“And what about your basket of cones, then?” said Mr Coo. “It is outside, and you promised to get them.”
“Oh I forgot,” said Mary. “Well, never mind. I daresay I shan’t see you again for a good while, so you might come part of the way with me.”
They did not answer; but when Mary had passed through the two gates into the forest, where it was beginning to look quite dark and to feel very chilly, there was the basket, and the Cooies on the handle.
“You sit down on the cones,” they said; and as she did so, without questioning, she felt herself uplifted, and glancing at the wood-pigeons, she saw that their wings were outspread for full flight.
It all seemed to pass in a moment; she had not time to think to herself that she and the basket and the birds were all flying together in some wonderful way, before there came—no, it could not be called a bump, it was too gentle for that, but a sudden stop, and there they were all of them just at the little wicket-gate leading through into Dove’s Nest garden.
“Thank you, Cooies,” said Mary, feeling as if she should be out of breath, though she wasn’t, “and—and—good-bye.”
“For the present,” added Mr Coo. “But, Mary, remember, if you want to join our great gathering the day after to-morrow, there is a way for you to do so; you have only to sharpen your wits and remember some of the fairy tales.”
“There is one,” said Mrs Coo softly, “about a prince who had a wishing—”
“Hush,” said Mr Coo, “it is against the rules to give such very broad hints. But I may tell you this without any hinting at all, Mary. If you come you need only walk through the forest to the place where you found us—”
“Or you found me,” interrupted Mary.