“Yes, but why kill him?” questioned Wendell. “Why not just change him into something good and harmless and useful. The Beauteous Maiden would like that just as well, wouldn’t she?”
“Well, you can ask her,” said the Pixie. “This is the age of labor-saving. Only, killing seems more definite, somehow, more final. But you can ask her.”
“I’ll try to get her on the ’phone, now,” said Wendell, “and you be thinking up something to change him to. And say, look in the Book and find the charm for it.”
Wendell was gone for some time. “I couldn’t get her,” he said when he returned. “But I’m sure she’ll be willing. We’ll go ahead and plan something anyway. Did you find a charm?”
“Oh, yes, loads of them,” said the Pixie. “Just listen to these:—
“‘TO CHANGE A HUMAN BEING INTO A TURTLE.
TO CHANGE A HUMAN BEING INTO A BUTTERFLY.
TO CHANGE A HUMAN BEING INTO A STONE—’ That might be good,—
‘TO CHANGE A HUMAN BEING INTO A DRAGON—’ He is that already.”
“Hold on,” said Wendell. “We don’t want any of those. Find a general one, to change him into any old thing. We can decide what afterwards.”
“All right,” said the Pixie. “I’ll keep on looking, and you keep on thinking.”
“We might change him into a janitor,” suggested Wendell, who had been looking idly out of the window until his eye fell on the janitor of Sammy’s apartment house. “He’s useful, you know. He puts out ashes and runs the furnace.”
“Oh, that would never do,” cried the Pixie. “That Giant has shown he can’t be trusted in any position of absolute authority and unlimited despotism. You must curtail his powers instead of enlarging them.”