Wyndham by this time has joined the group, and, scarcely knowing how, finds himself sitting on half of a rug, the other half of which belongs to his tenant. ‘I want to tell my own story,’ says Tommy with determination. He is evidently a boy possessed of much firmness, and one not to be ‘done’ by anyone if he can help it. ‘But, Tommy,’ persists Susan, who has dismal reasons for dreading his literary efforts, ‘I think you had better not tell one just now. We—that is—’ ‘Oh, do let him tell it!’ says Ella softly. ‘My dear Susan,’ says Crosby, ‘would you deprive us of an entertainment so unique—one we may never enjoy again?’ ‘Well, go on, Tommy,’ says Susan, resigning herself to the worst. ‘There once was a man,’ begins Tommy; and pauses. Silence reigns around. ‘An’ he fell into a big bit of water.’ The silence grows profounder. ‘’Twas as big as this’—making a movement of his short arms a foot or so from the ground. At this there are distinct groans of fear. ‘An’ he was drownded—a little fish ate him.’ ‘Oh, Tommy!’ says Susan, in woeful tones. She can now pretend to be frightened with a free heart. Evidently Tommy’s story this time is going to be of the mildest order. ‘He didn’t really eat him?’ ‘He did—he did!’ says Tommy, delighted at Susan’s fright. ‘He ate him all up—every bit of him!’ Here Susan lets her face fall into her hands, and Tommy relents. ‘But he wasn’t killed,’ says he. He looks anxiously at Susan’s bowed head. ‘No, he wasn’t.’ Susan lifts her head, and shakes it at him reproachfully. ‘Well, he wasn’t, really,’ says Tommy again. This repetition is not only meant as a help to Susan to mitigate her extreme grief, but to give him pause whilst he makes up another chapter. ‘Oh, are you sure?’ asks Susan tragically. ‘I am. The fish swallowed him, but he came up again.’ ‘Who gave the emetic?’ asks Dominick; but very properly no one attends to him. ‘Yes; well, what’s after that?’ asks Betty. ‘Well—’ Tommy stares at the earth, and then, with happy inspiration, adds: ‘The nasty witch got him.’ ‘Poor old soul!’ says Carew. ‘The witch, Tommy? But—’ ‘Yes, the witch’—angrily. ‘An’ then the goat said—’ ‘Goat! What goat?’ asks Ella very naturally, considering all things. ‘That goat,’ says Tommy, who really is wonderful. He points his lovely fat thumb down to where, in the distant field, a goat is browsing. His wandering eye had caught it as he vaguely talked, and he had at once embezzled it and twisted it into his imagination. ‘Yes?’ says Susan, seeing the child pause, and trying to help him. ‘The goat?’ ‘The goat an’ the witch—’ Long pause here, and plain incapacity to proceed. Tommy has evidently come face to face with a _cul de sac_. ‘Hole in the ballad,’ says Dominick to Betty in a low tone. ‘Go on, Tommy,’ says Susan encouragingly. Really, Tommy’s story is so presentable this time that she quite likes to give him a lift, as it were.