er; mother's
'air was somethink lovely, when she 'ad time to comb it out. Mother
wouldn't never a-beat me if she'd lived 'ere--I don't suppose there's
e'er a public nearer than Epping, do you, Miss?'

In her eagerness the child had stepped out of the shelter of the forest.
The sad-eyed woman saw her. She stood up, her thin face lighted up
with a radiance like sunrise, her long, lean arms stretched towards the
London child.

'Imogen!' she cried--at least the word was more like that than any other
word--'Imogen!'

There was a moment of great silence; the naked children paused in their
play, the women on the bank stared anxiously.

'Oh, it IS mother--it IS!' cried Imogen-from-London, and rushed across
the cleared space. She and her mother clung together--so closely, so
strongly that they stood an instant like a statue carved in stone.

Then the women crowded round. 'It IS my Imogen!' cried the woman.

'Oh it is! And she wasn't eaten by wolves. She's come back to me. Tell
me, my darling, how did you escape? Where have you been? Who has fed and
clothed you?'

'I don't know nothink,' said Imogen.

'Poor child!' whispered the women who crowded round, 'the terror of the
wolves has turned her brain.'

'But you know ME?' said the fair-haired woman.

And Imogen, clinging with black-clothed arms to the bare neck,
answered--

'Oh, yes, mother, I know YOU right 'nough.'

'What is it? What do they say?' the learned gentleman asked anxiously.

'You wished to come where someone wanted the child,' said the Psammead.
'The child says this is her mother.'

'And the mother?'

'You can see,' said the Psammead.

'But is she really? Her child, I mean?'

'Who knows?' said the Psammead; 'but each one fills the empty place in
the other's heart. It is enough.'

'Oh,' said the learned gentleman, 'this is a good dream. I wish the
child might stay in the dream.'

The Psammead blew itself out and granted the wish. So Imogen's future
was assured. She had found someone to want her.

'If only all the children that no one wants,' began the learned
gentleman--but the woman interrupted. She came towards them.

'Welcome, all!' she cried. 'I am the Queen, and my child tells me that
you have befriended her; and this I well believe, looking on your faces.
Your garb is strange, but faces I can read. The child is bewitched, I
see that well, but in this she speaks truth. Is it not so?'

The children said it wasn't worth mentioning.

I