sky; the air was scented with burning leaves, and cries from the
town rose up clear and hard, lingering and falling like notes of
music. Somewhere they were playing football, and the shouting was
distant and regular like the tramp of armed men. "Three" struck the
Cathedral clock, as though it were calling "Open Sesame." Other
lesser clocks repeated the challenge cry through the town. "Woppley-
-Woppley--Why!" sung the man who was selling skins down Orange
Street. The sky, turning slowly from blue to gold, shone
mysteriously through the glass of the street lamps, and the sun
began to wrap itself in tints of purple and crocus and iris.

"Woppley--Woppley--Why!" screamed the skin-man suddenly appearing at
the top of the street.

"Now 'urry, Master Jeremy," said the Jampot, "or we shall never get
'ome this night, and I might have known you'd choose the longest
walk possible. Come along, Miss Mary, now--none of that dawdling."

Jeremy, in his H.M.S. Adventure's cap and rough blue navy coat, felt
himself superior to the Jampot, so he only said, "Oh, don't bother,
Nurse," and then in the same breath, "I'll run you down the hill,
Mary," and before anyone could say a word there they were at the
bottom of Orange Street, as though they had fallen into a well. The
sun was gone, the golden horizon was gone--only the purple lights
began to gather about their feet and climb slowly the high black
houses.

Mary liked this, because she now had Jeremy to herself. She began
hurriedly, so that she should lose no time: