“Oh, thank you so much, dear. Such a wonderful thing has happened. But I must return to my post. He’ll wait till the end, he says.”
Still talking breathlessly, she drew the robe of mystery from William and put it on herself.
William wandered out again into the Fête ground. He visited the ice-cream stall again, then wandered aimlessly around. The first person to accost him was Miss Drew.
“Hello, William,” she said, gazing at him anxiously. “I’ve been looking for you. Would you like some ice-cream?”
William graciously condescended to be fed with ice-cream.
“Would you like a box of chocolates?” went on Miss Drew. “Do you feel all right, William, dear? You’ve been a bit pale lately.”
William accepted from her a large box of chocolates and three donkey rides. He admitted that perhaps he hadn’t been feeling very strong lately. When she departed he found Robert and Ethel looking for him. They treated him to a large and very satisfying tea and several more donkey rides. Both used an unusually tender tone of voice when addressing him. Ethel bought him a pine-apple and another box of chocolates, and Robert bought him a bottle of sweets and apologised for his unreasonable behaviour about the shoe polish. When they went home William walked between them and they carried his chocolates and sweets and pine-apple for him. Feeling that too much could not be made of the present state of affairs, he made Robert do his homework before he went to bed. Up in his room he gave his famous imitation of a churchyard cough that he had made perfect by practise and which had proved a great asset to him on many occasions. Ethel crept softly upstairs. She held a paper bag in her hand.
“William, darling,” she said, “I’ve brought this toffee for your throat. It might do it good.”
William added it to his store of presents.
“Thank you,” he said with an air of patient suffering.