so that the change was never quite right.

Oswald spoke first. 'I think we might stop people on Blackheath--with
crape masks and horse-pistols--and say "Your money or your life!
Resistance is useless, we are armed to the teeth"--like Dick Turpin and
Claude Duval. It wouldn't matter about not having horses, because
coaches have gone out too.'

Dora screwed up her nose the way she always does when she is going to
talk like the good elder sister in books, and said, 'That would be very
wrong: it's like pickpocketing or taking pennies out of Father's great-
coat when it's hanging in the hall.'

I must say I don't think she need have said that, especially before the
little ones--for it was when I was only four.

But Oswald was not going to let her see he cared, so he said--

'Oh, very well. I can think of lots of other ways. We could rescue an
old gentleman from deadly Highwaymen.'

'There aren't any,' said Dora.

'Oh, well, it's all the same--from deadly peril, then. There's plenty
of that. Then he would turn out to be the Prince of Wales, and he would
say, "My noble, my cherished preserver! Here is a million pounds a
year. Rise up, Sir Oswald Bastable."'

But the others did not seem to think so, and it was Alice's turn to say.