Not far off they found Bibo waiting for them with a rickety old wagon and an ancient horse. Money and Eugenia's determined character had secured the forlorn equipage. For it was difficult to buy any kind of horse or wagon in these war days. However, the small driver, who was the boy Eugenia had rescued some weeks before, drove with all the pomp of the king's coachman. That is, he allowed the old horse to pick her way along a grass-grown path for about a mile. Then he invited his two passengers to get down, as there was no road up to the old house that a horse and wagon could travel. So Dick and Barbara found themselves for the first time in their acquaintance wandering along a country lane together. Their position was not very romantic, however. Barbara led the way along the same narrow avenue that Eugenia had [Pg 67]followed on the day of her first visit to the supposedly deserted place. [Pg 67] Yet although Barbara almost ran along in her eagerness to arrive, Dick noticed that she looked very thin. She was not the Barbara of his first acquaintance; something had changed her. Well, one could hardly go through the experiences of this war without changing, even if one were only an outsider. And Dick Thornton glanced at his own useless arm with a tightening of his lips. He probably owed his life to the little girl ahead of him. Eugenia did not at first see her guests approaching until they had discovered her. She was in the front yard and the grass had been cut, so that there was a broad cleared space. Moreover, every window of the supposedly haunted house was thrown wide open, so that the sun and air poured in. It was as little like either a deserted or a haunted house as one could humanly imagine. For there were eight or ten children at this moment in the yard with Eugenia. She held a baby in her arms and a small boy stood close beside her. [Pg 68] [Pg 68] Barbara saw the little fellow at the same moment she recognized her friend. Instantly she decided that he was the most exquisite child she had ever seen in her life. The boy was like a small prince, although he wore only the blue cotton overalls and light shirt such as the other boys wore. But he must have said something to Eugenia, for she glanced up and then ran forward to meet her guests. The baby she dumped hastily
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