“Very well,” said Meg. “My name’s Margaret Macleod, I’m called Meg for short. My brother’s name is Robin, and Ben’s is Ben Nowell. Where shall we go first?”
“You are the leader of the party,” he answered, his face beginning to brighten a little. “Where shall it be?”
“The Palace of the Genius of the Flowers,” she said.
“Is that what it is called?” he asked.
“That’s what we call it,” she explained. “That’s part of the fairy story. We are part of a fairy story, and all these are palaces that the Genii built for the Great Magician.”
“That’s first-rate,” he said. “Just tell us about it. Ben and I have not heard.”
At first she had wondered if she could tell her stories to a grown-up person, but there was something in his voice and face that gave her the feeling that she could. She laughed a little when she began; but he listened with enjoyment that was so plain, and Ben, walking by her side, looked up with such eager, enraptured, and wondering eyes, that she went on bravely. It grew, as stories will, in being told, and it was better than it had been the day before. Robin himself saw that, and leaned towards her as eagerly as Ben.
By the time they entered the Palace of the Flowers and stood among the flame of colors, and beneath the great palm fronds swaying under the crystal globe that was its dome, she had warmed until she was all aglow, and as full of fancies as the pavilions were of blossoms.
As she dived into the story of the Genius who strode through tropical forests and deep jungles, over purple moors and up mountain sides, where strange-hued pale or vivid things grew in tangles, or stood in the sun alone, John Holt became of the opinion that his experiment would be a success. It was here that he began to find he had gifts to give. She asked him questions; Robin and Ben asked him questions; the three drew close to him, and hung on his every word.
“You know the things and the places where they grow,” Meg said. “We have never seen anything. We can only try to imagine. You can tell us.” And he did tell them; and as they went from court to pavilion, surrounded by sumptuous bloom and sumptuous leafage and sumptuous fragrance, the three beginning to cling to him, to turn to him with every new discovery, and to forget he was a stranger, he knew that he was less gloomy than he had been before, and that somehow this thing seemed worth doing.