or ve Butcha or me.  And so I came.  You must get up and come back.  You didn’t ought to be here.  Vis is a bad place, and I’ve bwoken my awwest.”