[Illustration: ALICE BEAT THE DONKEY FROM THE CART. THE REST SHOUTED.] He was not hurt either--though much the motor people would have cared if he had been--and he caught up with the others at the end of the village, for the donkey's pace had been too good to last, and the triumphal progress was resumed. It was some time before we found a wood sufficiently lurking-looking for our secret purposes. There are no woods close to the village. But at last, up by Bonnington, we found one, and tying our noble steed to the sign-post that says how many miles it is to Ashford, we cast a hasty glance round, and finding no one in sight disappeared in the wood with our bundles. We went in just ordinary creatures. We came out gipsies of the deepest dye, for we had got a pennorth of walnut stain from Mr. Jameson the builder, and mixed with water--the water we had brought in a medicine-bottle--it was a prime disguise. And we knew it would wash off, unlike the Condy's fluid we once stained ourselves with during a never-to-be-forgotten game of Jungle-Book. We had put on all the glorious things we had bagged from Miss Sandal's attic treasures, but still Alice had a small bundle unopened. "What's that?" Dora asked. "I meant to keep it as a reserve force in case the fortune-telling didn't turn out all our fancy painted it," said Alice; "but I don't mind telling you now." She opened the bundle, and there was a tambourine, some black lace, a packet of cigarette papers, and our missing combs. "What ever on earth----" Dicky was beginning, but Oswald saw it all. He has a wonderfully keen nose. And he said-- "Bully for you, Alice. I wish I'd thought it myself." Alice was much pleased by this handsome speech. "Yes," she said; "perhaps really it would be best to begin with it. It would attract the public's attention, and then we could tell the fortunes. You see," she kindly explained to Dicky and H.O. and Dora, who had not seen it yet--though Noel had, almost as soon as I did--"you see, we'll all play on the combs with the veils over our faces, so that no one can see what our instruments are. Why, they might be mouth-organs for anything any one will know, or some costly instruments from the far-off East, like they play to sultans in zenanas. Let's just try a tune or two before we go on, to be sure that all the combs work right. Dora's has such big teeth, I shouldn't wonder if it wouldn't act at all." So we all papered our combs and did "Heroes," but that sounded awful. "The Girl I Left Behind Me" went better, and so did "Bonnie Dundee." But we thought "See the Conquering" or "The Death of Nelson" would be the best to begin with. It was beastly hot doing it under the veils, but when Oswald had done one tune without the veil to see how the others looked he could not help owning that the veils did give a hidden mystery that was a stranger to simple combs.