Now, when Gillibloom found that the fairies had all gone and left him
to himself, and the four-footed things and the two-footed things, and
the things that have feathers and fur and gauze-wings and shell-wings
had gone too, he had felt differently from what he ever had before. He
had been bellowing for a long time that night, because he was
determined to learn to cry and get it over, and then go back to his
people, but now he said to himself: "I will not cry any more. And
anyway it is not Quite Crying, and if Almost Crying makes everything
run away from me, I don't know what Quite Crying would do."
So he tried to shut his mouth, and stop its bellowing, but it would
not stop. And he tried to smooth his forehead, and it stayed wrinkled,
and he tried to draw up the corners of his mouth, and they would not
stay, and he tried to open his eyes, and they would not open. And
there was a strange feeling in his throat, and his heart beat very
fast, and though he had not dipped up the water of the Standing Pool
for as much as two hours, his cheeks were all wet.
"Oh," said Gillibloom to himself, "what has happened to me! what has
happened to me!"
And he started running as fast as he could through the silent forest
to the Earth-Woman's house, and as he ran he said to himself: "What
has happened to me? What has happened to me? Am I afraid?"
Now for a fairy to be afraid is just as impossible as for it not to be
a fairy, but Gillibloom knew he was somehow changed, and he could only
run and call aloud at the top of his voice, "Am I afraid? Am I
afraid?"
Now the Earth-Woman lives in the very middle of the wood, in a green
house that nobody can see by day, and a dark brown house that nobody
can see by night.
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