David looked down at his own hand for a moment, and saw that Mr. and Mrs. Dose were both sitting there, and he supposed it must have been he who had asked for them. The cork of the bottle that Mrs. Dose carried was continually coming out, and she kept murmuring to herself, ‘It’s a glass stopper, I want, it is!’ Miss Bones was sitting there too. She had nearly finished the sirloin of beef she had asked for, and only a few shreds of meat were left on it. ‘Then have I collected you?’ asked David. ‘I can ask for all the rest, can’t I? Is nobody else playing?’ Miss Bones was sitting on his thumb. Somehow she looked quite life-size, and yet David did not feel any bigger than she. She was still gnawing her sirloin of beef, and tore off large pieces of gristle with her hands, just dropping them on David’s knee, or on the note-books of the Rhyme family who had got a good deal smaller, but were still sitting round him and writing. [Illustration: Miss Bones sitting on David’s thumb] ‘Collect yourself,’ she said. ‘You’ve got to collect yourself before you win. Where’s your father and mother, for instance? Ask for Mrs. Blaize, the fireman’s wife, and get her, and then we shall begin to believe in you.’ David felt that it was quite silly to mind whether Miss Bones believed in him or not. But he knew that if he called out ‘Mother!’ or ‘Mrs. Blaize, the fireman’s wife,’ nothing whatever would happen. Yet somehow he had to account for Mrs. Blaize, the fireman’s wife, not being there. ‘My mother isn’t feeling very well,’ he said. ‘Perhaps she may have gone to sleep, and it would be a pity to disturb her.’ ‘Mother malingering,’ announced Miss Bones contemptuously. ‘Where’s your father, then?’ David suddenly felt that this was a most ridiculous position. Hitherto he had always played with the happy families, and now they were playing with him. And they were so fierce and unkind, like wasps. ‘I can’t tell where my father is,’ he said. ‘I haven’t seen him all evening. And I’m getting so tired: mayn’t we stop?’ There was a sudden stir among the newer families, and Mr. Funk, the bather, ran up to him. He was dressed in a striped bathing-dress, and all his teeth chattered. ‘I believe you’re a Funk,’ he said. ‘I believe you belong to my family. I’m collecting you. Come on, Master Funk.’ ‘I’m not Master Funk,’ said David indignantly. ‘Haven’t got him. My turn.’ Miss Bones threw the remains of her sirloin at the Rhymes. It fell in their ink-bottle and splashed them frightfully, but they were already so covered with ink that a little more didn’t matter. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand, and sidled a little nearer David. ‘That’s right: it’s your turn,’ she whispered. ‘Remember you’ve got me, Don’t ask for me.’ ‘I shouldn’t think of it,’ said David. ‘What I want is the concert. I came here for a concert. I want to sit down and be quiet a little. Nobody knows all the things I’ve been doing.’ ‘And nobody cares,’ said Miss Bones.