TO INTRODUCE ORESTES


Hervey moved cautiously in along the limb to a point where he felt sure
that it would hold his weight, and as he did so it moved slowly up into
place. What the little householder thought of all this topsy-turvy
business it might be amusing to know. For surely, if the world war
changed the map of Europe, the little neighborhood of leaf and branch
where this timid denizen of the woods lived and had its being, had been
subject to jolts and changes quite as sweeping. Now and again it poked
its downy speckled head out for a kind of disinterested squint at
things, apparently unconcerned with mighty upheavals so long as its
little home was undisturbed.

Hervey Willetts straddled the branch and calculated the thickness of
it.

"You all right?" he heard Tom call from below.

"Yop," he called back; "did you see his nobs fly away? Back to the crags
for him, hey? Wait down there a few minutes, I'm going to bring a
friend."

Hervey had now a very nice little calculation to make. In the first
place he must not frighten his new acquaintance by approaching too near
again. Neither must he make any sudden and unnecessary noise or motions.
He knew that a nest of that particular sort was more than a home, it was
a comparatively safe refuge, and he knew that its occupant would not
emerge and desert it without good cause. One of those precious twenty
badges was evidence of that much knowledge.