XVI

Alice did not sleep very well that night. She had a stomach-ache. And she had a stomach-ache because she had eaten two chocolates and a caramel and a horehound drop that Robert had given her out of a bag of candy that he had found by the road-side. Robert had offered Emma some too, but she had very sensibly refused it. Candy doesn’t agree with ducks.

So, as she couldn’t sleep, no matter how hard she tried, Alice got up before daylight and went out into the woods. The cool morning air made her feel sleepy, so she thought she would try again, and, having found a sheltered spot under a big pine, she tucked her head under her wing and dozed off. When she woke up, the sun was shining and the swallows were pouring like smoke out of the chimney in search of their breakfast.

Alice called to one of them and asked him about the burglars.

“They’ve been here about a month,” said the swallow. “They go out every night and rob the farmers’ houses, and then come back and sleep all day. They usually get back about this time every morning, so you animals had better look out.”

“I don’t think they will be back this morning,” said Alice. “But tell me, did they dig up the gold we found when we were here before?”

“No,” said the swallow. “They haven’t touched it.”

“Thank you,” said Alice. “That was all I wanted to know. Good-morning.” And she hurried back to tell the others that their treasure was safe.

But when she got back to the house, she stopped in amazement on the threshold. Her sister, Emma, was waddling importantly up and down with a bracelet set with big blue sapphires round her neck and a beautiful bag, all made of little links of pure gold, tucked under her wing. The four mice, with diamond rings round their necks like collars, were playing tag in a corner, and they sparkled and glittered like little streaks of fire as they chased one another. Henrietta looked very queenly with a hoop of rubies set on her head like a crown. She was bending down and trying to see herself in the little mirror set in the cover of a powder box, which she had snapped open with her claw. But Mrs. Wiggins was most gorgeous of all. There was a rope of pearls about her big neck, and a platinum wrist watch on her left ankle. She had hung an emerald necklace on each horn, and they hung down and bobbed and dangled beside her broad, pleasant face like enormous ear-rings. And she had powdered her wide, black nose until it was as white as flour. She looked truly reckless.

Alice, after a moment’s astonishment, entered into the fun. She found a thin, gold chain with a diamond and pearl locket which she hung round her neck, and then she went over to where Henrietta was still admiring herself in the powder-box cover, and asked if she might have some powder for her bill.

“There isn’t any left,” said Henrietta.

“I’m sorry, Alice,” said Mrs. Wiggins. “I’m afraid I used it all up. There’s so much of me to powder, you know. I do wish I could see myself. Though I must say I don’t believe I have improved my appearance much. I must look like an overdressed washerwoman. You can’t do much with a cow,” she added sadly.

Then Robert and Jack played a game. Each took six bracelets, and Mrs. Wiggins stood perfectly still, and they tried to throw them over her horns. But they weren’t very good at it, and after Mrs. Wiggins had been hit on her nose several times, she said she guessed she wouldn’t play any more, as they were knocking all the powder off.

Then Henrietta said: “What are we going to do with all this jewellery?”

“We ought to give it back to the people it was stolen from,” said Hank.

“All very fine,” said Henrietta. “But how do you propose to do that?”

Hank said he didn’t exactly know. So they talked it over for a while and at last hit upon a plan. And after breakfast they loaded all the stolen things into the carriage and started out for the nearest farm-house.

When they got there, there was nobody in sight, but Jack and Robert barked until at last a woman came to the door to see what was the matter. She was a large, fat woman, and looked quite a lot like Mrs. Wiggins. She was wiping soap-suds off her hands on her apron, because she had been washing her husband’s other shirt.

“Land sakes alive!” she exclaimed when she saw the animals all grouped about the carriage. “What is this, a circus?”

It took quite a long time for the dogs to make her understand what they wanted her to do. They ran back and forth between her and the carriage, and at last she followed them. When she saw the heap of money and jewellery she gave a loud cry and seized the hoop of rubies that Henrietta had worn on her head.

“Land of love!” she cried. “Here’s the ring that Cousin Eunice gave me last Christmas, the one the burglars stole when they broke into our house a month ago. And here’s the emerald necklace I won as a prize at the pedro club last winter. And here’s Hiram’s gold cigarette case.”

She ran to the corner of the house. “Hiram! Hiram!” she called. “Come here this minute.”

So pretty soon Hiram, her husband, came from where he had been resting, up in the hay loft. And he found twenty dollars, beside the cigarette case, that the burglars had taken from him.

“Now, how do you suppose these animals got these things?” he said. “Do you suppose they found the place where the burglars hid them?”

“I don’t know about that,” said his wife. “But I do know that they brought them here so we could pick out what belonged to us. Such good, clever animals! I’m going to kiss every one of you!” Which she did, even the mice, who were scared to death. She looked very funny after she had kissed Mrs. Wiggins, because a lot of the powder came off on her face.

“Now,” she said, “I’m going to go over to Aunt Etta’s with these animals, because I saw her gold soup tureen among those things.” And she climbed in the phaeton and they started off, while Hiram went back to do some more resting in the hay loft.

Aunt Etta was an educated woman. Every evening she sat on the porch and read the newspaper until it got so dark she couldn’t see, and then she went in and lighted the lamp and finished reading it.

So when she had taken her soup tureen and one or two other things that the burglars had stolen, she said: “I know who these animals are. I saw a piece in the paper about them only last week. They’re migrating. They came from way up north and went to Florida for the winter. They’re very clever animals indeed. I expect they’re on their way home now, as it’s spring.”

“Well,” said her niece, “they won’t get home until fall at this rate. They’ll have to visit about a hundred farms to get all this stuff back to the people it belongs to. It’s too bad they can’t find a quicker way.”

“A lot of the things have been advertised for in the paper,” said Aunt Etta. “How would it be if we put an advertisement in, saying that all the things were here and the people could come here and get them? Then the animals wouldn’t have to traipse all over the country, and they could go on home in a day or two.”

The niece thought this was a good idea, and the animals looked at one another and nodded, and so Robert barked very loud to show that they thought it a good idea too. Then Aunt Etta got up. “I’ll go in and telephone the newspaper office right away,” she said, “and have the advertisement put in to-night. And then we’ll give these animals something to eat and a place to be comfortable. They must be tired, having come such a long way.”

So she telephoned the newspaper office, and then she went out in the barn and got some oats for Hank, and she showed Alice and Emma where the duck pond was, and introduced them to her own ducks, and she found two bones for the dogs, and a piece of cheese for the mice, and a saucer of cream for Jinx, and she cooked up some corn-meal mush for Charles and Henrietta, and led Mrs. Wiggins out into the pasture, where there was a very superior quality of grass. If she had noticed Mr. and Mrs. Webb she would probably have tried to catch some flies for them, she was such a kind and generous old lady, and so grateful for the return of her gold soup tureen.

Then, when the animals had all been given the things they liked best to eat, she sat down on the porch and told her niece everything she had read in the paper for the last six weeks.