in
honour, have done anything to him at any future time. But Robert's
fears, if he had any, were soon dispelled. Chivalry was a stranger to
the breast of the baker's boy. He pushed Anthea away very roughly, and
he chased Robert with kicks and unpleasant conversation right down the
road to the sand-pit, and there, with one last kick, he landed him in a
heap of sand.

"I'll larn you, you young varmint!" he said, and went off to pick up his
loaves and go about his business. Cyril, impeded by Jane, could do
nothing without hurting her, for she clung round his legs with the
strength of despair. The baker's boy went off red and damp about the
face; abusive to the last, he called them a pack of silly idiots, and
disappeared round the corner. Then Jane's grasp loosened. Cyril turned
away in silent dignity to follow Robert, and the girls followed him,
weeping without restraint.

It was not a happy party that flung itself down in the sand beside the
sobbing Robert. For Robert was sobbing--mostly with rage. Though of
course I know that a really heroic boy is always dry-eyed after a fight.
But then he always wins, which had not been the case with Robert.

Cyril was angry with Jane; Robert was furious with Anthea; the girls
were miserable; and not one of the four was pleased with the baker's
boy. There was, as French writers say, "a silence full of emotion."

Then Robert dug his toes and his hands into the sand and wriggled in his
rage. "He'd better wait till I'm grown up--the cowardly brute! Beast!--I
hate him! But I'll pay him out. Just because he's bigger than me."

"You began," said Jane incautiously.

"I know I did, silly--but I was only jollying--and he kicked me--look
here"--

Robert tore down a stocking and showed a purple bruise touched up with
red.

"I only wish I was bigger than him, that's all."

He dug his fingers in the sand, and sprang up, for his hand had touched
something furry. It was the Psammead, of course--"On the look-out to
make sillies of them as usual," as Cyril remarked later. And of course
the next moment Robert's wish was granted, and he was bigger than the
baker's boy. Oh, but much, much bigger! He was bigger than the big
policeman who used to be at the crossing at the Mansion House years
ago,--the one who was so kind in helping old ladies over the
crossing,--and he was the biggest man _I_ have ever seen, as well as the
kindest. No one had a foot-rule in its pocket, so Robert could not be
me