_Wet Magic_ [Illustration] [Illustration: _The sea came pouring in._] _Wet Magic_ E. NESBIT WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY H. R. MILLAR _Copyright © 1913 by E Nesbit_ _Illustrations copyright © 1913 by H. R. Millar_ _To Dr. E. N. da C. Andrade_, FROM E. NESBIT [Illustration] WELL HALL, KENT _Contents_ CHAPTER I SABRINA FAIR 1 CHAPTER II THE CAPTIVE 13 CHAPTER III THE RESCUE 30 CHAPTER IV GRATITUDE 51 CHAPTER V CONSEQUENCES 61 CHAPTER VI THE MERMAID’S HOME 69 CHAPTER VII THE SKIES ARE FALLING 84 CHAPTER VIII THE WATER-WAR 101 CHAPTER IX THE BOOK PEOPLE 116 CHAPTER X THE UNDER FOLK 135 CHAPTER XI THE PEACEMAKER 154 CHAPTER XII THE END 167 _Illustrations_ _The sea came pouring in._ _Frontispiece_ “_We die in captivity._” _26_ “_‘Translucent wave,’ indeed!_” _42_ “_The police._” _54_ _And disappeared entirely._ _59_ _She caught Kathleen in her arms._ _79_ _The golden door._ _82_ _The Swordfish Brigade._ _103_ _The First Dipsys._ _110_ _Book Hatefuls._ _122_ _Book Heroines._ _130_ _In the net._ _137_ _The Hall of Public Archives._ _149_ _The chargers of the Horse Marines._ _152_ CHAPTER ONE _Sabrina Fair_ THAT GOING TO THE SEASIDE was the very beginning of everything—only it seemed as though it were going to be a beginning without an end, like the roads on the Sussex downs which look like roads and then look like paths, and then turn into sheep tracks, and then are just grass and furze bushes and tottergrass and harebells and rabbits and chalk. The children had been counting the days to The Day. Bernard indeed had made a calendar on a piece of cardboard that had once been the bottom of the box in which his new white sandshoes came home. He marked the divisions of the weeks quite neatly in red ink, and the days were numbered in blue ink, and every day he crossed off one of those numbers with a piece of green chalk he happened to have left out of a penny box. Mavis had washed and ironed all the dolls’ clothes at least a fortnight before The Day. This was thoughtful and farsighted of her, of course, but it was a little trying to Kathleen, who was much younger and who would have preferred to go on playing with her dolls in their dirtier and more familiar state. “Well, if you do,” said Mavis, a little hot and cross from the ironing board, “I’ll never wash anything for you again, not even your face.”