of my secret-surprise-think. Do say ah, Daddy, and keep your
mouth open at the end, and lend me that tooth. I'm going to draw
a carp-fish's mouth wide-open.'

'What for?' said her Daddy.

'Don't you see?' said Taffy, scratching away on the bark. 'That
will be our little secret s'prise. When I draw a carp-fish with
his mouth open in the smoke at the back of our Cave--if Mummy
doesn't mind--it will remind you of that ah-noise. Then we can
play that it was me jumped out of the dark and s'prised you with
that noise--same as I did in the beaver-swamp last winter.'

'Really?' said her Daddy, in the voice that grown-ups use when
they are truly attending. 'Go on, Taffy.'

'Oh bother!' she said. 'I can't draw all of a carp-fish, but I
can draw something that means a carp-fish's mouth. Don't you know
how they stand on their heads rooting in the mud? Well, here's a
pretence carp-fish (we can play that the rest of him is drawn).
Here's just his mouth, and that means ah.' And she drew this.
(1.)

'That's not bad,' said Tegumai, and scratched on his own piece of
bark for himself; but you've forgotten the feeler that hangs
across his mouth.'

'But I can't draw, Daddy.'

'You needn't draw anything of him except just the opening of his