“Tearful heart goes lame they say, But smiling heart runs all the way!” she repeated, remembering an old rhyme her mother used to sing to her when she was “quite a little thing” out in India. CHAPTER XIV. INSIDE A CROCODILE Coppertop had travelled many miles, and was growing very tired, when she remembered that she was on an island, and therefore must be going round and round in her search for the crocodile. And now the question arose as to which was chasing which. “I can’t be running after him and away from him at the same time, can I?” she exclaimed. “Was that question addressed to me?” chirped a small blue bird, from the branch of a baobab tree. “Oh, yes, if you like,” said Coppertop, not at all surprised to be conversing with a strange bird; nothing surprised her now. “If only I had brought Pudgy with me, instead of Miss Smiler,” she mused, “he would have been able to tell me!” “Who is Pudgy?” asked the Bird, who was very curious. “Why, my little bronze Golliwog, of course.” “Golliwog! Golliwog!” exclaimed the Bird, putting his little blue head first on one side and then on the other. “Never tasted Golliwog! Don’t suppose it grows in these parts.” “It isn’t to eat!” cried Coppertop, glancing nervously behind her as she hurried along. “Not to EAT! Then what’s the use of it? Everything is to eat here, and everything eats everything else,” explained the Bird, “until there’s nothing else left to eat anything else!” “What happens then?” “Then! Oh, then we turn back and start the other way,” chirped the Bird, with an air of great wisdom. But Coppertop found this more puzzling than the question as to which was being chased, she or the crocodile. “Which is what you’d better do,” continued the Bird. “Which--what?” asked the child, very much confused. “Why, you’d better turn round and go the other way,” said the Bird. “And meet the crocodile face to face! Thank you very much, but I’d rather not!” replied Coppertop with decision. “Well, it’s the only way!” cried the Bird, with a shrug of his wings, “otherwise you and the crocodile will go round and round for ever! And that’s an awful long time.” “I have it!” exclaimed Coppertop; “I’ll fly across the island and catch the crocodile in the flank!” “Oh, yes!” said the Bird, but he didn’t really understand, and she couldn’t wait to explain any further. So, spreading her wings, she flew across the island. * * * * * When she reached the other side an unexpected sight met her eyes! Close by the water’s edge lay the crocodile, motionless as a rock. Its tail was still in the water, as though it had fallen asleep in the very act of crawling out. “It looks very much like Mrs. Grudge!” thought the child. “Just her expression--especially about the teeth! I wonder if it IS Mrs. Grudge! It might be, in a kind of way.”