"What do you mean? We haven't been dreaming anything. You must have dropped off in your chair."
The curate heaved a sigh of relief.
"Oh, if it's only I," he said; "if we'd all dreamed it I could never have believed it, never!"
Afterwards Aunt Selina said to the other aunt:—
"Yes, I know it was an untruth, and I shall doubtless be punished for it in due course. But I could see the poor, dear fellow's brain giving way before my very eyes. He couldn't have stood the strain of three dreams. It was odd, wasn't it? All three of us dreaming the same thing at the same moment. We must never tell dear Seppy. But I shall send an account of it to the Psychical Society, with stars instead of names, you know."
And she did. And you can read all about it in one of the society's fat Blue-books.
Of course, you understand what had happened?
The intelligent Phœnix had simply gone straight off to the psammead, or sand-fairy, who gives wishes and had wished Robert and Jane at home. And, of course, they were at home at once. Cyril and Anthea had not half finished mending the carpet.
When the joyful emotions of reunion had calmed down a little they all went out and spent what was left of Uncle Reginald's sovereign in presents for mother. They bought her a pink silk handkerchief, a pair of blue and white vases, a bottle of scent, a packet of Christmas candles, and a cake of soap shaped and coloured like a tomato, and one that was so like an orange that almost anyone you had given it to would have tried to peel it—if they liked oranges, of course. Also they bought a cake with icing on, and the rest of the money they spent in flowers to put in the vases.