CHAPTER 22: THE MOST SURPRISING ADVENTURE OF ALL
THE END



CHAPTER 1: THE AVORIES

Once upon a time there was a nice family. Its name was Avory, and it lived
in an old house in Chiswick, where the Thames is so sad on grey days and so
gay on sunny ones.

Mr.--or rather Captain--Avory was dead; he had been wounded at Spion Kop,
and died a few years after. Mrs. Avory was thirty-five, and she had four
children. The eldest was Janet, aged fourteen, and the youngest was Gregory
Bruce, aged seven. Between these came Robert Oliver, who was thirteen, and
Hester, who was nine.

They were all very fond of each other, and they rarely quarreled. (If they
had done so, I should not be telling this story. You don't catch me writing
books about people who quarrel.) They adored their mother.

The name of the Avories' house was "The Gables," which was a better name
than many houses have, because there actually were gables in its roof.
Hester, who had funny ideas, wanted to see all the people who lived in all
the houses that are called "The Gables" everywhere drawn up in a row so
that she might examine them. She used to lie awake at night and wonder how
many there would be. "I'm sure mother would be the most beautiful, anyway,"
she used to say.

History was Hester's passion. She could read history all day. Here she