Here Tabitha could contain herself no longer, but clapped her hands and
cried out delightedly:

"Yes, that's it. It's my thimble."

"Oh! very well," said Menzi, "but it is easy to discover what is lost
and hard to find it."

Then followed another long examination of the assessors or acolytes, or
witch-doctor's chorus, by which it was established at length that the
thimble had been lost three days before, when Tabitha was sitting on a
stone sewing, that she believed it had fallen into a crevice of rocks,
and so forth.

After this the chorus was silent and Menzi himself took up the game,
apparently asking questions of the sky and putting his ear to the ground
for an answer.

At length he announced: (1) That the thimble was not among the rocks;
(2) That it was not lost at all.

"But it is, it is, you silly old man," cried Tabitha excitedly. "I have
hunted everywhere, and I cried about it because I haven't got another,
and can't buy one here, and the needle hurts my finger."

Menzi contemplated her gravely as though he were looking her through and
through.

"It is _not_ lost, Little Flower. I see it; you have it now. Put your
hand into the pocket of your dress. What do you find there?"