by E. Nesbit
CHAPTER IX
THERE is a curtain, thin as gossamer, clear as glass, strong as iron,that hangs for ever between the world of magic and the world that seemsto us to be real. And when once people have found one of the little weakspots in that curtain which are marked by magic rings, and amulets, andthe like, almost anything may happen. Thus it is not surprising thatMabel and Kathleen, conscientiously conducting one of the dullest dolls'tea-parties at which either had ever assisted, should suddenly, and bothat once, have felt a strange, unreasonable, but quite irresistibledesire to return instantly to the Temple of Flora--even at the cost ofleaving the dolls' tea-service in an unwashed state, and only half theraisins eaten. They went--as one has to go when the magic impulse drivesone--against their better judgment, against their wills almost.
And the nearer they came to the Temple of Flora, in the golden hush ofthe afternoon, the more certain each was that they could not possiblyhave done otherwise.
And this explains exactly how it was that when Gerald and Jimmy,holding hands in the darkness of the passage, uttered their firstconcerted yell, "just for the lark of the thing," that yell wasinstantly answered from outside.
A crack of light showed in that part of the passage where they had leastexpected the door to be. The stone door itself swung slowly open, andthey were out of it, in the Temple of Flora, blinking in the gooddaylight, an unresisting prey to Kathleen's embraces and thequestionings of Mabel.
"And you left that Ugly-Wugly loose in London," Mabel pointed out; "youmight have wished it to be with you, too."
"It's all right where it is," said Gerald. "I couldn't think ofeverything. And besides, no, thank you! Now we'll go home and seal upthe ring in an envelope."
"_I_ haven't done anything with the ring yet," said Kathleen.
"I shouldn't think you'd want to when you see the sort of things it doeswith you," said Gerald.
"It wouldn't do things like that if _I_ was wishing with it," Kathleenprotested.
"Look here," said Mabel, "let's just put it back in the treasure-roomand have done with it. I oughtn't ever to have taken it away, really.It's a sort of stealing. It's quite as bad, really, as Eliza borrowingit to astonish her gentleman friend with."
"I don't mind putting it back if you like," said Gerald, "only if any ofus do think of a sensible wish you'll let us have it out again, ofcourse?"
"Of course, of course," Mabel agreed.
So they trooped up to the castle, and Mabel once more worked the springthat let down the panelling and showed the jewels, and the ring was putback among the odd dull ornaments that Mabel had once said were magic.
"How innocent it looks!" said Gerald. "You wouldn't think there was anymagic about it. It's just like an old silly ring. I wonder if what Mabelsaid about the other things is true! Suppose we try."
"_Don't!_" said Kathleen. "_I_ think magic things are spiteful. Theyjust enjoy getting you into tight places."
"I'd like to try," said Mabel, "only--well, everything's been ratherupsetting, and I've forgotten what I said anything was."
So had the others. Perhaps that was why, when Gerald said that a bronzebuckle laid on the foot would have the effect of seven-league boots, itdidn't; when Jimmy, a little of the City man he had been clinging to himstill, said that the steel collar would ensure your always having moneyin your pockets, his own remained empty; and when Mabel and Kathleeninvented qualities of the most delightful nature for various rings andchains and brooches, nothing at all happened.
"It's only the ring that's magic," said Mabel at last; "and, I say!" sheadded, in quite a different voice.
"What?"
"Suppose even the ring isn't!"
"But we know it is."
"I don't," said Mabel. "I believe it's not to-day at all. I believe it'sthe other day--we've just dreamed all these things. It's the day I madeup that nonsense about the ring."
"No, it isn't," said Gerald; "you were in your Princess-clothes then."
"What Princess-clothes?" said Mabel, opening her dark eyes very wide.
"Oh, don't be silly," said Gerald wearily.
"I'm not silly," said Mabel; "and I think it's time you went. I'm sureJimmy wants his tea."
"Of course I do," said Jimmy. "But you had got the Princess-clothes thatday. Come along; let's shut up the shutters and leave the ring in itslong home."
"What ring?" said Mabel.
"Don't take any notice of her," said Gerald. "She's only trying to befunny."
"No, I'm not," said Mabel; "but I'm inspired like a Python or aSibylline lady. What ring?"
"The wishing-ring," said Kathleen; "the invisibility ring."
"Don't you see _now_," said Mabel, her eyes wider than ever, "the ring'swhat you _say_ it is? That's how it came to make us invisible--I justsaid it. Oh, we can't leave it here, if that's what it is. It isn'tstealing, really, when it's as valuable as that, you see. Say what itis."
"It's a wishing-ring," said Jimmy.
"We've had that before--and you had your silly wish," said Mabel, moreand more excited. "I say it isn't a wishing-ring. I say it's a ring thatmakes the wearer four yards high."
She had caught up the ring as she spoke, and even as she spoke the ringshowed high above the children's heads on the finger of an impossibleMabel, who was, indeed, twelve feet high.
"Now you've done it!" said Gerald--and he was right. It was in vain thatMabel asserted that the ring was a wishing-ring. It quite clearlywasn't; it was what she had said it was.
"And you can't tell at all how long the effect will last," said Gerald."Look at the invisibleness." This is difficult to do, but the othersunderstood him.
"It may last for days," said Kathleen. "Oh, Mabel, it _was_ silly ofyou!"
"That's right, rub it in," said Mabel bitterly; "you should havebelieved me when I said it was what I said it was. Then I shouldn't havehad to show you, and I shouldn't be this silly size. What am I to donow, I should like to know?"
"We must conceal you till you get your right size again--that's all,"said Gerald practically.
"Yes--but _where_?" said Mabel, stamping a foot twenty-four inches long.
"In one of the empty rooms. You wouldn't be afraid?"
"Of course not," said Mabel. "Oh, I do wish we'd just put the ring backand left it."
"Well, it wasn't us that didn't," said Jimmy, with more truth thangrammar.
"I shall put it back now," said Mabel, tugging at it.
"I wouldn't if I were you," said Gerald thoughtfully. "You don't want tostay that length, do you? And unless the ring's on your finger when thetime's up, I dare say it wouldn't act."
The exalted Mabel sullenly touched the spring. The panels slowly slidinto place, and all the bright jewels were hidden. Once more the roomwas merely eight-sided, panelled, sunlit, and unfurnished.
"Now," said Mabel, "where am I to hide? It's a good thing auntie gave meleave to stay the night with you. As it is, one of you will have to staythe night with me. I'm not going to be left alone, the silly height Iam."
Height was the right word; Mabel had said "four yards high"--and she_was_ four yards high. But she was hardly any thicker than when herheight was four feet seven, and the effect was, as Gerald remarked,"wonderfully worm-like." Her clothes had, of course, grown with her, andshe looked like a little girl reflected in one of those long bentmirrors at Rosherville Gardens, that make stout people look so happilyslender, and slender people so sadly scraggy. She sat down suddenly onthe floor, and it was like a four-fold foot-rule folding itself up.
"It's no use sitting there, girl," said Gerald.
SHE SAT DOWN SUDDENLY ON THE FLOOR, AND IT WAS LIKE AFOUR-FOLD FOOT-RULE FOLDING ITSELF UP.]
"I'm not sitting here," retorted Mabel; "I only got down so as to beable to get through the door. It'll have to be hands and knees throughmost places for me now, I suppose."
"Aren't you hungry?" Jimmy asked suddenly.
"I don't know," said Mabel desolately; "it's--it's such a long way off!"
; "Well, I'll scout," said Gerald; "if the coast's clear----"
"Look here," said Mabel, "I think I'd rather be out of doors till itgets dark."
"You _can't_. Some one's certain to see you."
"Not if I go through the yew-hedge," said Mabel. "There's a yew-hedgewith a passage along its inside like the box-hedge in 'The Luck of theVails.'"
"In _what_?"
"'The Luck of the Vails.' It's a ripping book. It was that book firstset me on to hunt for hidden doors in panels and things. If I creptalong that on my front, like a serpent--it comes out amongst therhododendrons, close by the dinosaurus--we could camp there."
"There's tea," said Gerald, who had had no dinner.
"That's just what there isn't," said Jimmy, who had had none either.
"Oh, you _won't_ desert me!" said Mabel. "Look here--I'll write toauntie. She'll give you the things for a picnic, if she's there andawake. If she isn't, one of the maids will."
So she wrote on a leaf of Gerald's invaluable pocket-book:--
"DEAREST AUNTIE,--
"Please may we have some things for a picnic? Gerald will bring them. I would come myself, but I am a little tired. I think I have been growing rather fast.--Your loving niece,
"MABEL."
"P.S.--Lots, please, because some of us are very hungry."
It was found difficult, but possible, for Mabel to creep along thetunnel in the yew-hedge. Possible, but slow, so that the three hadhardly had time to settle themselves among the rhododendrons and towonder bitterly what on earth Gerald was up to, to be such a time gone,when he returned, panting under the weight of a covered basket. Hedumped it down on the fine grass carpet, groaned, and added, "But it'sworth it. Where's our Mabel?"
The long, pale face of Mabel peered out from rhododendron leaves, verynear the ground.
"I look just like anybody else like this, don't I?" she asked anxiously;"all the rest of me's miles away, under different bushes."
"We've covered up the bits between the bushes with bracken and leaves,"said Kathleen, avoiding the question; "don't wriggle, Mabel, or you'llwaggle them off."
Jimmy was eagerly unpacking the basket. It was a generous tea. A longloaf, butter in a cabbage-leaf, a bottle of milk, a bottle of water,cake, and large, smooth, yellow gooseberries in a box that had once heldan extra-sized bottle of somebody's matchless something for the hairand moustache. Mabel cautiously advanced her incredible arms from therhododendron and leaned on one of her spindly elbows, Gerald cut breadand butter, while Kathleen obligingly ran round, at Mabel's request, tosee that the green coverings had not dropped from any of the remoterparts of Mabel's person. Then there was a happy, hungry silence, brokenonly by those brief, impassioned suggestions natural to such anoccasion:--
"More cake, please."
"Milk ahoy, there."
"Chuck us the goosegogs."
Everyone grew calmer--more contented with their lot. A pleasant feeling,half tiredness and half restfulness, crept to the extremities of theparty. Even the unfortunate Mabel was conscious of it in her remotefeet, that lay crossed under the third rhododendron to thenorth-north-west of the tea-party. Gerald did but voice the feelings ofthe others when he said, not without regret:--
"Well, I'm a new man, but I couldn't eat so much as another goosegog ifyou paid me."
"_I_ could," said Mabel: "yes, I know they're all gone, and I've had myshare. But I _could_. It's me being so long, I suppose."
A delicious after-food peace filled the summer air. At a little distancethe green-lichened grey of the vast stone dinosaurus showed through theshrubs. He, too, seemed peaceful and happy. Gerald caught his stone eyethrough a gap in the foliage. His glance seemed somehow sympathetic.
"I dare say he liked a good meal in his day," said Gerald, stretchingluxuriously.
"Who did?"
"The dino what's-his-name," said Gerald.
"He had a meal to-day," said Kathleen, and giggled.
"Yes--didn't he?" said Mabel, giggling also.
"You mustn't laugh lower than your chest," said Kathleen anxiously, "oryour green stuff will joggle off."
"What do you mean--a meal?" Jimmy asked suspiciously. "What are yousniggering about?"
"He had a meal. Things to put in his inside," said Kathleen, stillgiggling.
"Oh, be funny if you want to," said Jimmy, suddenly cross. "We don'twant to know--do we, Jerry?"
"I do," said Gerald witheringly; "I'm _dying_ to know. Wake me, yougirls, when you've finished pretending you're not going to tell."
He tilted his hat over his eyes, and lay back in the attitude ofslumber.
"Oh, don't be stupid!" said Kathleen hastily. "It's only that we fed thedinosaurus through the hole in his stomach with the clothes theUgly-Wuglies were made of!"
"We can take them home with us, then," said Gerald, chewing the whiteend of a grass stalk, "so that's all right."
"Look here," said Kathleen suddenly; "I've got an idea. Let me have thering a bit. I won't say what the idea is, in case it doesn't come off,and then you'd say I was silly. I'll give it back before we go."
"Oh, but you aren't going yet!" said Mabel, pleading. She pulled off thering. "Of course," she added earnestly, "I'm only too glad for you totry any idea, however silly it is."
Now, Kathleen's idea was quite simple. It was only that perhaps the ringwould change its powers if some one else renamed it--some one who wasnot under the power of its enchantment. So the moment it had passed fromthe long, pale hand of Mabel to one of her own fat, warm, red paws, shejumped up, crying, "Let's go and empty the dinosaurus _now_," andstarted to run swiftly towards that prehistoric monster. She had a goodstart. She wanted to say aloud, yet so that the others could not hearher, "This is a wishing-ring. It gives you any wish you choose." And shedid say it. And no one heard her, except the birds and a squirrel ortwo, and perhaps a stone faun, whose pretty face seemed to turn alaughing look on her as she raced past its pedestal.
The way was uphill; it was sunny, and Kathleen had run her hardest,though her brothers caught her up before she reached the great blackshadow of the dinosaurus. So that when she did reach that shadow she wasvery hot indeed and not in any state to decide calmly on the best wishto ask for.
"I'll get up and move the things down, because I know exactly where Iput them," she said.
Gerald made a back, Jimmy assisted her to climb up, and she disappearedthrough the hole into the dark inside of the monster. In a moment ashower began to descend from the opening--a shower of empty waistcoats,trousers with wildly waving legs, and coats with sleeves uncontrolled.
"Heads below!" called Kathleen, and down came walking-sticks andgolf-sticks and hockey-sticks and broom-sticks, rattling and chatteringto each other as they came.
"Come on," said Jimmy.
"Hold on a bit," said Gerald. "I'm coming up." He caught the edge of thehole above in his hands and jumped. Just as he got his shoulders throughthe opening and his knees on the edge he heard Kathleen's boots on thefloor of the dinosaurus's inside, and Kathleen's voice saying:
"Isn't it jolly cool in here? I suppose statues are always cool. I dowish I was a statue. Oh!"
The "oh" was a cry of horror and anguish. And it seemed to be cut offvery short by a dreadful stony silence.
"What's up?" Gerald asked. But in his heart he knew. He climbed up intothe great hollow. In the little light that came up through the hole hecould see something white against the grey of the creature's sides. Hefelt in his pockets, still kneeling, struck a match, and when the blueof its flame changed to clear yellow he looked up to see what he hadknown he would see--the face of Kathleen, white, stony, and lifeless.Her hair was white, too, and her hands, clothes, shoes--everything waswhite, with the hard, cold whiteness of marble. Kathleen had her wish:she was a statue. There was a long moment of perfect stillness in theinside of the dinosaurus. Gerald could not speak. It was too sudden, tooterrible. It w
as worse than anything that had happened yet. Then heturned and spoke down out of that cold, stony silence to Jimmy, in thegreen, sunny, rustling, live world outside.
"Jimmy," he said, in tones perfectly ordinary and matter of fact,"Kathleen's gone and said that ring was a wishing-ring. And so it was,of course. I see now what she was up to, running like that. And then theyoung duffer went and wished she was a statue."
"And is she?" asked Jimmy, below.
"Come up and have a look," said Gerald. And Jimmy came, partly with apull from Gerald and partly with a jump of his own.
"She's a statue, right enough," he said, in awestruck tones. "Isn't itawful!"
"Not at all," said Gerald firmly. "Come on--let's go and tell Mabel."
To Mabel, therefore, who had discreetly remained with her long lengthscreened by rhododendrons, the two boys returned and broke the news.They broke it as one breaks a bottle with a pistol-shot.
KATHLEEN HAD HER WISH: SHE WAS A STATUE.]
"Oh, my goodness!" said Mabel, and writhed through her long length sothat the leaves and fern tumbled off in little showers, and she felt thesun suddenly hot on the backs of her legs. "What next? Oh, my goodness!"
"She'll come all right," said Gerald, with outward calm.
"Yes; but what about _me_?" Mabel urged. "I haven't got the ring. And mytime will be up before hers is. Couldn't you get it back? Can't you getit off her hand? I'd put it back on her hand the very minute I was myright size again--faithfully I would."
"Well, it's nothing to blub about," said Jimmy, answering the sniffsthat had served her in this speech for commas and full-stops; "not foryou, anyway."
"Ah! you don't know," said Mabel; "you don't know what it is to be aslong as I am. Do--do try and get the ring. After all, it is my ring morethan any of the rest of yours, anyhow, because I did find it, and I didsay it was magic."
The sense of justice always present in the breast of Gerald awoke tothis appeal.
"I expect the ring's turned to stone--her boots have, and all herclothes. But I'll go and see. Only if I can't, I can't, and it's no useyour making a silly fuss."
The first match lighted inside the dinosaurus showed the ring dark onthe white hand of the statuesque Kathleen.
The fingers were stretched straight out. Gerald took hold of the ring,and, to his surprise, it slipped easily off the cold, smooth marblefinger.
"I say, Cathy, old girl, I am sorry," he said, and gave the marble handa squeeze. Then it came to him that perhaps she could hear him. So hetold the statue exactly what he and the others meant to do. This helpedto clear up his ideas as to what he and the others did mean to do. Sothat when, after thumping the statue hearteningly on its marble back, hereturned to the rhododendrons, he was able to give his orders with theclear precision of a born leader, as he later said. And since the othershad, neither of them, thought of any plan, his plan was accepted, as theplans of born leaders are apt to be.
"Here's your precious ring," he said to Mabel. "Now you're notfrightened of anything, are you?"
"No," said Mabel, in surprise. "I'd forgotten that. Look here, I'll stayhere or farther up in the wood if you'll leave me all the coats, so thatI sha'n't be cold in the night. Then I shall be here when Kathleen comesout of the stone again."
"Yes," said Gerald, "that was exactly the born leader's idea."
"You two go home and tell Mademoiselle that Kathleen's staying at theTowers. She is."
"Yes," said Jimmy, "she certainly is."
"The magic goes in seven-hour lots," said Gerald; "your invisibility wastwenty-one hours, mine fourteen, Eliza's seven. When it was awishing-ring it began with seven. But there's no knowing what number itwill be really. So there's no knowing which of you will come rightfirst. Anyhow, we'll sneak out by the cistern window and come down thetrellis, after we've said good-night to Mademoiselle, and come and havea look at you before we go to bed. I think you'd better come close up tothe dinosaurus and we'll leaf you over before we go."
Mabel crawled into cover of the taller trees, and there stood up lookingas slender as a poplar and as unreal as the wrong answer to a sum inlong division. It was to her an easy matter to crouch beneath thedinosaurus, to put her head up through the opening, and thus to beholdthe white form of Kathleen.
"It's all right, dear,"' she told the stone image; "I shall be quiteclose to you. You call me as soon as you feel you're coming rightagain."
MABEL LAY DOWN, WAS COVERED UP, AND LEFT.]
The statue remained motionless, as statues usually do, and Mabelwithdrew her head, lay down, was covered up, and left. The boys wenthome. It was the only reasonable thing to do. It would never have donefor Mademoiselle to become anxious and set the police on their track.Every one felt that. The shock of discovering the missing Kathleen, notonly in a dinosaurus's stomach, but, further, in a stone statue ofherself, might well have unhinged the mind of any constable, to saynothing of the mind of Mademoiselle, which, being foreign, wouldnecessarily be a mind more light and easy to upset. While as forMabel----
"Well, to look at her as she is now," said Gerald, "why, it would sendany one off their chump--except us."
"We're different," said Jimmy; "our chumps have had to jolly well getused to things. It would take a lot to upset us now."
"Poor old Cathy! all the same," said Gerald.
"Yes, of course," said Jimmy.
= = = = =
The sun had died away behind the black trees and the moon was rising.Mabel, her preposterous length covered with coats, waistcoats, andtrousers laid along it, slept peacefully in the chill of the evening.Inside the dinosaurus Kathleen, alive in her marble, slept too. She hadheard Gerald's words--had seen the lighted matches. She was Kathleenjust the same as ever, only she was Kathleen in a case of marble thatwould not let her move. It would not have let her cry, even if shewanted to. But she had not wanted to cry. Inside, the marble was notcold or hard. It seemed, somehow, to be softly lined with warmth andpleasantness and safety. Her back did not ache with stooping. Her limbswere not stiff with the hours that they had stayed moveless. Everythingwas well--better than well. One had only to wait quietly and quitecomfortably and one would come out of this stone case, and once more bethe Kathleen one had always been used to being. So she waited happilyand calmly, and presently waiting changed to not waiting--to notanything; and, close held in the soft inwardness of the marble, sheslept as peacefully and calmly as though she had been lying in her ownbed.
She was awakened by the fact that she was not lying in her own bed--wasnot, indeed, lying at all--by the fact that she was standing and thather feet had pins and needles in them. Her arms, too, held out in thatodd way, were stiff and tired. She rubbed her eyes, yawned, andremembered. She had been a statue, a statue inside the stone dinosaurus.
"Now I'm alive again," was her instant conclusion, "and I'll get out ofit."
She sat down, put her feet through the hole that showed faintly grey inthe stone beast's underside, and as she did so a long, slow lurch threwher sideways on the stone where she sat. _The dinosaurus was moving!_
"_Oh!_" said Kathleen inside it, "how dreadful! It must be moonlight,and it's come alive, like Gerald said."
It was indeed moving. She could see through the hole the changingsurface of grass and bracken and moss as it waddled heavily along. Shedared not drop through the hole while it moved, for fear it should crushher to death with its gigantic feet. And with that thought came another:where was Mabel? Somewhere--somewhere _near_? Suppose one of the greatfeet planted itself on some part of Mabel's inconvenient length? Mabelbeing the size she was now it would be quite difficult not to step onsome part or other of her, if she should happen to be in one'sway--quite difficult, however much one tried. And the dinosaurus wouldnot try. Why should it? Kathleen hung in an agony over the roundopening. The huge beast swung from side to side. It was going faster; itwas no good, she dared not jump out. Anyhow, they must be quite awayfrom Mabel by now. Faster and faster went the dinosaurus. The floor ofits stomach sloped. They
were going downhill. Twigs cracked and broke asit pushed through a belt of evergreen oaks; gravel crunched, groundbeneath its stony feet. Then stone met stone. There was a pause. Asplash! They were close to water--the lake where by moonlight Hermesfluttered and Janus and the dinosaurus swam together. Kathleen droppedswiftly through the hole on to the flat marble that edged the basin,rushed sideways, and stood panting in the shadow of a statue's pedestal.Not a moment too soon, for even as she crouched the monster lizardslipped heavily into the water, drowning a thousand smooth, shining lilypads, and swam away towards the central island.
"Be still, little lady. I leap!" The voice came from the pedestal, andnext moment Phoebus had jumped from the pedestal in his little temple,clearing the steps, and landing a couple of yards away.
MABEL LAY DOWN, WAS COVERED UP, AND LEFT.]
"You are new," said Phoebus over his graceful shoulder. "I shouldnot have forgotten you if once I had seen you."
"I am," said Kathleen, "quite, quite new. And I didn't know you couldtalk."
"Why not?" Phoebus laughed. "You can talk."
"But I'm alive."
"Am not I?" he asked.
"Oh, yes, I suppose so," said Kathleen, distracted, but not afraid;"only I thought you had to have the ring on before one could even seeyou move."
Phoebus seemed to understand her, which was rather to his credit, forshe had certainly not expressed herself with clearness.
"Ah! that's for mortals," he said. "_We_ can hear and see each other inthe few moments when life is ours. That is a part of the beautifulenchantment."
"But I am a mortal," said Kathleen.
"You are as modest as you are charming," said Phoebus Apollo absently;"the white water calls me! I go," and the next moment rings of liquidsilver spread across the lake, widening and widening, from the spotwhere the white joined hands of the Sun-god had struck the water as hedived.
Kathleen turned and went up the hill towards the rhododendron bushes.She must find Mabel, and they must go home at once. If only Mabel was ofa size that one could conveniently take home with one! Most likely, atthis hour of enchantments, she was. Kathleen, heartened by the thought,hurried on. She passed through the rhododendron bushes, remembered thepointed painted paper face that had looked out from the glossy leaves,expected to be frightened--and wasn't. She found Mabel easily enough,and much more easily than she would have done had Mabel been as shewished to find her. For quite a long way off, in the moonlight, shecould see that long and worm-like form, extended to its full twelvefeet--and covered with coats and trousers and waistcoats. Mabel lookedlike a drain-pipe that has been covered in sacks in frosty weather.Kathleen touched her long cheek gently, and she woke.
"What's up?" she said sleepily.
"It's only me," Kathleen explained.
"How cold your hands are!" said Mabel.
"Wake up," said Kathleen, "and let's talk."
"Can't we go home now? I'm awfully tired, and it's so long sincetea-time."
"_You're_ too long to go home yet," said Kathleen sadly, and then Mabelremembered.
She lay with closed eyes--then suddenly she stirred and cried out:--
"Oh! Cathy, I feel so funny--like one of those horn snakes when you makeit go short to get it into its box. I am--yes--I know I am----"
She was; and Kathleen, watching her, agreed that it was exactly like theshortening of a horn spiral snake between the closing hands of a child.Mabel's distant feet drew near--Mabel's long, lean arms grewshorter--Mabel's face was no longer half a yard long.
"You're coming right--you are! Oh, I am so glad!" cried Kathleen.
"I know _I_ am," said Mabel; and as she said it she became once moreMabel, not only in herself, which, of course, she had been all the time,but in her outward appearance.
"You are all right. Oh, hooray! hooray! I _am_ so glad!" said Kathleenkindly; "and now we'll go home at once, dear."
"Go home?" said Mabel, slowly sitting up and staring at Kathleen withher big dark eyes. "Go home--like that?"
"Like what?" Kathleen asked impatiently.
"Why, _you_," was Mabel's odd reply.
"I'm all right," said Kathleen. "Come on."
"Do you mean to say you don't know?" said Mabel. "Look at yourself--yourhands--your dress--everything."
Kathleen looked at her hands. They were of marble whiteness. Her dress,too--her shoes, her stockings, even the ends of her hair. She was whiteas new-fallen snow.
"What is it?" she asked, beginning to tremble. "What am I all thishorrid colour for?"
"Don't you see? Oh, Cathy, don't you see? You've _not_ come right.You're a statue still."
"I'm not--I'm alive--I'm talking to you."
"I know you are, darling," said Mabel, soothing her as one soothes afractious child. "That's because it's moonlight."
"But you can see I'm alive."
"Of course I can. I've got the ring."
"But I'm all right; I _know_ I am."
"WHAT IS IT?" SHE ASKED, BEGINNING TO TREMBLE. "WHAT AM IALL THIS HORRID COLOUR FOR?"]
"Don't you see," said Mabel gently, taking her white marble hand,"you're not all right? It's moonlight, and you're a statue, and you'vejust come alive with all the other statues. And when the moon goes downyou'll just be a statue again. _That's_ the difficulty, dear, about ourgoing home again. You're just a statue still, only you've come alivewith the other marble things. Where's the dinosaurus?"
"In his bath," said Kathleen, "and so are all the other stone beasts."
"Well," said Mabel, trying to look on the bright side of things, "thenwe've got one thing, at any rate, to be thankful for!"