“Yes,” said the headless man. “Very lonesome indeed. A big house like this ought to have children in it.”
“It’s funny,” Muffs replied. “But Mother and I live in two tiny rooms and the landlady doesn’t like children.”
“I thought I didn’t—once.”
“I’m glad you’ve changed your mind,” Muffs said, smiling at him over her grapefruit. He had put a cherry in the center just the way she liked it and after that came Tommy’s favorite dish—pancakes. Muffs ate five and Tommy had seven and an extra helping of jam. That was for the Guide who sat in the chair beside him.
“Wise people like jam,” he said in explanation.
While they ate the headless man told how he had discovered them asleep when he went back to the van to find something the moving men had forgotten to deliver.
“Otherwise,” he said, “you might be on your way to Chicago with a load of furniture that left at four o’clock this morning. It was taking an awful chance to climb into an empty moving van. Why did you do it?”
“We wanted to surprise you,” Tommy explained. “We thought you had forgotten about the Bramble Bush Man.”
“Indeed I haven’t and if it’s in my power you shall see him this very day.”