“Ya—­o-o!”

“Hullo!” (Judy looks up in amazement, for there is only one noise in the house like that, and she has the sole rights of it).  “Hullo, is that me?  I didn’t know I was doing it”—­(the roars from Peter continue)—­“but I suppose I am.  I must be.  Let’s have a lot more of this very good noise I am making—­Ya—­o-o!”

The duet produces a crescendo astounding to them both, for there has never been a noise so wonderful as this in all their experience.  Then to Judy a very strange thing happens.  She pauses for breath, but the noise goes on.  “This is amazing—­how do I do it?...”

She joins in again—­and then Peter stops.  He too is puzzled vaguely.  However, bother introspection, the concert proceeds, both artists doing their level best.  Now one of them pauses, now the other, and at length serious doubts begin to creep in.  There is something queer afoot—­ something....

The matter resolves itself.  Turning suddenly they behold each other, both yelling splendidly.  Amazement!  Cavern confronts cavern!  Face to face they roar their hardest, demanding the reason for this strange phenomenon, “this other me who does when I don’t.”

They pause—­their mouths remain agape.  Slowly they close and smiles succeed.  Joy!  A reasonable-sized face at last.  What a relief after the enormous faces, the great mouths, the Cyranese noses of the Big People who are wont to come and peer.  Here at last is a true face, a face that—­no, they both agree not to dwell unduly on the discovery.

Indifferent to each other once again they regard the special objects of their attention, their hands waving gently in the air, seeking the fairies that babies’ hands are always trying to catch.

Ha! their hands have met.

“Hoo!  It’s a reasonable hand.  It’s got proper fingers, not stumps of bananas.”

“Moreover,” says Peter politely, “if you care to take advantage of my offer you will find that it is properly moistened, succulent and suitable to a baby’s taste.  You needn’t mind; I prepared it myself.”

“Goo!  Gool-gur!” All is peace and chuckles.  Hand-in-hand they survey their mothers. “Our mothers, yours—­mine.  Ha, ha—­he, he—­goo!”

The inner thoughts of the two babies may be hidden from me (I accept the punishment), but I know—­I know what the two mothers are thinking of.  Twenty years hence, a paragraph in The Times:  “Peter—­Judy—­” Oh, you fatuous mothers!

L.

* * * * *

“Public interest remains unabated in the remarkable occurrences at the poultry-house farm at Brickendon, where spirit rappings in the morse code have been heard for weeks past....  One question put to the spirit last night was ‘How many people are outside?’ And the reply was ‘Rorty,’ which proved to be correct.”—­Liverpool Paper.

And possibly furnishes some clue to the identity of the spirit concerned.