'To prison,' said his far-seeing brother, turning away and beginning to walk towards the bicycles. 'We can't be sure it was our balloon,' said Dicky, following. 'Pretty average,' said Oswald bitterly. 'But no one would know it was us if we held our tongues.' 'We can't hold our tongues,' Oswald said; 'if we do someone else will be blamed, as sure as fate. You didn't hear what that woman said about insurance money.' 'We might wait and see if anyone _does_ get into trouble, and _then_ come forward,' said Dicky. And Oswald owned they might do that, but his heart was full of despair and remorse. Just as they got to their bikes a man met them. 'All lost, I suppose?' he said, jerking his thumb at the blazing farmyard. 'Not all,' said Dicky; 'we saved the furniture and the wool and things----' The man looked at us, and said heavily: 'Very kind of you, but it was all insured.' 'Look here,' said Oswald earnestly, 'don't you say that to anyone else.' 'Eh?' said the man. 'If you do, they're safe to think you set fire to it yourself!' He stared, then he frowned, then he laughed, and said something about old heads on young shoulders, and went on. We went on, too, in interior gloom, that only grew gloomier as we got nearer and nearer home. We held a council that night after the little ones had gone to bed. Dora and Alice seemed to have been crying most of the day. They felt a little better when they heard that no one had been burned to death. Alice told me she had been thinking all day of large families burned to little cinders. But about telling of the fire-balloon we could not agree. Alice and Oswald thought we ought. But Dicky said 'Wait,' and Dora said 'Write to father about it.' Alice said: 'No; it doesn't make any difference about our not being sure whether our balloon _was_ the cause of destruction. I _expect_ it was, and, anyway, we ought to own up.' 'I feel so too,' said Oswald; 'but I do wish I knew how long in prison you got for it.' We went to bed without deciding anything. And very early in the morning Oswald woke, and he got up and looked out of the window, and there was a great cloud of smoke still going up from the doomed rickyard. So then he went and woke Alice, and said: 'Suppose the police have got that poor farmer locked up in a noisome cell, and all the time it's _us_.' 'That's just what _I_ feel,' said Alice. Then Oswald said, 'Get dressed.' And when she had, she came out into the road, where Oswald, pale but resolute, was already pacing with firm steps. And he said: 'Look here, let's go and tell. Let's say you and I made the balloon. The others can stop out of it if they like.' 'They won't if it's really prison,' said Alice. 'But it would be noble of us to try it on. Let's----' But we found we didn't know who to tell. 'It seems so fatal to tell the police,' said Alice; 'there's no getting out of it afterwards. Besides, he's only Jameson, and he's very stupid.'