"The name sounds strange to me," he said. "I doubt if I can help you?'
"It is not very far from Fairyland," the Professor suggested.
Eric Lindon's eye-brows were slightly raised at these words,
and an amused smile, which he courteously tried to repress,
flitted across his handsome face: "A trifle cracked!" he muttered
to himself. "But what a jolly old patriarch it is!" Then he turned
to the children. "And ca'n't you help him, little folk?" he said,
with a gentleness of tone that seemed to win their hearts at once.
"Surely you know all about it?
'How many miles to Babylon?
Three-score miles and ten.
Can I get there by candlelight?
Yes, and back again!'"
To my surprise, Bruno ran forwards to him, as if he were some old
friend of theirs, seized the disengaged hand and hung on to it with
both of his own: and there stood this tall dignified officer in the
middle of the road, gravely swinging a little boy to and fro, while
Sylvie stood ready to push him, exactly as if a real swing had suddenly
been provided for their pastime.
"We don't want to get to Babylon, oo know!" Bruno explained as he swung.
"And it isn't candlelight: it's daylight!" Sylvie added, giving the
swing a push of extra vigour, which nearly took the whole machine off
its balance.
By this time it was clear to me that Eric Lindon was quite unconscious
of my presence. Even the Professor and the children seemed to have
lost sight of me: and I stood in the midst of the group, as
unconcernedly as a ghost, seeing but unseen.
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