swept again. And she was very unhappy about this, and used to put pins in the good fairy's seat to prevent her going to sleep, and give her strong coffee to drink for the same purpose. But it was all no good, until one day she noticed that as long as a child was with her the good fairy kept awake. So the poor lady set to work again, and tried to see a child every day, because even if she talked to a child for a little in the morning, and especially if it gave her a kiss, the good fairy was much less sleepy.
Tommy's eyes grew wide.
' Oh, I do love you!' he said, and hoisted himself with his dirty boots into her lap. Then, smitten with a child's sudden shyness, he clambered down again, and the wheelbarrow went on its way.
The two others strolled on in silence for a moment over the grass, Amelie with a strange lump in her throat. Then she put her arm round Mrs. Emsworth's waist.
' Good-morning,' she said quietly, and they kissed.
' I think I love you too,' she said. ' I came out to tell you that.'
Mrs. Emsworth kissed her again.
' That is nice too,' she said. ' But what makes you?'
' I don't know. I think it was seeing you in that horrid play last night. You were like a sunbeam in—in a cesspool. But why do that sort of thing?'
Mrs. Emsworth shrugged her shoulders.
' Because people are beasts, my dear,' she said—' because they like that sort of thing. And one has to live.'
Amelie thought a moment, with her face growing grave.
' Oh, I am sorry, I am sorry,' she said.
A sudden impatience and ungovernable irritation filled Dorothy. She felt as if she was being hauled back to her ordinary life, when she was so happy in the sweetness of the early morning hour. Why did this stupid, gawky girl come and speak to her like this? But with an effort at
