'It all collects in there and rises to the top like cream,' he went on, 'and has a little tiny perfume like wild violets, and by walking through it you get clothed and covered with it, and come out again all soft-shiny--' 'What's soft-shiny, please?' 'Something half-primrose and half-moon. You're like a star--' 'But how--like a star?' 'Why,' he explained gently, yet a little disappointed that his adventure was not instantly accepted, 'you shine, and your eyes twinkle, and everybody likes you and thinks you beautiful--' 'Even if you're not?' inquired Jinny. 'But you _are_--' 'Couldn't we go there now? Mother's fast asleep!' suggested Jimbo in a mysterious whisper. He felt a curious excitement. This, he felt, was more real than usual. He glanced at Monkey's eyes a moment. 'Another time,' said Daddy, already half believing in the truth of his adventure, yet not quite sure of himself. 'It collects, and collects, and collects. Sometimes, here and there, a little escapes and creeps out into yellow flowers like dandelions and buttercups. A little, too, slips below the ground and fills up empty cracks between the rocks. Then it hardens, gets dirty, and men dig it out again and call it gold. And some slips out by the roof--though very, very little--and you see it flashing back to find the star it belongs to, and people with telescopes call it a shooting star, and--' It came pouring through him again. 'But when you're in it--in the Cavern,' asked Monkey impatiently; 'what happens then?' 'Well,' he answered with conviction, 'it sticks to you. It sticks to the eyes most, but a little also to the hair and voice, and nobody loves you unless you've got a bit of it somewhere on you. A girl, before any one falls in love with her, has always been there, and people who write stories and music and things--all have got some on their fingers or else nobody cares for what they write--' 'Oh, Daddy, then why don't you go there and get sticky all over with it?' Jinny burst out with sudden eagerness, ever thinking of others before herself. 'I'll go and get some for you--lots and lots.' 'I _have_ been there,' he answered slowly, 'once long, long ago. But it didn't stick very well with me. It wipes off so quickly in the day- time. The sunlight kills it.' 'But you got _some_!' the child insisted. 'And you've got it still, I mean?' 'A little, perhaps, a very little.' All felt the sadness in his voice without understanding it. There was a moment's pause. Then the three of them spoke in a single breath-- 'Please show it to us--_now_,' they cried. 'I'll try,' he said, after a slight hesitation, 'but--er--it's only a rhyme, you see'; and then began to murmur very low for fear of waking Mother: he almost sang it to them. The flock of tiny voices whispered it to his blood. He merely uttered what he heard:--