Wolf became aware that a fit of sudden shyness had fallen upon both himself and Gerda. He continued to kneel above the prostrate Lob, pinioning the child’s arms and putting off the moment when he must rise and face her. Gerda, too, seemed to prolong with unnecessary punctiliousness her fumbling with the ragged recesses of her faded little purse, as she emptied pennies and bits of silver into her lap.

“Ninepence! It was ninepence!” the boy kept shouting, as he sought in vain to lift up his eager grass-stained face high enough to see what the girl was doing: “It was sixpence if he went to Malakite’s! It was ninepence if he came here!”

Wolf, bending over his prisoner, found himself watching the progress of a minute ladybird who with infinite precaution was climbing the bent stalk of a small grass-blade close to the boy’s head. But he was so conscious of Gerda’s presence that a slow, sweet, shivering sensation ran through his nerves, as if in the midst of a great heat his body had been plunged into the cool air of a cavern.