Fairies -- Fiction; Great Britain -- History -- Edward VII, 1901-1910 -- Fiction; Siblings -- Fiction; Wishes -- Fiction
I don't know how the baker's boy got down, but I do know that he
missed the cart, and got into the very hottest of hot water when he
turned up at last at the bakehouse. I am sorry for him, but, after
all, it was quite right that he should be taught that English boys
mustn't use their feet when they fight, but their fists. Of course
the water he got into only became hotter when he tried to tell his
master about the boy he had licked and the giant as high as a
church, because no one could possibly believe such a tale as that.
Next day the tale was believed - but that was too late to be of any
use to the baker's boy.
When Robert rejoined the others he found them in the garden.
Anthea had thoughtfully asked Martha to let them have dinner out
there - because the dining-room was rather small, and it would have
been so awkward to have a brother the size of Robert in there. The
Lamb, who had slept peacefully during the whole stormy morning, was
now found to be sneezing, and Martha said he had a cold and would
be better indoors.
'And really it's just as well,' said Cyril, 'for I don't believe
he'd ever have stopped screaming if he'd once seen you the awful
size you are!'
Robert was indeed what a draper would call an 'out-size' in boys.
He found himself able to step right over the iron gate in the front
garden.
Martha brought out the dinner - it was cold veal and baked
potatoes, with sago pudding and stewed plums to follow.
She of course did not notice that Robert was anything but the usual
size, and she gave him as much meat and potatoes as usual and no
more. You have no idea how small your usual helping of dinner
looks when you are many times your proper size. Robert groaned,
and asked for more bread. But Martha would not go on giving more
bread for ever. She was in a hurry, because the keeper intended to
call on his way to Benenhurst Fair, and she wished to be dressed
smartly before he came.
'I wish WE were going to the Fair,' said Robert.
'You can't go anywhere that size,' said Cyril.
'Why not?' said Robert. 'They have giants at fairs, much bigger
ones than me.'
'Not much, they don't,' Cyril was beginning, when Jane screamed
'Oh!' with such loud suddenness that they all thumped her on the
back and asked whether she had swallowed a plum-stone.
'No,' she said, breathless from being thumped, 'it's - it's not a
plum-stone. it's an idea. Let's take Robert to the Fair, and get
them to give us money for showing him! Then we really shall get
something out of the old Sammyadd at last!'
'Take me, indeed!' said Robert indignantly. 'Much more likely me
take you!'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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