“Can’t fly! They’ve got to fly,” said Mother Owl, “and you and I must help them. Back to the old tree we go this very night.”
After that there was a great to-do up in the hollow. Teddy watched it all lying on his stomach in the door of the knot-hole, for it was moonlight by this time and almost as bright as day.
The little owls got up on the edge of the hollow and there they sat, teetering and flapping and afraid to fly. Their mother grew crosser and crosser, and at last she got back of them and gave them a push, and then down they went, fluttering and tumbling and bumping into the tree-trunks.
The Father Owl sailed about from branch to branch, calling, “Who-o-o-o! Who-o-o! Come on! Spread your wings and go like this. Who-o-o-o!” and then he would sail on to another bush; but the Mother Owl flew down beside them and showed them how to spread their wings, and pushed them with her beak, and gradually the fluttered farther and farther into the darkling woods, their cries growing fainter and then dying away until all Teddy could hear was the Father Owl’s voice, very faint and far away. “Who-o-o! Who-o-o!” Then it too died away, and the woods were still.
After a while the moon set and Teddy began to feel very sleepy.
Then a little breeze sprang up; the light grew clearer and the east was red, and at last the sun peeped over the top of the hill opposite.
As the first beam struck old Granddaddy Thistletop’s tree, Teddy started to his knees, gazing out down the hill-slope. There were the four black-and-yellow butterflies flying directly toward the tree as fast as their wings could carry them, and on the two foremost ones were old Granddaddy Thistletop himself and the beautiful Rosine.
They drew rein at the knot-hole, and the old fairy, skipping from his butterfly and never pausing to fasten it, tottered straight to Teddy and threw his arms about his neck. “Our preserver!” he cried. “And to think I should have called you a gamblesome elf! But never mind; I will make it up to you.”
Suddenly he turned and caught the blushing Rosine by the hand. “Here!” he cried; “she is yours, and you shall live with us, and learn to turn your toes up, and we will all be happy together.”
“But —but —” cried Teddy, starting back, “don’t you know? I’m not an elf at all. I’m—”