"Not enough to go running back to Rye for, anyway," her twin added ungrammatically.

"And besides," Mary went on, "we're not allowed to take money from strangers."

Miss Ballinger jumped up from her stool and raised both hands above her head.

"Brats," she stuttered. "Disgusting brats! Will you go away?"

Mary put the dog down.

"Mackie, darling," she said, "don't take any notice of her. She's rude."

"Rude!" screamed Miss Ballinger and knocked the easel over.

Dickie politely helped to set it up again, while Mary examined the daubed canvas critically. Miss Ballinger snatched it from her, broke it in half across her knee and flung the pieces away and joyfully the little dog pursued them!

"Get out of my way, both of you," she went on between clenched teeth. "Just get away before I lay my hands on you... Yes, I'm going!"

"Look," Jon whispered. "I think she's foaming at the mouth now. This is grand. I wouldn't have missed it for anything."

Dickie was speaking.

"I'm sorry you've got to go. We really are. I wanted to see how you made a picture out of all those measurings."

"Measurings? What do you mean, boy?" she asked sharply.

"Well," said Dickie innocently. "Mary and me were behind that little tiny hill over there."

"And," Mary went on, "we saw you come along that path and put your tripod thing up there and then get a tape measure and string or something and go crawling along the walls measurin' and writin' things down in a book."

Jon and Penny looked quickly and significantly at each other.

"Yes, that's right," Dickie said. "What did you do it for?"

The noise that Miss Ballinger now made cannot be described in words. Certainly she snorted, and afterwards they agreed that she laughed a sinister laugh, but she did not answer the question. Instead she turned her back on them, picked up the folding stool, put it under her arm and waddled away in the direction of Winchelsea.

"There you are," said David. "That's the end of the Morton Twins' act. You've had it! "

David got to his knees and leaned over the parapet. Instead of calling down to them, he whistled, clear and sweet, the haunting call of the peewit. "Come up here, you two, and meet some new friends," he called, and then turned back to Jon. "You don't mind, do you? I'm afraid we've rather butted in."

"Of course we don't mind," Jon said. "You staying down here?"

Before David could answer, Penny said:

"I know where I've seen that little dog. Didn't you recognize him, Jon? He's at home. At the Dolphin! He's the one I spoke to last night when we got in. I say..." and she turned on her knees to face David. "You're not, by any chance, staying at the Gay Dolphin, are you? You're not our first visitors, are you?"