Part 24

The rainbow had faded away, and Teddy was back in the great high-post bedstead again, with the silk coverlet drawn up over his knees, and the Counterpane Fairy still sitting on top of the hill. Teddy lay looking at her for a while in silence. “Mrs. Fairy, was that a true story like the others?” he asked her at last.

“How should I know?” asked the fairy. “Do I look as though I knew anything about rainbow children? You’d better ask Ellen McFinney; maybe she can tell you.”

“Well, I will,” said Teddy. “I mean to ask her just as soon as ever I’m well.”

He did not have to wait for that, however, for the very next day his mother told him that little Ellen had at last consented to be taken to the hospital, and that perhaps when he saw the little girl again she would be able to walk and run about almost like other children.

CHAPTER EIGHTH. HARRIETT’S DREAM.

Teddy had begged mamma to ask Harriett to come over and play with him after school, but not to tell her that now he was no longer in bed, so when the little girl came running in she was very much surprised. “Why, Teddy, you’re well again, aren’t you?” she cried.

“Yes, now I’m well again,” said Teddy “and mamma says we may each have a little sponge-cake, and she’s going to let us blow soap-bubbles. Would you like to blow soap-bubbles, Harriett?”

“Yes, I guess so,” said Harriett.

So mamma made them a bowl of strong suds, and brought out two pipes, and the children played together very happily for quite a time. Sometimes they threw the bubbles into the air and tried to blow them up to the ceiling; sometimes the children put their pipes close together, so that the bubbles they blew were joined in one lopsided globe.

Last of all they set the bowl on a chair, and kneeling beside it put their pipes into the suds, and blew and blew until quite a soap-bubble castle rose up and touched their noses with wet suds.

Teddy felt a little tired and soapy by that time, so mamma put all the things away, and read them some stories from Grimm’s Fairy Tales.

After that Harriett said she must go home, and indeed it was almost supper-time, so mamma helped her put on her little hat and coat and kissed her good-bye.

Teddy was very tired by the time supper was over; he felt quite willing to be put to bed, and as soon as he was there he sank into a doze.

When he awoke again he was alone; it was quite dark outside, but mamma had set a lamp behind the screen. By its dim light Teddy saw the Counterpane Fairy’s brown hood appearing above the hill, and he heard her sighing to herself: “Oh dear! oh dear!”

“Oh, Mrs. Fairy!” cried the little boy, almost before she had reached the top of the hill, “I’m so glad you’ve come, for I don’t know when mamma will be here. Won’t you show me a story?”

“In a minute! in a minute!” said the fairy. “As soon as I can catch my breath.”

Teddy was so afraid that mamma would come in that he could hardly wait, and when the Counterpane Fairy told him that she was ready and that he might choose a square, he made haste and pointed out a silvery gray one. Then the fairy began to count. “FORTY-NINE!” she cried.

Teddy was walking down a long, smooth, gray road. There was a silvery mist all about him, so that it was almost as though he were walking through the sky, and the road seemed to begin and end in grayness.

He knew that somewhere behind him lay his home, and that in front was the place where he was going, but he did not know what that place was.

At last he reached the edge of a wide gray lake as smooth and as shining as glass. Beside him on the beach a little gray bird was crouching. “Peet-weet! peet-weet!” cried the little gray bird.

It was so close to Teddy’s feet that it seemed to him that with a single movement he could stoop and catch it. Very softly he reached out his hand and the little bird did not stir. “Peet-weet! peet-weet!” it cried. Suddenly with a quick movement he clutched it. For a moment he thought that he felt it in his fingers, all feathery and soft and warm, and then the voice of the Counterpane Fairy cried, “Take care! you’re rumpling my cloak!”

Teddy dropped the bird as though it had burned him, and there it was not a bird at all, but the Counterpane Fairy, who stood smoothing down her cloak and frowning. “Oh! I didn’t know that was you; I thought it was a bird,” cried Teddy.

“A bird!” cried the fairy. “Do I look like a bird?”

Teddy thought that she did, for her nose was long and thin, and her eyes were bright like those of a sparrow, but he did not like to say so. All he said was, “I wonder why I came here?” for now he knew that this was the place that he had been coming to.

“I suppose you came to see the dreams go by,” said the Counterpane Fairy. “I often come for that myself.”

“The dreams go by!” said Teddy. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“Do you see that castle over yonder?” asked the fairy, pointing out across the lake. Teddy looked as hard as he could, and after a while he thought he did see the shadowy roofs and turrets of a great gray castle through the mist.

“I think I do,” he said.