"tidy the room," said Johnnie;

"fetch the turf," said Tommy;

"pick up the chips," said Johnnie;

"sort your scraps," said Tommy;

"and do everything. Oh! I wish he hadn't gone away."

"What's that?" said the Tailor, coming in at this moment.

"It's the Brownie, Father," said Tommy. "We are so sorry he went, and
do so wish we had one."

"What nonsense have you been telling them, Mother?" asked the Tailor.

"Heighty teighty," said the old lady, bristling. "Nonsense, indeed! As
good men as you, son Thomas, would as soon have jumped off the crags,
as spoken lightly of _them_, in my mother's young days."

"Well, well," said the Tailor, "I beg their pardon. They never did
aught for me, whatever they did for my forbears; but they're as welcome
to the old place as ever, if they choose to come. There's plenty to
do."

"Would you mind our setting a pan of water, Father?" asked Tommy very
gently. "There's no bread-and-milk."

"You may set what you like, my lad," said the Tailor; "and I wish there
were bread-and-milk for your sakes, bairns. You should have it, had I
got it. But go to bed now."

They lugged out a pancheon, and filled it with more dexterity than
usual, and then went off to bed, leaving the knife in one corner, the
wood in another, and a few splashes of water in their track.

There was more room than comfort in the ruined old farm-house, and the
two boys slept on a bed of cut heather, in what had been the old
malt-loft. Johnnie was soon in the land of dreams, growing rosier and
rosier as he slept, a tumbled apple among the grey heather. But not so
lazy Tommy. The idea of a domesticated Brownie had taken full
possession of his mind; and whither Brownie had gone, where he might be
found, and what would induce him to return, were mysteries he longed to
solve. "There's an owl living in the old shed by the mere," he thought.
"It may be the Old Owl herself, and she knows, Granny says. When
Father's gone to bed, and the moon rises, I'll go." Meanwhile he lay
down.

* * * * *

The moon rose like gold, and went up into the heavens like silver,
flooding the moors with a pale ghostly light, taking the colour out of
the heather, and painting black shadows under the stone walls. Tommy
opened his eyes, and ran to the window. "The moon has risen," said he,
and crept softly down the ladder, through the kitchen, where was the
pan of water, but no Brownie, and so out on to the moor.