had gone up.

"I told you it was Ariel!" Alicia stood by the open window--our
windows are sunk into the walls, and cased with solid black walnut
as Impervious to decay as the granite itself--and leaned out to the
wet and dripping garden.

"Sophy," said she, in her high, sweet voice that carries like a
thrush's. "Sophy, the best thing about this world is, that the best
things in it aren't really _real_. This is one of its enchanted
places. Sycorax used to live in this house: that's what you feel
about it yet. But now she's gone, her spell is lifting, and Hynds
House is going to come alive and be young again!"

"At least," I grumbled, "admit that the dust inside and the rain
outside and the weeds and mud are real; and I'm really hungry!"

"Me too!" Alicia assented instantly and ungrammatically. "Oh, for a
square meal!" She thrust her charming head out far enough for the
rain to splatter on her bright hair and whip it into curls, and
bring a deeper shade of pink to her cheeks, and a deeper blue
to her eyes. "Ariel!" she fluted, "Spirit of the Violin, I'm
hungry--earthily, worm-of-the-dustly, unromantically hungry! Send us
something to eat."

"Why don't you rap on one of the tables," I suggested ironically,
"and call up your high spirits to do your bidding?"

"My high spirits won't be above making you a soothing cup of coffee
just as soon as that ancient African returns. In the meantime,