And the old
woman in the bed sometimes opened her eyes and peered curiously,
expectantly, about her. Even in her sleep she looked for things.
Almost, they felt, she seemed aware of their presence near her, she
knew that they were there; she smiled.
A moment later they were in mid-air on their way to the Citadelle,
singing as they went:--
He keeps that only
For the old and lonely,
Who sleep so little that they need the best.
The rest--
The common stuff--
Is good enough
For Fraulein, or for baby, or for mother,
Or any other
Who likes a bit of dust,
And yet can do without it--
If they must...
Already something of the Dawn's faint magic painting lay upon the
world. Roofs shone with dew. The woods were singing, and the flowers
were awake. Birds piped and whistled shrilly from the orchards. They
heard the Mer Dasson murmuring along her rocky bed. The rampart of the
Alps stood out more clearly against the sky.
'We must be _very_ quick,' Cousin Henry flashed across to them,
'quicker than an express train.'
'That's impossible,' cried Jimbo, who already felt the call of waking
into his daily world. 'Hark! There's whistling already....'
The next second, in a twinkling, he was gone. He had left them. His
body had been waked up by the birds that sang and whistled so loudly
in the plane tree outside his window.
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