THE WOULDBEGOODS
Alice pointed to it, and said:
"What's that?"
"It's not a church," said Noël, "because there's no church-yard. Perhaps it's a tower of mystery that covers the entrance to a subterranean vault with treasure in it."
Dicky said, "Subterranean fiddlestick!" and "A water-works, more likely."
Alice thought perhaps it was a ruined castle, and the rest of its crumbling walls were concealed by ivy, the growth of years.
Oswald could not make his mind up what it was, so he said: "Let's go and see! We may as well go there as anywhere."
So we got down out of the church tower and dusted ourselves, and set out.
The Tower of Mystery showed quite plainly from the road, now that we knew where to look for it, because it was on the top of a hill. We began to walk. But the tower did not seem to get any nearer. And it was very hot.
So we sat down in a meadow where there was a stream in the ditch and ate the "snack." We drank the pure water from the brook out of our hands, because there was no farm to get milk at just there, and it was too much fag to look for one—and, besides, we thought we might as well save the sixpence.
Then we started again, and still the tower looked as far off as ever. Denny began to drag his feet, though he had brought a walking-stick which none of the rest of us had, and said:
72
