d, to be flung off again in a frantic hunt for
some fish hooks, whose disappearance no doubt Leonard explained in the
same way.

It came to be rather a convenient idea. Not only losses, but breakages,
tearings, all such annoyances were laid to the account of the bad fairy.
And it was a very heavy account. Never had there been so many unlucky
accidents as during these last few weeks spent by the boys and their
sister with their mother, in a little country house, lessons being for
the time put aside, nothing thought of but fun and frolic. Even old
nurse, who usually took charge--too much charge--of the light-hearted
careless boys, was away; there was no one to "worry" about putting
things by tidily, wearing the proper clothes at the proper time, and so
on. At least so it seemed for a while. But things grew worse and worse,
the bad fairy more and more spiteful, till at last even their indulgent
mother could take it all quietly no longer.

One evening, finding several of her own private possessions
missing--scissors and pen-knife in particular--she came late into the
boys room after they were asleep, there to look for them. But she almost
forgot her errand in her horrified amazement at the disorder and
confusion before her. What a difference from the neat room she used to
peep into at night when nurse was at home--everything everywhere,
_nothing_ where it should be, almost a sort of ingenuity in the
perfection of disorder.

[Illustration]

"Really," thought the poor lady, "I could be tempted to believe in the
spiteful fairy."

She set to work, and with a shaded candle, for the boys were fast
asleep, cleared away some part of the confusion. But it was of course
impossible to do it thoroughly. The next morning, without saying
anything, she returned to the charge, in the children's absence. By
degrees order gained the day, and in the process many of the missing
articles turned up, and were quietly restored to their places. Late that
evening again came the motherly fairy. Things were not as bad as the
night before--they could scarcely have been so, since the morning's
tidying. But they were bad enough. All the boys had had in use during
the day was "pitched about" as before--again must their mother work for
nearly an hour to get the room quite to her mind. And this went on for
several days.

During this time there began to be less talk of "the bad fairy," and
more than once both David and Leonard expressed their surpris