"Home!" said Cyril, and instantly the cool draught from under the nursery door played upon their legs as they sat. They were all on the carpet still, and the carpet was lying in its proper place on the nursery floor, as calm and unmoved as though it had never been to the theatre or taken part in a fire in its life. Four long breaths of deep relief were instantly breathed. The draught which they had never liked before was for the moment quite pleasant. And they were safe. And everyone else was safe. The theatre had been quite empty when they left. Everyone was sure of that. They presently found themselves all talking at once. Somehow none of their adventures had given them so much to talk about. None other had seemed so real. "Did you notice----?" they said, and "Do you remember----?" When suddenly Anthea's face turned pale under the dirt which it had collected on it during the fire. "Oh," she cried, "mother and father! Oh, how awful! They'll think we're burned to cinders. Oh, let's go this minute and tell them we aren't." "We should only miss them," said the sensible Cyril. "Well--_you_ go, then," said Anthea, "or I will. Only do wash your face first. Mother will be sure to think you are burnt to a cinder if she sees you as black as that. Mother, she'll faint or be ill or something. Oh, I wish we'd never got to know that Phoenix." "Hush!" said Robert; "it's no use being rude to the bird. I suppose it can't help its nature. Perhaps we'd better wash too. Now I come to think of it my hands are rather----" No one had noticed the Phoenix since it had bidden them to step on the carpet. And no one noticed that no one had noticed. All were partially clean, and Cyril was just plunging into his great-coat to go and look for his parents--he, and not unjustly, called it looking for a needle in a bundle of hay--when the sound of father's latchkey in the front door sent everyone bounding up the stairs. "Are you all safe?" cried mother's voice; "are you all safe?" and the next moment she was kneeling on the linoleum of the hall, trying to kiss four damp children at once, and laughing and crying by turns, while father stood looking on and saying he was blessed or something. "But how did you guess we'd come home?" said Cyril, later, when everyone was calm enough for talking.