corner in front of them; and when they turned the corner too, they found

it quiet there, but he saw nothing of the lady.

“Now you lead me,” he said, taking her hand, “and I'll take care of you.”

The girl withdrew her hand, but only to dry her eyes with her frock, for

the other had enough to do with her broom. She put it in his again, and

led him, turning after turning, until they stopped at a cellar-door in a

very dirty lane. There she knocked.

“I shouldn't like to live here,” said Diamond.

“Oh, yes, you would, if you had nowhere else to go to,” answered the

girl. “I only wish we may get in.”

“I don't want to go in,” said Diamond.

“Where do you mean to go, then?”

“Home to my home.”

“Where's that?”

“I don't exactly know.”

“Then you're worse off than I am.”

“Oh no, for North Wind--” began Diamond, and stopped, he hardly knew

why.

“What?” said the girl, as she held her ear to the door listening.

But Diamond did not reply. Neither did old Sal.

“I told you so,” said the girl. “She is wide awake hearkening. But we

don't get in.”

“What will you do, then?” asked Diamond.

“Move on,” she answered.

“Where?”

“Oh, anywheres. Bless you, I'm used to it.”

“Hadn't you better come home with me, then?”

“That's a good joke, when you don't know where it is. Come on.”

“But where?”

“Oh, nowheres in particular. Come on.”

Diamond obeyed. The wind had now fallen considerably. They wandered on

and on, turning in this direction and that, without any reason for one

way more than another, until they had got out of the thick of the houses

into a waste kind of place. By this time they were both very tired.

Diamond felt a good deal inclined to cry, and thought he had been very

silly to get down from the back of North Wind; not that he would have

minded it if he had done the girl any good; but he thought he had been

of no use to her. He was mistaken there, for she was far happier for

having Diamond with her than if she had been wandering about alone. She

did not seem so tired as he was.

“Do let us rest a bit,” said Diamond.

“Let's see,” she answered. “There's something like a railway there.

Perhaps there's an open arch.”

They went towards it and found one, and, better still, there was an

empty barrel lying under the arch.

“Hallo! here we are!” said the girl. “A barrel's the jolliest bed

going--on the tramp, I mean. We'll have forty winks, and then go on

again.”

She crept in, and Diamond crept in beside her. They put their arms round

each other, and when he began to grow warm, Diamond's courage began to

come back.

“This is jolly!” he said. “I'm so glad!”

“I don't think so much of it,” said the girl. “I'm used to it, I

suppose. But I can't think how a kid like you comes to be out all alone

this time o' night.”

She called him a kid, but she was not really a month older than he was;

only she had had to work for her bread, and that so soon makes people

older.

“But I shouldn't have been out so late if I hadn't got down to help

you,” said Diamond. “North Wind is gone home long ago.”

“I think you must ha' got out o' one o' them Hidget Asylms,” said the

girl. “You said something about the north wind afore that I couldn't get

the rights of.”

So now, for the sake of his character, Diamond had to tell her the whole

story.

She did not believe a word of it. She said he wasn't such a flat as to

believe all that bosh. But as she spoke there came a great blast of wind

through the arch, and set the barrel rolling. So they made haste to get

out of it, for they had no notion of being rolled over and over as if

they had been packed tight and wouldn't hurt, like a barrel of herrings.

“I thought we should have had a sleep,” said Diamond; “but I can't say

I'm very sleepy after all. Come, let's go on again.”

They wandered on and on, sometimes sitting on a door-step, but always

turning into lanes or fields when they had a chance.

They found themselves at last on a rising ground that sloped rather

steeply on the other side. It was a waste kind of spot below, bounded by

an irregular wall, with a few doors in it. Outside lay broken things in

general, from garden rollers to flower-pots and wine-bottles. But the

moment they reached the brow of the rising ground, a gust of wind

seized them and blew them down hill as fast as they could run. Nor could

Diamond stop before he went bang against one of the doors in the wall.

To his dismay it burst open. When they came to themselves they peeped

in. It was the back door of a garden.

“Ah, ah!” cried Diamond, after staring for a few moments, “I thought

so! North Wind takes nobody in! Here I am in master's garden! I tell you

what, little girl, you just bore a hole in old Sal's wall, and put your

mouth to it, and say, 'Please, North Wind, mayn't I go out with you?'

and then you'll see what'll come.”

“I daresay I shall. But I'm out in the wind too often already to want

more of it.”

“I said with the North Wind, not in it.”

“It's all one.”

“It's not all one.”

“It is all one.”

“But I know best.”

“And I know better. I'll box your ears,” said the girl.

Diamond got very angry. But he remembered that even if she did box his

ears, he musn't box hers again, for she was a girl, and all that boys

must do, if girls are rude, is to go away and leave them. So he went in

at the door.

“Good-bye, mister” said the girl.

This brought Diamond to his senses.

“I'm sorry I was cross,” he said. “Come in, and my mother will give you

some breakfast.”

“No, thank you. I must be off to my crossing. It's morning now.”

“I'm very sorry for you,” said Diamond.

“Well, it is a life to be tired of--what with old Sal, and so many holes

in my shoes.”

“I wonder you're so good. I should kill myself.”

“Oh, no, you wouldn't! When I think of it, I always want to see what's

coming next, and so I always wait till next is over. Well! I suppose

there's somebody happy somewheres. But it ain't in them carriages. Oh

my! how they do look sometimes--fit to bite your head off! Good-bye!”

She ran up the hill and disappeared behind it. Then Diamond shut the

door as he best could, and ran through the kitchen-garden to the stable.

And wasn't he glad to get into his own blessed bed again!

DIAMOND said nothing to his mother about his adventures. He had half a

notion that North Wind was a friend of his mother, and that, if she did

not know all about it, at least she did not mind his going anywhere with

the lady of the wind. At the same time he doubted whether he might not

appear to be telling stories if he told all, especially as he could

hardly believe it himself when he thought about it in the middle of the

day, although when the twilight was once half-way on to night he had no

doubt about it, at least for the first few days after he had been with

her. The girl that swept the crossing had certainly refused to believe

him. Besides, he felt sure that North Wind would tell him if he ought to

speak.

It was some time before he saw the lady of the wind again. Indeed

nothing remarkable took place in Diamond's history until the following