For the second I was rather at a loss. I stared round to see
the door of the magic shop, and, behold, it was not there!
There was no door, no shop, nothing, only the common pilaster
between the shop where they sell pictures and the window with
the chicks! . . .

I did the only thing possible in that mental tumult; I walked straight
to the kerbstone and held up my umbrella for a cab.

"'Ansoms," said Gip, in a note of culminating exultation.

I helped him in, recalled my address with an effort, and got in also.
Something unusual proclaimed itself in my tail-coat pocket, and
I felt and discovered a glass ball. With a petulant expression
I flung it into the street.

Gip said nothing.

For a space neither of us spoke.

"Dada!" said Gip, at last, "that WAS a proper shop!"

I came round with that to the problem of just how the whole thing
had seemed to him. He looked completely undamaged--so far, good;
he was neither scared nor unhinged, he was simply tremendously
satisfied with the afternoon's entertainment, and there in his arms
were the four parcels.

Confound it! what could be in them?