painting?"

"Flourishing," said Pirlaps, cheerfully. "How are the children?"

"I haven't seen them this week," said Avrillia. "I vanished them last
Roseday."

Pirlaps' face fell a little--perhaps an inch, altogether. But Sara
cried out, clapping her hands again with impunity (try doing it that
way, sometime--it's great fun),

"Oh, are there children?"

"Yes," said Avrillia.

"How many?"

"Oh, about seventy," said Avrillia, a little languidly.

"May--may I see them?" asked Sara.

"I hope so," said Avrillia. "Perhaps you'll come some day when they're
not vanished."

Sara, somehow, felt herself to have been politely dismissed; and she
soon found herself walking beside Pirlaps down the little marble
stairs. She slipped her hand into his as she would into her own
father's, and, looking up into his face, said, enthusiastically, "Oh,
isn't she lovely?"