"And I made him give me his museum-key before he went out, so that I might come here after my tea," she went on. "It's such fun—nurse can't come after me when I'm in the museum, because nobody must come in without Grandpapa's leave. She can only rap at the door, and call. Now you are going to tell me about all these things;" and she waved her hand toward the cases. "I want to know about every single thing."
"I'm afraid I can't tell you much, Miss, because I have only begun to learn," I said.
"Well, then, you can tell me the beginning, just as far as you have learnt," said she. "Come, what is this big round stone? Look how it is marked."
"That's an ammonite," I said, glad to know the first thing she asked.
"An am-mo-nite?" said she. "Yes; go on," and she nodded her head.
So I told her what little I was able, how the ammonite had once been a living sea-creature, swimming about in the ocean; and how it had somehow died out, so that no ammonite was ever found now alive; and how the only ones ever seen were these fossil ammonites, which had lived so very, very long ago, that their remains were turned to stone. I showed her some tiny little ammonites, beside the big one she had noticed first.
For the best part of an hour she kept me busy, either answering questions or saying I couldn't answer them. Sometimes she would murmur, "How clever you are!" and quite as often it was, "What! don't you know that!" So I was in no danger of being made conceited.
All went smoothly enough so far, and the little lady was as sweet and pleasant as she could be; but by-and-by we came to a small glass case, which had Indian curiosities in it, and she stooped over to look at them.
"Oh, what are those funny things?" she cried. "Look! are they stones? What do you call them? 'Catseyes!' Not real eyes of real cats?"
"It's a sort of precious stone," I told her. "They are worth a lot, I believe."