We had never seen the inside of his house, but we could imagine what it was like. No doubt he kept his servants in proper order and did not allow them to tidy up, so that his things lay all over the room where he could find them when he wanted them. He had a friendly cat, with whom we were acquainted, so that he would not lack company, and probably on wet days when he could not go out into the garden he had the goat in to play with him. He went to bed when he liked and got up when he liked, and had cake for every meal instead of common bread. A man like that would be quite capable of having a sweetshop in one of the rooms, with a real pair of scales, so that he could help himself whenever he wanted to. Whenever our own lives grew a little dull we played at being the wool-gatherer, but although he occupied such a large part of our thoughts we never dared to speak to him, because we were afraid of his extraordinary wisdom. This was not our normal reason for avoiding the society of grown-up people. When one day a funeral passed us in the street, and we were told that it was the wool-gatherer’s, we shook our heads sceptically. The coffin was quite new and shiny, and all the horses had their hoofs neatly blacked, and we thought we knew our man better than that. But as day followed day and we met him no more our doubts were overcome, and we knew that he was dead. After a while his will was published in the local newspaper, and the grown-ups were greatly impressed, because it seemed that he had been very rich and had left all his money to hospitals. Secretly we patronised them for their tardy discovery of our man’s worth; it had not needed any newspaper to tell us that he was remarkable. But when some new people took his house and cut down all the bushes and tidied up the garden we were really hurt, and began to realise what we had lost. Where should we play now these hot nights of summer when the hours passed so slowly and we could not sleep? They had made his beautiful wilderness as dull as our own, and our dreams must find a new playground. We never heard what happened to the goat.