“Oh, no! honorable mother,” said she, shaking her head with quite a shocked air.
“Then, when you hear the reason why the fairies do not appear to you except in your dreams, you will know that they are doing just as you would do were you in a fairy’s shoes.”
“A story! A story!” cried Mermei, clapping her hands and waving her fan, and Choy and Fei and Wei and Sui, who were playing battledore and shuttlecock on the green, ran into the house and grouped themselves around Mermei and the mother. They all loved stories.
“Many, many years ago,” began the mother of Mermei, “when the sun was a warm-hearted but mischievous boy, playing all kinds of pranks with fruits and flowers and growing things, and his sister, the moon, was too young to be sad and serious, the fairies met together by night. The sun, of course, was not present, and the moon had withdrawn behind a cloud. Stars alone shone in the quiet sky. By their light the fairies looked upon each other, and found themselves so fair and radiant in their robes of varied hues, all wonderfully fashioned, fringed and laced, some bright and brilliant, others, delicate and gauzy, but each and all a perfect dream of loveliness, that they danced for very joy in themselves and the garments in which they were arrayed.
“The dance being over, the queen of all sighed a fragrant sigh of happiness upon the air, and bowing to her lovely companions said:
“‘Sweet sisters, the mission of the fairies is to gladden the hearts of the mortals. Let us, therefore, this night, leave behind us on the earth the exquisite garments whose hues and fashions have given us so much pleasure. And because we may not be seen uncovered, let us from henceforth be invisible.’
“‘We will! We will!’ cried the sister fairies. They were all good and kind of heart, and much as they loved their dainty robes, they loved better to give happiness to others.
“And that is why the fairies are invisible, and why we have the flowers.”
“The flowers!” cried Mermei. “Why the flowers?”
“And the fairies’ garments! Where can we find them?” asked Fei with the starry eyes.