Look which way she would she could not see them. They had disappeared clean out of sight before she could have said “Daddy Coax.”
“It certainly is Vanish Land as well as Naughty Children Land,” thought Kitty dejectedly. “How can I ever find Daddy Coax?”
She perceived she was now standing on the edge of the wood and at the entrance of a lane. The lane seemed to lead to Untidy Village. She could just see the houses with the broken window-panes, the weedy gardens, the ground all covered with broken toys and torn books.
Kitty took heart. “I’ll run down the lane. I am sure Daddy Coax lives in the village.”
She had not gone many steps down the lane when she came upon a party of boys and girls having a picnic. Gracious! how they gobbled; it was a sight to see. They doubled up whole buns into their mouths, crammed down tarts and lumps of cakes. Their cheeks were puffed out, their noses hidden. Every now and then they gave a grasp, stroked themselves up and down, and set to again.
“Could you please tell me the way to Daddy Coax’s house?” asked Kitty politely, trying to look as if she were not at all astonished at the quantity the children were eating or their manner of gobbling.
They said something that sounded between a snort, a sneeze, and a mouthful of pudding, and went on cramming.
Thin birds hovered above them, lean dogs and cats peered hungrily at the feast; but when the birds came down to pick up the crumbs, or the dogs advanced with an entreating whine, and the cats slowly with glittering eyes, the gobblers, with a hiss, waved their arms and frightened away the beggars.
“I think it is perfectly disgusting to be so greedy,” said Kitty, turning her back upon the picnickers. She walked off slowly. She could not bear the sight of the hungry animals repulsed by these children, who looked all fat cheeks.
No wonder the dogs she met appeared to be always watching their opportunity to bite somebody’s legs; that the cats seemed to have no purr in them; the birds no sweet thanksgiving song; that the crests of the cocks and hens hung depressed like bits of red rags out of an old-clothes shop.