"How tall and strong you've grown, Tyltyl!" said Granny.

And Grandad cried:

"And Mytyl! Just look at her! What pretty hair, what pretty eyes!"

And the Children danced and clapped their hands and flung themselves by turns into the arms of one or the other.

At last, they quieted down a little; and, with Mytyl nestling against Grandad's chest and Tyltyl comfortably perched on Granny's knees, they began to talk of family affairs:

"How are Daddy and Mummy Tyl?" asked Granny.

"Quite well, Granny," said Tyltyl. "They were asleep when we went out."

Granny gave them fresh kisses and said:

"My word, how pretty they are and how nice and clean!... Why don't you come to see us oftener? It is months and months now that you have forgotten us and that we have seen n.o.body...."

"We couldn't, Granny," said Tyltyl, "and to-day it's only because of the Fairy...."

"We are always here," said Granny Tyl, "waiting for a visit from those who are alive. The last time you were here was on All-hallows...."

"All-hallows? We didn't go out that day, for we both had colds!"

"But you thought of us! And, every time you think of us, we wake up and see you again."

Tyltyl remembered that the Fairy had told him this. He had not thought it possible then; but now, with his head on the heart of the dear Granny whom he had missed so much, he began to understand things and he felt that his grandparents had not left him altogether. He asked:

"So you are not really dead?..."

The old couple burst out laughing. When they exchanged their life on earth for another and a much nicer and more beautiful life, they had forgotten the word "dead."

"What does that word 'dead' mean?" asked Gaffer Tyl.

"Why, it means that one's no longer alive!" said Tyltyl.

Grandad and Granny only shrugged their shoulders:

"How stupid the Living are, when they speak of the Others!" was all they said.

And they went over their memories again, rejoicing in being able to chat.

All old people love discussing old times. The future is finished, as far as they are concerned; and so they delight in the present and the past. But we are growing impatient, like Tyltyl; and, instead of listening to them, we will follow our little friend's movements.

He had jumped off Granny's knees and was poking about in every corner, delighted at finding all sorts of things which he knew and remembered:

"Nothing is changed, everything is in its old place!" he cried. And, as he had not been to the old people's home for so long, everything struck him as much nicer; and he added, in the voice of one who knows, "Only everything is prettier!... Hullo, there's the clock with the big hand which I broke the point off and the hole which I made in the door, the day I found Grandad's gimlet...."

"Yes, you've done some damage in your time!" said Grandad. "And there's the plum-tree which you were so fond of climbing, when I wasn't looking...."

Meantime, Tyltyl was not forgetting his errand:

"You haven't the Blue Bird here by chance, I suppose?"

At the same moment, Mytyl, lifting her head, saw a cage:

"Hullo, there's the old blackbird!... Does he still sing?"

As she spoke, the blackbird woke up and began to sing at the top of his voice.

"You see," said Granny, "as soon as one thinks of him...."

Tyltyl was simply amazed at what he saw:

"But he's blue!" he shouted. "Why, that's the bird, the Blue Bird!...

He's blue, blue, blue as a blue gla.s.s marble!... Will you give him to me?"

The grandparents gladly consented; and, full of triumph, Tyltyl went and fetched the cage which he had left by the tree. He took hold of the precious bird with the greatest of care; and it began to hop about in its new home.

"How pleased the Fairy will be!" said the boy, rejoicing at his conquest. "And Light too!"

"Come along," said the grandparents. "Come and look at the cow and the bees."

As the old couple were beginning to toddle across the garden, the children suddenly asked if their little dead brothers and sisters were there too. At the same moment, seven little children, who, up to then, had been sleeping in the house, came tearing like mad into the garden.

Tyltyl and Mytyl ran up to them. They all hustled and hugged one another and danced and whirled about and uttered screams of joy.

"Here they are, here they are!" said Granny. "As soon as you speak of them, they are there, the imps!"

Tyltyl caught a little one by the hair:

"Hullo, Pierrot! So we're going to fight again, as in the old days!...

And Robert!... I say, Jean, what's become of your top?... Madeleine and Pierrette and Pauline!... And here's Riquette!..."

Mytyl laughed:

"Riquette's still crawling on all fours!"

Tyltyl noticed a little dog yapping around them:

"There's Kiki, whose tail I cut off with Pauline's scissors.... He hasn't changed either...."

"No," said Gaffer Tyl, in a voice of great importance, "nothing changes here!"

But, suddenly, amid the general rejoicings, the old people stopped spell-bound: they had heard the small voice of the clock indoors strike eight!

[Ill.u.s.tration: The grandparents and grandchildren sat down to supper]

"How's this?" they asked. "It never strikes nowadays...."

"That's because we no longer think of the time," said Granny. "Was any one thinking of the time?"