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He often rode at her side for an hour or more, pointing out to her the secret quick life of woodland and meadow, and finding perhaps that she already knew the bird, squirrel, marmot or hare, by another name. "London is well enough," he said one day, "but 'tis not for me. I could never live grubbing in the dark there like a mouldiwarp." Josian's delicate brows drew together.
"But the swans and the carriages and the voice and jumping out of the window..." Dickie urged. "The swans were white magic the white Mouldiwarp of Arden did all that." Then she told him all about the white Mouldiwarp of Arden, and how it was the badge of Arden's house its picture being engraved on Tinkler, and how it had done all sorts of magic for Edred and Elfrida, and would do still more.
He went back instead to the time he loved, when James the First was King. And when he woke in the little panelled room it seemed to him that all this was only dreams and fancies. In the course of this adventure he met the white Mouldiwarp, and it was just a white mole, very funny and rather self-important. The second Mouldiwarp he had not yet met.
"Thou'rt a fair sprig of de old tree, Muster Dickie, so 'e be," in the thick speech of the peasant people round about Talbot house where Dickie had once been a little burglar. "He is indeed a worthy scion of the great house we serve," said the other Mouldiwarp with precise and gentle utterance. "As Mouldierwarp to the Ardens I can but own that I am proud of him."
Next moment a voice spoke so close to him that he started and all but cried out. "Bide where you be, lad, bide still; 'tis only me old Mouldiwarp of Arden. You be a bold lad, by my faith, so you be. Never an Arden better. Never an Arden of them all." "Oh, Mouldiwarp, dear Mouldiwarp, do help me! I led them into this help me to get them back safe. Do, do, do!"
"There's purty manners," the Mouldiwarp said. "The pleasure is ours," said the Mouldierwarp instantly. Dickie could not help seeing that both these old creatures were extremely pleased with him. "When shall I see the other Mouldiwarp?" he asked, to keep up the conversation "the one on our shield of arms?"
And the thing Edred couldn't do was to make poetry, however bad. He simply couldn't do it, any more than you can fly. It wasn't in him, any more than wings are on you. "Oh, Mouldiwarp, you said we must Not have any more magic. But we trust You won't be hard on us, because Dickie is lost And we don't know how to find him."
Every one in the room was looking at the two children, and it seemed impossible for them not to advance, though slowly and shyly, right to the front of the throne. Arrived there, it seemed right to bow, very low. So they did it. Then the Mouldiwarp said "What brings you here?" "Kind magic," Elfrida answered. And the Mouldierwarp said "What is your desire?"
"I do want to see them both." See them he did, in a blue-gray mist in which he could feel nothing solid, not even the ground under his feet or the touch of his clenched fingers against his palms. They were very white, the Mouldiwarps, outlined distinctly against the gray blueness, and the Mouldiwarp he had seen in that wonderful adventure in the far country smiled, as well as a mole can, and said
"Oh! if only we'd got the old white magic and the Mouldiwarp to help us, we could find out what's become of him." "Perhaps he has fallen down a disused mine," Edred suggested, "and is lying panting for water, and his faithful dog has jumped down after him and broken all its dear legs." Elfrida melted to tears at this desperate picture, melted to a speechless extent.
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