"
"I," rejoined Gerald in gloom, "was just going to have steak and
fried potatoes."
The silence, and the darkness, and the earthy scent were all they
had now.
"I always wondered what it would be like," said Jimmy in low,
even tones, "to be buried alive. And now I know! Oh! his voice
suddenly rose to a shriek, "it isn't true, it isn't! It's a dream that's
what it is!"
There was a pause while you could have counted ten. Then "Yes,"
said Gerald bravely, through the scent and the silence and the
darkness, "it's just a dream, Jimmy, old chap. We'll just hold on,
and call out now and then just for the lark of the thing. But it's
really only a dream, of course."
Of course, said Jimmy in the silence and the darkness and the
scent of old earth.
There is a curtain, thin as gossamer, clear as glass, strong as iron,
that hangs for ever between the world of magic and the world that
seems to us to be real. And when once people have found one of
the little weak spots in that curtain which are marked by magic
rings, and amulets, and the like, almost anything may happen.
Thus it is not surprising that Mabel and Kathleen, conscientiously
conducting one of the dullest dolls tea-parties at which either had
ever assisted, should suddenly, and both at once, have felt a
strange, unreasonable, but quite irresistible desire to return
instantly to the Temple of Flora even at the cost of leaving the
dolls tea-service in an unwashed state, and only half the raisins
eaten.
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