He brought home a poor old
crab without a claw, and the green bird and the dormice found a
hook and screwed it in, and the poor old crab used to carry parcels
for the neighbours; but he still lived with the Tinkle-Tinkle.
Another time it was a snail with a broken shell; for him they built
a beautiful little house, and he made little rush brooms and sold
them to the passers-by; but he lived ever after close to the
Tinkle-Tinkle's front door.
So it went on till all the Tinkle-Tinkle's homes were full of
strange occupants, and he began to feel very old and worn and
weary. Then he remembered the promise of the beautiful Creature,
and went slowly over the sea hoping the time had come for it to be
fulfilled, and it had. The beautiful Creature stretched out its
lovely rose and purple wings and wrapped the Tinkle-Tinkle in their
warm soft greatness, and bore him down and down through the depths
till they came to the Great Gate. At the beautiful Creature's
voice it swung slowly back, and they passed down the Blue Pathway,
which is all ice, cut and carved into lovely pinnacles and spires,
very blue with the blue of the summer sky and the southern seas.
The Tinkle-Tinkle could just see it from between the beautiful
Creature's wings, stretching away in the blue distance, and at the
end one star.
Presently--and though the time had been one thousand years it had
not seemed long to the Tinkle-Tinkle--they came out into a
beautiful place that was nothing but light, and the beautiful
Creature set the Tinkle-Tinkle down; he looked around him and saw
many other Tinkle-Tinkles, and he knew them for what they were and
loved their beauty; and the Creature gently swept one of its purple
pinions across him, and the Tinkle-Tinkle took form.
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