Having got his hands free, Teddy stood up bravely and told the story
briefly and clearly, to the great amusement of his hearers.

'And he would never have been caught if he hadn't gone back to undo him,'
put in Nancy; 'so he oughtn't to have been punished at all.'

'What made you go back, my boy?' asked Mrs. Graham gently.

The colour rose in Teddy's cheeks, but he never hesitated to speak
the truth.

'I went back when I remembered it was wrong to have done it,' he
said simply.

'But you are not such a paragon of goodness generally,' said the
colonel. 'Wasn't it you and some others who scared our dairymaid into
fits one night last winter, by playing pranks, after dark, outside the
dairy window?'

'Yes, sir,' said Teddy humbly.

'And why didn't you run away when the old man woke?' asked Lady Helen.

'I never run away from anybody,' said Teddy, his head more erect than
ever. 'I'm a soldier's son.'

'Capital, my boy; and so your father is a soldier? What regiment?'

'He's dead, sir. May I tell you father's story?'