"So there isn't," replied her sister. "I wonder why."
But before she could ask why, the Admiral jumped into the bow of the boat, took off his cocked hat, and waving it above his head, called out again, "King's guests! King's guests!" Upon which all the little people in little shrill voices shouted "Welcome to the King's guests!" and waved their pocket handkerchiefs. It was just as though a flock of pigeons had suddenly flown up out of a flower-bed.
At the same moment the children saw coming down the road a little carriage drawn by two pretty little horses of the color of a new horse-chestnut, with white manes, cut short, and with stiff little white tails like bottle-brushes. The coachman, who sat up very straight and stuck out his elbows with an air of great importance, was dressed in a fuzzy white wig with a three-cornered hat on top of it, a green coat with gold buttons, white knee-breeches and rose-colored stockings. Altogether, he looked very smart indeed, and very well pleased with himself, too, to judge by the way he smiled as he drew up his chubby little horses at the far end of the pier.
For that matter, though, everybody was smiling away in a manner so cheerful that the children thought they had never seen such a merry-looking lot of people, and as smiles are just as catching as whooping cough, Margaret and Frances could not help smiling too; whereupon all the people on the pier smiled twice as much as before and clapped their hands for joy.
"What nice people!" exclaimed Margaret.
"Yes. Aren't you glad we came?" responded her sister. "And such a pretty place, too; and—I wonder who the old gentleman is, coming down to the steps."
In fact, as the boat slowly glided up to the steps at the end of the pier, an old gentleman came forward and took up his position on the top step; all the rest of the people standing back at a respectful distance, forming a half-circle behind him. He was a tall old gentleman—for a Floating Islander—with a head perfectly bald except for a fringe of white hair at the back extending from one ear to the other; wearing a long green cloak with silver willow leaves embroidered round the collar. In one hand he carried a large copper bell, like a cow-bell, and in the other a sheet of parchment with a big red seal hanging to it.
"The Court Crier," explained the Admiral, whispering behind his hand; and as he said it, the boat stopped of its own accord at the bottom step.
As if the stopping of the boat had been the moment he was waiting for, the Court Crier began vigorously ringing his bell; whereupon all the people ceased clapping their hands and stood quiet to hear what the Court Crier might have to say. Even the dragon up on his tower—as the little girls noticed—sat down again on his three-legged stool, and folding two pairs of claws across his stomach, cocked his ears forward to listen.