Page:Oswald Bastable and Others - Nesbit.djvu/419

Rh He saw the white lilies sleeping standing up, just like real live sentinels. He saw the white peacocks roosting in the yew-trees, and the white swans cuddled up among the reeds by the lake. He went hither and thither through the cold white beauty of the night, and he thought and thought, but he could not think any thought that was worth the trouble of thinking.

And at last he sat down on a marble bench and very nearly wished that he were dead. Not quite, of course, because people very seldom do that; and if he had there would have been an end to this story.

The silence and the moonlight soothed him; his poor brain felt clearer and brighter, and at last he had the sense to say, without at all knowing that he was saying anything sensible, 'I wish I was clever.'

And instantly he was.

The change was so great, so sudden, and so violent that it nearly choked him. He drew two or three difficult breaths, and then he said:

'Oh, I see! How stupid of me! I wish I were the kind of person the real Princess could love.'

And he felt his body change. He grew thinner,