“That’s something like what we used to be taught in the nursery,” I thought to myself, looking back through the long years (about a hundred and fifty of them) to the time when I used to be a little child myself.  And here an idea came into my head, and I asked him, “Aren’t you one of the fairies that teach children to be good?”

“Well, we have to do that sometimes,” said Bruno, “and a dreadful bother it is.”

As he said this, he savagely tore a heart’s-ease in two, and trampled on the pieces.

“What are you doing there, Bruno?” I said.

“Spoiling Sylvie’s garden,” was all the answer Bruno would give at first.  But, as he went on tearing up the flowers, he muttered to himself, “The nasty c’oss thing—­wouldn’t let me go and play this morning, though I wanted to ever so much—­said I must finish my lessons first—­lessons, indeed!  I’ll vex her finely, though!”

“Oh, Bruno, you shouldn’t do that!” I cried.  “Don’t you know that’s revenge?  And revenge is a wicked, cruel, dangerous thing!”

“River-edge?” said Bruno.  “What a funny word!  I suppose you call it cooel and dangerous because, if you went too far and tumbled in, you’d get d’owned.”

“No, not river-edge,” I explained; “rev-enge” (saying the word very slowly and distinctly).  But I couldn’t help thinking that Bruno’s explanation did very well for either word.

“Oh!” said Bruno, opening his eyes very wide, but without attempting to repeat the word.

“Come! try and pronounce it, Bruno!” I said, cheerfully.  “Rev-enge, rev-enge.”

But Bruno only tossed his little head, and said he couldn’t; that his mouth wasn’t the right shape for words of that kind.  And the more I laughed, the more sulky the little fellow got about it.

“Well, never mind, little man!” I said.  “Shall I help you with the job you’ve got there?”

“Yes, please,” Bruno said, quite pacified.  “Only I wish I could think of something to vex her more than this.  You don’t know how hard it is to make her ang’y!”

“Now listen to me, Bruno, and I’ll teach you quite a splendid kind of revenge!”

“Something that’ll vex her finely?” Bruno asked with gleaming eyes.

“Something that’ll vex her finely.  First, we’ll get up all the weeds in her garden.  See, there are a good many at this end—­quite hiding the flowers.”

“But that wont vex her,” said Bruno, looking rather puzzled.

“After that,” I said, without noticing the remark, “we’ll water the highest bed—­up here.  You see it’s getting quite dry and dusty.”

Bruno looked at me inquisitively, but he said nothing this time.

“Then, after that,” I went on, “the walks want sweeping a bit; and I think you might cut down that tall nettle; it’s so close to the garden that it’s quite in the way—­”

“What are you talking about?” Bruno impatiently interrupted me.  “All that wont vex her a bit!”