It was perceived that even while they chattered, Room and castle had already recurred seven times, ending on a Room. And Peter said she would sleep in the last Room but one—the fifth, to be exact,—before the dot was put in.
“And then Squeith can take the animals for a run,” quoth thoughtful little Merle, who remembered that giraffes and gift-horses require a certain amount of exercise. “He can put them on a leash if he likes.”
Stuart grumbled: “He’s sure to come home without them. Or they’ll come home without him. Yes, it’s no good frowning at me, Merle,—I will bully Squeith. You’d better have your Balm-for-Wounded-Feelings factory moved into the Room; ‘Nothing but the Best Balm supplied. Beware of Counterfeit. We only use British Bull’s-grease and Home-grown Sympathy.’ I’ll write your advertisements.”
Whereat Peter exclaimed jealously that if Merle had a factory, she would have trains; she must have trains, instantly—“just as if I could ever live in a Room without trains. An Outer Circle line running the whole way round, close under the walls; with real tunnels and signal-boxes. And you can advertise your Balm inside the darkest tunnel, where it won’t disturb the landscape. My railway shall start from Euston, of course——”
—“And end at Euston,” Merle reminded her, laughing, “if it’s a Circle railway.”
“Quite right. The lines shall be laid for the purpose of taking passengers from Euston to Euston. I’ve always longed for just such a gloriously unpractical service of trains.”
And here Stuart interposed with the offer of his almost forgotten Wagon-lit, the tame red Wagon-lit with trustful brown eyes, hitherto kept in the back garden among the washing.
“Want a present too,” Merle pleaded.
He gave her a clothes-line, so that she could be perpetually wringing out her soul, and hanging it up to dry. In return for which piece of impertinence, she presented him with a nice easy rack, which he could work himself, like a barrel-organ, by turning a handle; and thus practise for half an hour every morning after breakfast, the self-torture he so affected.