'If you will give yourself the trouble to lay your left finger beside your nose it might inform you,' said Gyp courteously.
Yellow-cap did as he was desired. The reflection in the glass lifted the corresponding finger and laid it beside the nose of no other than the central head.
'Would you mind winking your left eye?' continued Gyp.
Yellow-cap did so. The central head alone winked back.
'Now you might stick out your tongue,' suggested Gyp.
Yellow-cap tried this experiment also: the seventh head was the only one that imitated the gesture.
'This is absurd,' exclaimed Yellow-cap indignantly. 'The central head imitates everything I do; it even pretends to look like me, which is ridiculous, for it is ugly, while I am——'
'Perhaps you have never looked in a mirror before?' said Gyp gently.
'Yes, I have—in tin pans,' returned Yellow-cap warmly.
'Tin pans are untrustworthy,' said Gyp. 'This is the best mirror in the world, and that is the reason why it is in the shape of an eye, without any face belonging to it.'