"Nonsense!" said Grandmother Grey. "You can't fool me with your nettles, and nonsense, and hedges, and ditches. What do I care about all that? You know as well as I do that you came here to _steal cake_ and _drink cream_. Besides, you have broken my best china-cup!" The Elf gave a sigh, and looked up in the air; then took a glance at Martha's broom, and as he looked down he thought he saw Toody winking at him. So he just smiled and said: "I declare, by the tom-tit's folly, and the mole's pin-hole eye, and the woodpecker's thorny tongue, that I have told you the truth." Noticing that Toody was still winking at him he kept on, and told the following story: "One day when I was loafing about in the wood I heard a strange noise in the bushes. I peeped over the edge, and there was a robin bathing in the brook. It ruffled its feathers with a spattering sound, made itself into a fussy ball, and threw up a shower of water; but what I most noticed was its eye--its eye!--" "Its eye--its eye?" broke in all the children. "What about its eye?" The Elf glanced again at Toody, and he saw that this time she gave him a quiet nod, as much as to say, "I'll find you a chance." So the Elf gave a downward squint at the closed cage-door, just for a hint. Then he scratched his cheek, jumped down on the floor of the cage, and began to act out a "robin," just as if he were on the stage. "Its eye--its eye? Well, just as soon as it caught a glimpse of me it bobbed--took wing--and was out of sight. Then back it came again, as if angry. It looked like an alderman lecturing the poor, but meaning really to--_unlock the cage!_ I mean--to try to fool me. See! How high it flies. Clear up to the tip-top of the tree. Look at its large bright eye! There! There! See how it bobs--makes a quick bow, just as I am doing--points down its tail and up its nose--and off it goes!" And out and off went the Elf! "Run, Tiny, run! Oh, Kitty! Twig! The little rascal is gone! Run, Toody, run! Ah, I caught you; you are the one who loosened the cage-door. Run, Tiny! Oh, Kitty, Twig, and Crocus, that robin redbreast story was only meant to fool us!" Thus cried Grandmother Grey, till she was breathless.