The Greatest Works of E. Nesbit (220+ Titles in One Illustrated Edition). Эдит Несбит
to wash the sand out of the Lamb's eyes somehow. Of course the ginger hurt horribly, and he howled more than ever. And, amid his anguish of kicking, the bottle was upset and the beautiful ginger-beer frothed out into the sand and was lost for ever.
It was then that Robert, usually a very patient brother, so far forgot himself as to say—
"Anybody would want him, indeed! Only they don't; Martha doesn't, not really, or she'd jolly well keep him with her. He's a little nuisance, that's what he is. It's too bad. I only wish everybody did want him with all their hearts; we might get some peace in our lives."
The Lamb stopped howling now, because Jane had suddenly remembered that there is only one safe way of taking things out of little children's eyes, and that is with your own soft wet tongue. It is quite easy if you love the Baby as much as you ought to do.
Then there was a little silence. Robert was not proud of himself for having been so cross, and the others were not proud of him either. You often notice that sort of silence when someone has said something it ought not to—and everyone else holds its tongue and waits for the one who oughtn't to have said it is sorry.
The silence was broken by a sigh—a breath suddenly let out. The children's heads turned as if there had been a string tied to each nose, and somebody had pulled all the strings at once.
And everyone saw the Sand-fairy sitting quite close to them, with the expression which it used as a smile on its hairy face.
"Good-morning," it said; "I did that quite easily! Everyone wants him now."
"It doesn't matter," said Robert sulkily, because he knew he had been behaving rather like a pig. "No matter who wants him—there's no one here to—anyhow."
"Ingratitude," said the Psammead, "is a dreadful vice."
"We're not ungrateful," Jane made haste to say, "but we didn't really want that wish. Robert only just said it. Can't you take it back and give us a new one?"
"No—I can't," the Sand-fairy said shortly; "chopping and changing—it's not business. You ought to be careful what you do wish. There was a little boy once, he'd wished for a Plesiosaurus instead of an Ichthyosaurus, because he was too lazy to remember the easy names of everyday things, and his father had been very vexed with him, and had made him go to bed before tea-time, and wouldn't let him go out in the nice flint boat along with the other children,—it was the annual school-treat next day,—and he came and flung himself down near me on the morning of the treat, and he kicked his little prehistoric legs about and said he wished he was dead. And of course then he was."
"How awful! said the children all together.
"Only till sunset, of course," the Psammead said; "still it was quite enough for his father and mother. And he caught it when he woke up—I tell you. He didn't turn to stone—I forget why—but there must have been some reason. They didn't know being dead is only being asleep, and you're bound to wake up somewhere or other, either where you go to sleep or in some better place. You may be sure he caught it, giving them such a turn. Why, he wasn't allowed to taste Megatherium for a month after that. Nothing but oysters and periwinkles, and common things like that."
All the children were quite crushed by this terrible tale. They looked at the Psammead in horror. Suddenly the Lamb perceived that something brown and furry was near him.
"Poof, poof, poofy," he said, and made a grab.
"It's not a pussy," Anthea was beginning, when the Sand-fairy leaped back.
"Oh, my left whisker!" it said; "don't let him touch me. He's wet."
Its fur stood on end with horror—and indeed a good deal of the ginger-beer had been spilt on the blue smock of the Lamb.
The Psammead dug with its hands and feet, and vanished in an instant and a whirl of sand.
The children marked the spot with a ring of stones.
"We may as well get along home," said Robert. "I'll say I'm sorry; but anyway if it's no good it's no harm, and we know where the sandy thing is for to-morrow."
The others were noble. No one reproached Robert at all. Cyril picked up the Lamb, who was now quite himself again, and off they went by the safe cart-road.
The cart-road from the gravel-pits joins the road almost directly.
At the gate into the road the party stopped to shift the Lamb from Cyril's back to Robert's. And as they paused a very smart open carriage came in sight, with a coachman and a groom on the box, and inside the carriage a lady—very grand indeed, with a dress all white lace and red ribbons and a parasol all red and white—and a white fluffy dog on her lap with a red ribbon round its neck. She looked at the children, and particularly at the Baby, and she smiled at him. The children were used to this, for the Lamb was, as all the servants said, a "very taking child." So they waved their hands politely to the lady and expected her to drive on. But she did not. Instead she made the coachman stop. And she beckoned to Cyril, and when he went up to the carriage she said—
"Poof, poof, poofy," he said, and made a grab
"What a dear darling duck of a baby! Oh, I should so like to adopt it! Do you think its mother would mind?"
"She'd mind very much indeed," said Anthea shortly.
"Oh, but I should bring it up in luxury, you know. I am Lady Chittenden. You must have seen my photograph in the illustrated papers. They call me a Beauty, you know, but of course that's all nonsense. Anyway"——
She opened, the carriage door and jumped out. She had the wonderfullest red high-heeled shoes with silver buckles. "Let me hold him a minute," she said. And she took the Lamb and held him very awkwardly, as if she was not used to babies.
Then suddenly she jumped into the carriage with the Lamb in her arms and slammed the door, and said, "Drive on!"
The Lamb roared, the little white dog barked, and the coachman hesitated.
"Drive on, I tell you!" cried the lady; and the coachman did, for, as he said afterwards, it was as much as his place was worth not to.
The four children looked at each other, and then with one accord they rushed after the carriage and held on behind. Down the dusty road went the smart carriage, and after it, at double-quick time, ran the twinkling legs of the Lamb's brothers and sisters.
The Lamb howled louder and louder, but presently his howls changed by slow degrees to hiccupy gurgles, and then all was still, and they knew he had gone to sleep.
The carriage went on, and the eight feet that twinkled through the dust were growing quite stiff and tired before the carriage stopped at the lodge of a grand park. The children crouched down behind the carriage, and the lady got out. She looked at the Baby as it lay on the carriage seat, and hesitated.
At double-quick time, ran the twinkling legs of the Lamb's brothers and sisters
"The darling—I won't disturb it," she said, and went into the lodge to talk to the woman there about a setting of eggs that had not turned out well.
The coachman and footman sprang from the box and bent over the sleeping Lamb.
"Fine boy—wish he was mine," said the coachman.
"He wouldn't favour you much," said the groom sourly; "too 'andsome."
The coachman pretended not to hear. He said—
"Wonder at her now—I do really! Hates kids. Got none of her own, and can't abide other folkses'."
The children, crouched in the white dust under the carriage, exchanged uncomfortable glances.
"Tell you what," the coachman went on firmly, "blowed if I don't hide the little nipper in the hedge and tell her his brothers took