"That's 'im!" said Mrs. Stubbs, and she pointed dramatically to the life-
size head and shoulders of a burly man with a dead white rose in the
buttonhole of his coat that made you think of a curl of cold mutting fat.
Just below, in silver letters on a red cardboard ground, were the words,
"Be not afraid, it is I."

"It's ever such a fine face," said Alice faintly.

The pale-blue bow on the top of Mrs. Stubbs's fair frizzy hair quivered.
She arched her plump neck. What a neck she had! It was bright pink where
it began and then it changed to warm apricot, and that faded to the colour
of a brown egg and then to a deep creamy.

"All the same, my dear," she said surprisingly, "freedom's best!" Her
soft, fat chuckle sounded like a purr. "Freedom's best," said Mrs. Stubbs
again.

Freedom! Alice gave a loud, silly little titter. She felt awkward. Her
mind flew back to her own kitching. Ever so queer! She wanted to be back
in it again.


Chapter 1.IX.

A strange company assembled in the Burnells' washhouse after tea. Round
the table there sat a bull, a rooster, a donkey that kept forgetting it was
a donkey, a sheep and a bee. The washhouse was the perfect place for such
a meeting because they could make as much noise as they liked, and nobody
ever interrupted. It was a small tin shed standing apart from the
bungalow. Against the wall there was a deep trough and in the corner a