s mother wished the children to go downstairs to her for a
little. Jeanne jumped up, delighted to welcome any change.

"You must keep the story for another day, Marcelline," she said, as she
ran out of the room.

"I am getting too old to tell stories," said Marcelline, half to
herself, half to Hugh, who was following his cousin more slowly. He
stopped for a moment.

"Too old?" he repeated.

"Yes, Monsieur Cheri, too old," the nurse replied. "The thoughts do not
come so quickly as they once did, and the words, too, hobble along like
lamesters on crutches."

"But," said Hugh, half timidly, "it is never--you would never, I mean,
be too old to visit that country, where there are so many stories to be
found?"

"Perhaps not," said Marcelline, "but even if I found them, I might not
be able to tell them. Go and look for them for yourself, Monsieur
Cheri; you have not half seen the tapestry castle yet."

But when Hugh would have asked her more she would not reply, only smiled
and shook her head. So the boy went slowly downstairs after Jeanne,
wondering what old Marcelline could mean, half puzzled and half pleased.

"Only," he said to himself, "if I get into the castle, Jeanne really
must come with me, especially if it is to hear stories."

CHAPTER VII

WINGS AND CATS.

"And all their cattish gestures plainly spoke
They thought the affair they'd come upon no joke."
CHARLES LAMB.

Some days went on, and nothing more was said by the children about the
adventures which had so puzzled poor Hugh. After a while he seemed to
lose the wish to talk about them to little Jeanne; or rather, he began
to feel as if he could not, that the words would not come, or that if
they did, they would not tell what he wanted. He thought about the
strange things he had seen very often, but it was as if he had read of
them rather than as if he had seen and heard them, or as if they had
happened to some one else. Whenever he saw Dudu and Houpet and the rest
of the pets, he looked at them at first in a half dreamy way, wondering
if they too were puzzled about it all, or if, being really fairies, they
did not find anything to puzzle them! The only person (for, after all,
he could often not prevent himself from looking upon all the animals as
persons)--the only person who he somehow felt sure _did_ understand him,
was Marcelline, and this was a great satisfaction. She said not