"Our task here is accomplished," she said. "You will not need to puzzle about the toy woman, and how she and I can be the same and yet not the same. And this way into fairyland will now be closed. But when the sunshine peeps in at your window and lights up your fair hair and puts some colour into your cheeks, you may believe, my little maiden, that I am kissing you. Or when some drops of rain make you start by their cool touch, you may say to yourself that the Rain fairy is sending you his greeting. Both of us, first one and then the other, working together. That is how it is and should be. And now," she went on, "we will see you safe home again," and glancing up, Merran saw that beside the lovely lady stood the picturesque figure of the Rain fairy, with his dark but kindly face. "Together," for once, "the pair that tell the weather."
They turned and entered the pretty room, passing through it, however, till at the other side, where a door led into the familiar "rain-house," or hut, they stood still, beckoning to Merran, who had followed them in silence, feeling excited and happy, and yet a little sad. Then each took one of her hands—her gifts were safely nestling inside her bodice—and whispering softly, in a sort of musical murmur, which made her close her eyes half sleepily:
"Farewell, little Merran, farewell. In sunshine or in rainy weather, little maiden, fare thee well."
And before she had time to look round or wonder what was going to happen to her, she felt herself gently pushed over the edge of the rain-house, like a fledgling which the parent birds are training to fly, and though she had no wings, fly or flutter she did, down, down, till she found herself standing safely on the floor of the old garret, just in front of the storm-window, in her favourite nook.
She rubbed her eyes. Was it all a dream?
She might almost have thought so, but—feeling in her bodice for her handkerchief, her fingers touched something, and she drew out the fairy gifts. Yes—there they were all right, and evidently changed in size like her own small self, for they lay in her hands in the same way as above in the fairy house, "and up there," said Merran, "I must have been much, much littler than I am now, for I could go in and out quite easily."
The thought made her glance at the high shelf where ever since she could remember had stood the toy hut, with the woman's figure just peeping out. But what she now saw made her start.
The rain-house had fallen—its walls and roof were in pieces, as if a fairy earthquake had shattered them! Merran felt half inclined to cry, but before she had decided if she should do so or not she caught sight of a tiny figure peering at her from behind the rubbish. It was the toy woman, just as she had always been, dress and all, but as Merran gazed, the stiff wooden doll seemed to melt away, giving place to the lovely Sunshine fairy, who smiled and waved her hand as if in farewell, and the little girl, feeling that this was indeed her last sight of the so long unknown friends, who had watched over and cared for her, allowed some tears to trickle down her face unchecked, while she waved and kissed her hand in return till the pretty vision disappeared and nothing was left to tell her that her visit had not been all a dream, except the broken bits of painted wood and cardboard which she had called the rain-house!