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'Mother dear, said Anthea.
'Yes, love-a-duck, said mother.
'About cook, said Anthea.  "I know where she is.'
'Do you, dear? said mother.  Well, I wouldn't take her back after the way she has behaved.'
'It's not her fault, said Anthea.  May I tell you about it from the beginning?'
Mother laid down her pen, and her nice face had a resigned expression. As you know, a resigned
expression always makes you want not to tell anybody anything.
'It's like this, said Anthea, in a hurry:  that egg, you know, that came in the carpet; we put it in the fire
and it hatched into the Phoenix, and the carpet was a wishing carpet-and-'
'A very nice game, darling, said mother, taking up her pen.  Now do be quiet. I've got a lot of letters to
write. I'm going to Bournemouth to-morrow with the Lamb-and there's that bazaar.'
Anthea went back to x y z, and mother's pen scratched busily.
'But, mother, said Anthea, when mother put down the pen to lick an envelope,  the carpet takes us
wherever we like-and-'
'I wish it would take you where you could get a few nice Eastern things for my bazaar, said mother.  I
promised them, and I've no time to go to Liberty's now.'
'It shall, said Anthea,  but, mother-'
'Well, dear, said mother, a little impatiently, for she had taken up her pen again.
'The carpet took us to a place where you couldn't have whooping-cough, and the Lamb hasn't whooped
since, and we took cook because she was so tiresome, and then she would stay and be queen of the
savages. They thought her cap was a crown, and-'
'Darling one, said mother,  you know I love to hear the things you make up-but I am most awfully busy.'
'But it's true, said Anthea, desperately.
'You shouldn't say that, my sweet, said mother, gently. And then Anthea knew it was hopeless.
'Are you going away for long? asked Anthea.
'I've got a cold, said mother,  and daddy's anxious about it, and the Lamb's cough.'
'He hasn't coughed since Saturday, the Lamb's eldest sister interrupted.
'I wish I could think so, mother replied.  And daddy's got to go to Scotland. I do hope you'll be good
children.'
'We will, we will, said Anthea, fervently.  When's the bazaar?'
'On Saturday, said mother,  at the schools. Oh, don't talk any more, there's a treasure! My head's going
round, and I've forgotten how to spell whooping-cough.'
Mother and the Lamb went away, and father went away, and there was a new cook who looked so like
a frightened rabbit that no one had the heart to do anything to frighten her any more than seemed natural
to her.
The Phoenix begged to be excused. It said it wanted a week's rest, and asked that it might not be
disturbed. And it hid its golden gleaming self, and nobody could find it.
So that when Wednesday afternoon brought an unexpected holiday, and every one decided to go
somewhere on the carpet, the journey had to be undertaken without the Phoenix. They were debarred
from any carpet excursions in the evening by a sudden promise to mother, exacted in the agitation of
parting, that they would not be out after six at night, except on Saturday, when they were to go to the
bazaar, and were pledged to put on their best clothes, to wash themselves to the uttermost, and to clean
their nails-not with scissors, which are scratchy and bad, but with flat-sharpened ends of wooden
matches, which do no harm to any one's nails.
'Let's go and see the Lamb, said Jane.
But every one was agreed that if they appeared suddenly in Bournemouth it would frighten mother out of
her wits, if not into a fit. So they sat on the carpet, and thought and thought and thought till they almost
began to squint.
'Look here, said Cyril,  I know. Please carpet, take us somewhere where we can see the Lamb and
mother and no one can see us.'
'Except the Lamb, said Jane, quickly.
And the next moment they found themselves recovering from the upside-down movement-and there they
were sitting on the carpet, and the carpet was laid out over another thick soft carpet of brown
pine-needles. There were green pine-trees overhead, and a swift clear little stream was running as fast as
ever it could between steep banks-and there, sitting on the pine-needle carpet, was mother, without her
hat; and the sun was shining brightly, although it was November-and there was the Lamb, as jolly as jolly
and not whooping at all.
'The carpet's deceived us, said Robert, gloomily;  mother will see us directly she turns her head.'
But the faithful carpet had not deceived them.
Mother turned her dear head and looked straight at them, and DID NOT SEE THEM!
'We're invisible, Cyril whispered:  what awful larks!'
But to the girls it was not larks at all. It was horrible to have mother looking straight at them, and her face
keeping the same, just as though they weren't there.
'I don't like it, said Jane.  Mother never looked at us like that before. Just as if she didn't love us-as if we
were somebody else's children, and not very nice ones either-as if she didn't care whether she saw us or
not.'
'It is horrid, said Anthea, almost in tears.
But at this moment the Lamb saw them, and plunged towards the carpet, shrieking,  Panty, own
Panty-an Pussy, an Squiggle-an Bobs, oh, oh!' [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]