"I don't know, I'm sure," Taro said. "I can't think. But, anyway, we're lucky that it didn't happen. We're here—and we're ourselves!"
"Let's go into the garden this minute and see if we can find Bot'Chan's tree," said Take. "He's so new that maybe we can find the very spot where he grew."
"The fairies would surely hide the place so we couldn't find it," said Taro; "but we can try. Let's go softly; then maybe they won't hear us."
They tiptoed out into the garden. How I wish you could see their garden! There are all sorts of wonderful places in it! It isn't very large, but it has in it a little bit of a toy mountain, and a tiny lake with little weeny goldfish in it, and a little stream of water, like a baby river, that runs into the lake. And, best of all, there is a curved bridge, painted red, just big enough for the Twins to walk over, if they are very careful and don't bounce! The Twins' Grandfather made this garden for their Father to play in when he was a little boy, so they all love it dearly.
There are iris plants and lilies beside the tiny lake, and a funny little pine tree—a very little pine tree, just a few feet high—grows out of some rocks on the side of the mountain.
The Twins crossed the tiny red bridge and crept up the stepping-stones on the mountain-side until they reached the little pine tree.
"Do you s'pose it could be the pine tree?" Take whispered.
"Maybe; it's so small—just the right size for Bot'Chan," Taro whispered back.
The Twins looked carefully all around the pine tree, but its trunk was gnarled and old. It is hard to believe that so little a tree could be so old, but the Japanese know how to keep a tree small, like a toy tree, even if it has been growing for a hundred years.
This tree wasn't a hundred years old, because their Grandfather had set it out when the Twins' Father was a little boy, and the Twins' Father wasn't anywhere near a hundred years old.