aid I.

"It is, sir," said the shopman, "always--for that sort of child," and as
he spoke we had a glimpse of the other youngster, a little, white face,
pallid from sweet-eating and over-sapid food, and distorted by evil
passions, a ruthless little egotist, pawing at the enchanted pane. "It's
no good, sir," said the shopman, as I moved, with my natural helpfulness,
doorward, and presently the spoilt child was carried off howling.

"How do you manage that?" I said, breathing a little more freely.

"Magic!" said the shopman, with a careless wave of the hand, and behold!
sparks of coloured fire flew out of his fingers and vanished into the
shadows of the shop.

"You were saying," he said, addressing himself to Gip, "before you came
in, that you would like one of our 'Buy One and Astonish your Friends'
boxes?"

Gip, after a gallant effort, said "Yes."

"It's in your pocket."

And leaning over the counter--he really had an extraordinary long body--
this amazing person produced the article in the customary conjurer's
manner. "Paper," he said, and took a sheet out of the empty hat with the
springs; "string," and behold his mouth was a string box, from which he
drew an unending thread, which when he had tied his parcel he bit off--
and, it seemed to me, swallowed the ball of string. And then he lit a
candle at the nose of one of the ventriloquist's dummies, stuck one of his
fingers (which had become sealing-wax red) into the flame, and so sealed
the parcel. "Then there was the Disappearing Egg," he remarked, and
produced one from within my coat-breast and packed it, and also The Crying
Baby, Very Human. I handed each parcel to Gip as it was ready, and he
clasped them to his chest.

He said very little, but his eyes were eloquent; the clutch of his arms
was eloquent. He was the playground of unspeakable emotions. These, you
know, were _real_ Magics.

Then, with a start, I discovered something moving about in my hat--
something soft and jumpy. I whipped it off, and a ruffled pigeon--no doubt
a confederate--dropped out and ran on the counter, and went, I fancy, into
a cardboard box behind the _papier-mache_ tiger.

"Tut, tut!" said the shopman, dexterously relieving, me of my headdress;
"careless bird, and--as I live--nesting!"

He shook my hat, and shook out into his extended hand, two or three eggs,
a large marble, a watch, about half a dozen of the inevitable glass balls,
and then crumpled, crinkled paper, more and