you say, however you say it, or
half say it. He was not the least surprised at my talking of his staring
me awake, though he had not exactly meant to do so.

'It has come into my mind, Giles,' he began, very importantly, 'how
queer and lucky it is that the old lady is going away for a fortnight. I
should not wonder if it had been managed somehow.'

He waited for my grunt, but it turned into--

'What on earth do you mean?'

'I mean, perhaps it's part of the spell, without her knowing, of course,
that she should have to go to London. For if she was still there, we
couldn't do anything without her finding out.'

'I don't know what you mean about doing anything,' I said. 'And please
don't say "we." I haven't promised to join you. Most likely I'll do my
best to stop whatever it is you've got in that rummy head of yours.'

'Oh no, you won't!' he replied coolly. 'I don't know that you could if
you tried, without telling the others. And you can't do that, of course,
as I've trusted you. It's word of honour, you see, though I didn't
exactly make you say so. And it's nothing naughty or mischievous, else I
wouldn't plan it.'

'What is it, then? Hurry up and tell me, without such a lot of
preparation,' I grumbled.

'I can't tell you very much,' he answered, ''cos, you see, I don't know
myself. It will show as we go on--I'm certain you'll help me, Gilley.
You remember the prince in the "Sleeping Beauty" did not know exactly
what he would do--no more did the one in----'

'Never mind all that,' I interrupted.

'Well, then, what we've got to do is to try to talk to her ourselves
without any one hearing. That's the first thing. We will tell her what
the parrot says, and then it will be easy to find out if she knows
herself about the spell.'

'But what do you think the spell is?' I asked, feeling again the strange
interest and half belief in his fancies that Peterkin managed to put
into me. 'What do you suppose your bad fairies, or whatever they are,
have done to her?'

'There are lots of things, it might be,' he replied gravely. 'They may
have made her not able to walk, or very queer to look at--p'raps turned
her hair white, so that you couldn't be sure if she was a little girl
or an old woman; or made her nose so long that it trails on the floor.
No, I don't think it's that,' he added, after stopping to think a
minute. 'Her voice sounds as if she was pretty, even if it's rather
grumbly. P'raps she turns into a mouse at