c trances.

It was probably owing to this habit that one morning Michael, looking
round in Kensington Gardens, could discern no familiar figure. He was by
himself in the middle of a broad gravel walk. Nurse and the perambulator
had vanished. For a moment a sickening horror seized him. He would never
see Carlington Road again; he would never see Stella or his mother; he
would never go to the seaside; he was lost. Then he recalled to himself
the knowledge of his name and address: he reassured himself by repeating
both aloud, Charles Michael Saxby Fane, 64 Carlington Road, Kensington.
A name and address he had often been warned was a talisman to enlist
the service of policemen. His heart beat more gently again; his
breathing became normal. He looked around him at the world seen for the
first time with freedom's eyes. With waves of scent the beds of
hyacinths impressed themselves upon his memory. He was free under a
great gusty sky, free to climb railings, to pick up shells from the
gravel walk, to lie on his back in the grass and brood upon the huge
elm-trees that caught the clouds in their net. Michael wandered along to
a drinking-fountain to which, access had often been forbidden. He drank
four cups of water from the captive metal mug: he eyed curiously the
many children who, as free as himself, ran up and down the steps of the
fountain. He wished for barley-sugar that he might offer it to them and
earn their approbation and company. He was particularly attracted to one
group consisting of three funny little girls with splashed pinafores and
holes in their stockings, and of two little boys with holes in their
knickerbockers and half-peeled sticks. The group moved away from the
fountain and Michael followed at a distance. The group turned
somersaults over the highest railings and Michael watched it hungrily.
The group strolled on, the girls nonchalant and enlaced, the boys still
peeling their sticks with perseverance. Michael squeezed through the
railings, and followed in the group's wake. The two boys finished
peeling their sticks and pushed over in a heap the three little girls.
There was laughter and shouting, and a confusion of pinafores and black
stockings and hair and caps. Michael stood close to them, wide-eyed with
admiration. Suddenly the group realized his propinquity and flocked
together critically to eye him, Michael became self-conscious and turned
away; he heard giggling and spluttering. He blushed with shame