For a sixpence, one of the ostlers was willing to let Mayhew decant the furry monsters in an empty horse stall. He ushered his audience inside: child, mother, and one very pretty governess. At least, he assumed she was a governess. She was clearly well-bred, yet she was traveling on a stagecoach, and in Mayhew’s experience respectable young ladies who traveled by stagecoach were usually governesses.
“They’re a brother and sister,” he told his audience, kneeling on the straw and unfastening the strap that held the basket closed. “Someone I know found them in a creek. Tied up in a sack.”
“In a sack?” the little boy echoed, his eyes wide with dismay.
“He saved them all,” Mayhew reassured him. “And a lady took them home and looked after them, and now they’re big enough to have homes of thei
