“It is,” admitted Aladdin.  “No, I’ll not make a wish.  It was you who summoned the genie.  You shall make your own wish!”

At this Everychild glanced at the genie as if in search of assistance.  But he received no encouragement at all.  The genie really looked like a person who had come to bring evil rather than good.  And Everychild felt his heart pounding painfully, and his head throbbing.  But at last a happy thought occurred to him.  He might make a very little wish!

“It is getting dark,” he said to the genie, trying to speak as if he were thoroughly experienced in making wishes, “I wish I had a nice place to sleep, here in the forest.”

He had scarcely spoken when he realized that he was all alone:  Aladdin with his Oriental rug and his lamp was gone; the genie was gone.  His hand was resting upon something very soft and cool.  It seemed like a carpet, though finer than any carpet he had ever seen.  And he remembered how his mother had scolded him more than once for lying on the carpet at home.

“But no one will scold me for lying here,” he reflected.

So it came about that on his first night away from home he slept on the beautiful green carpet, with the Road of Troubled Children hard by.

And he could not know that the thing he had wished for, and which had been given him was the very thing which poor beggars, beloved of God, are granted every tranquil summer night.

CHAPTER IV

EVERYCHILD IS JOINED BY HANSEL AND GRETTEL

In the morning he went on his way along the Road of Troubled Children; and it seemed to him that he had gone a very great distance when he heard voices by the roadside.  They were the voices of children, and it was plain to Everychild that they were in trouble.

He waited until they came close, and then his heart bounded, because he recognized them.  He had often seen their pictures.  They were Hansel and Grettel.

Hansel was saying sorrowfully, “I am afraid they are all gone, Grettel, and we shall never be able to find our home again.”

It was then that Everychild stepped forward.  “I know you,” he said, trying to seem really friendly. “You are Hansel and Grettel.  Your parents lost you in the woods to be rid of you—­because there wasn’t enough to eat at home.”

[Illustration:  “You are Hansel and Grettel.”]

Hansel and Grettel looked at each other with round eyes.  “It is true,” they replied in unison.  “But to think it should have got about already!  Who are you?”

Everychild addressed himself to Hansel—­who, by the way, was a fat boy with wooden shoes and a tiny homespun jacket and trousers of the same stuff, the trousers being very floppy about the ankles.  “I am Everychild,” he said.  “And if I were you I’d not try to go home to such a father and mother.  You know, they still had half a loaf left.”