knees into
a hill, and lay looking out of the window, and wondering when mamma
would come home, and what she would bring with her.

"You're not asleep, are you?' asked a little voice from his knees.

"Oh, Counterpane Fairy, I'm so glad you've come," cried Teddy, "for
mamma has gone down-town, and I was just beginning to get lonely."

There was the familiar little figure in the brown cloak and hood, seated
on top of the counterpane hill, and as he spoke she looked down on him
smilingly. "I suppose the next thing will be a story," she said.

"Oh! will you show me one?" cried Teddy. "I wish you would, for I don't
know when mamma will be home."

"Very well," said the fairy. "Perhaps I can show you one before she
comes back. Which square shall it be this time?"

"I've had the red, and the yellow, and the green, and ever so many: I
wonder if that brown one has a good story to it."

"You might choose it and see," said the fairy. So Teddy chose that one,
and then the fairy began to count. "One, two, three, four, five," she
counted, and so on and on until she reached "FORTY-NINE!"

* * * * * * * *

"Why, how funny!" cried Teddy.

He was nowhere at all but on the back door-step, and he sat there just
as naturally as though he were not in a story at all. Then the back gate
opened, and in through it came a little withered old woman, wearing a
brown cloak, and a brown hood drawn over her head. "Why, Counterpane
Fairy!" cried Teddy, but when she raised her head and looked at him he
saw that it was not the Counterpane Fairy after all, but an old Italian
woman carrying a basket on her arm.

"You buy something, leetle boy?" she said.

"I can't," said Teddy. "I haven't any money except what's in my bank,
but I'll ask Hannah and maybe she will."

So saying he ran into the kitchen. The clock was ticking on the wall,
and the room smelled of fresh-baked bread, but it was empty. Opening
the door of the stairway, Teddy called, "Hannah! Hannah!" There was
no answer; it all seemed strangely still upstairs. "She must have gone
out," Teddy said to himself.

When he went back to the outside door the old Italian had put down her
basket and was sitting on the step beside it. She did not seem at all
surprised when he told her he could not find anyone. "You not find
anyone, and you not have money," she said. "Then I tell you what I do;
you put your hand in dis baskit, and I give you what you take; I make
what you