‘You’ve given me too much curds,’ said a voice behind the door. ‘I’ve told you before to find some way to weigh the whey. It’s a curd before. Take it away!’
‘That must be Miss Muffet,’ thought David. ‘There’s a girl creeping into it after all. I wonder if she makes puns all the time. I wish I hadn’t knocked.’
‘No, I’m rationed about puns,’ said Miss Muffet, as if he had spoken aloud, ‘and I’ve had my week’s allowance now. But a margin’s allowed for margarine. Butter—margarine,’ she said in explanation.
‘I saw that, said David.
‘No, you didn’t: you heard it. Now, come in and shut the door, because the tuffet’s blowing about. And the moment you’ve shut the door, shut your eyes too, because I’m not quite ready. I’ll sing to you my last ballad while you’re waiting. I shall make it up as I go along.’
Accordingly David shut the door, and then his eyes, and Miss Muffet began to sing in a thin cracked voice:
‘As it fell out upon a day
When margarine was cheap,
It filled up all the grocers’ shops
In buckets wide and deep.