“Yes, but it wouldn’t carry _me_,” Bob objected; “I’m too heavy.” “I’ll have to shrink you,” Fitz Mee said quietly. “_Shrink_ me?” drawing back in alarm bordering on consternation. “Yes; it won’t hurt you.” “How—how’re you going to do it?” “I’ll show you.” The goblin got upon his feet, took a small bottle from his waistcoat pocket and deliberately unscrewed the top and shook out a tiny tablet. “There,” he said, “take that.” “Uk-uh!” grunted Bob, compressing his lips and shaking his head. “I don’t like to take pills.” “This isn’t a pill,” Fitz explained, “it’s a tablet.” “It’s all the same,” the boy declared obstinately. “Won’t you take it?” “No.” “Then you can’t go with me.” “I can’t?” The goblin shook his head. “Isn’t there some other way you can—can shrink me?” Again Fitz Mee silently shook his head. “W-e-ll,” Bob said slowly and reluctantly, “I’ll take it. But, say?” “Well?” “What’ll it do to me—just make me smaller?” “That’s all.” “How small will it make me?” “About my size,” grinned the goblin. “Oo—h!” ejaculated Bob. “And will it make me as—as _ugly_ as you are?” in grave concern. The goblin clapped his hands over his stomach, wriggled this way and that and laughed till the tears ran down his fat cheeks. “Oh—ho!” he gasped at last. “So you think me ugly, do you?” “Yes, I do,” the lad admitted candidly, a little nettled. “Well, that’s funny,” gurgled the goblin; “for that’s what I think of you. So you see the matter of looks is a matter of taste.” “Huh!” Bob snorted contemptuously. “But will that tablet change my looks? That’s what _I_ want to know.” “No, it won’t,” was the reassuring reply. “And will I always be small—like you?” “Look here!” Fitz Mee croaked hoarsely. “If you’re going with me, stop asking fool questions and take this tablet.” “Give it to me,” Bob muttered, in sheer desperation. And he snatched the tablet and swallowed it. Immediately he shrunk to the size of the goblin. “My!” he cried. “It feels funny to be so little and light.” He sprang from the bed to the window-sill, and anticly danced a jig in his night garment. “Get into your clothes,” the goblin commanded, “and let’s be off.” Bob nimbly leaped to the floor, tore off his night-robe and caught up his trousers. Then he paused, a look of comical consternation upon his apple face. “What’s the matter?” giggled the goblin. “Why—why,” the boy gasped, his mouth wide open, “my clothes are all a mile too big for me!” Fitz Mee threw himself prone upon his stomach, pummeled and kicked the window-sill, and laughed uproariously. CHAPTER II BOB BECOMES AN AËRONAUT “You stop that, you mean old thing!” Bob blustered angrily. The goblin laughed the harder. “Stop it, I say!” the boy shouted, loud enough to waken all the sleepers about the house, he thought. The goblin continued to laugh and rub his fists and kick his heels.