The conversation was in French--school and village French. Her brother ignored the question with 'va te cacher!' He had no doubts himself. 'Just wait a moment while I tighten my belt,' he observed. 'You can tell it by his eyes,' he added, as Monkey urged him forward to the door. 'I know a good dreamer when I see one.' Then fate helped them. The door against their noses opened and Daddy came out, followed by his cousin. All four collided. 'Oh, is the washing-up finished?' asked Monkey innocently, quick as a flash. 'How you startled me!' exclaimed Daddy. 'You really must try to be less impetuous. You'd better ask Mother about the washing,' he repeated, 'she's in there sewing.' His thoughts, it seemed, were just a trifle confused. Plates and linen both meant washing, and sometimes hair and other stuff as well. 'There's no light, you see, yet,' whispered Jimbo. A small lamp usually hung upon the wall. Jane Anne at that moment came out carrying it and asking for a match. 'No starlight, either,' added Monkey quickly, giving her cousin a little nudge. 'It's all upwumbled, or whatever Daddy calls it.' The look he gave her might well have suppressed a grown-up person-- 'grande personne,' as Jimbo termed it, translating literally--but on Monkey it had only slight effect. Her irrepressible little spirit concealed springs few could regulate. Even avoir-dupois increased their resiliency the moment it was removed. But Jimbo checked her better than most. She did look a trifle ashamed--for a second. 'Can't you wait?' he whispered. 'Daddy'll spoil it if you begin it here. How you do fidget!' They passed all together out into the yard, the men in front, the two children just behind, walking warily. Then came the separation, yet none could say exactly how it was accomplished. For separations are curious things at the best of times, the forces that effect them as mysterious as wind that blows a pair of butterflies across a field. Something equally delicate was at work. One minute all four stood together by the fountain, and the next Daddy was walking downhill towards the carpenter's house alone, while the other three were already twenty metres up the street that led to the belt of forest. Jimbo, perhaps, was responsible for the deft manoeuvring. At any rate, he walked beside his big cousin with the air of a successful aide-de- camp. But Monkey, too, seemed flushed with victory, rolling along--her rotundity ever suggested rolling rather than the taking of actual steps--as if she led a prisoner. 'Don't bother your cousin, children,' their father's voice was heard again faintly in the distance. Then the big shoulder of La Citadelle hid him from view and hearing.