‘I wish I had a dove like Noah!’ he thought.

“The moony moon was round and bright, It shone and shone and made it light.”

After that rhyme, which came into his head all at once, he became conscious of music, very soft-lovely!  Mum playing!  He bethought himself of a macaroon he had, laid up in his chest of drawers, and, getting it, came back to the window.  He leaned out, now munching, now holding his jaws to hear the music better.  “Da” used to say that angels played on harps in heaven; but it wasn’t half so lovely as Mum playing in the moony night, with him eating a macaroon.  A cockchafer buzzed by, a moth flew in his face, the music stopped, and little Jon drew his head in.  She must be coming!  He didn’t want to be found awake.  He got back into bed and pulled the clothes nearly over his head; but he had left a streak of moonlight coming in.  It fell across the floor, near the foot of the bed, and he watched it moving ever so slowly towards him, as if it were alive.  The music began again, but he could only just hear it now; sleepy music, pretty--sleepy--music--sleepy--slee.....

And time slipped by, the music rose, fell, ceased; the moonbeam crept towards his face.  Little Jon turned in his sleep till he lay on his back, with one brown fist still grasping the bedclothes.  The corners of his eyes twitched—­he had begun to dream.  He dreamed he was drinking milk out of a pan that was the moon, opposite a great black cat which watched him with a funny smile like his father’s.  He heard it whisper:  “Don’t drink too much!” It was the cat’s milk, of course, and he put out his hand amicably to stroke the creature; but it was no longer there; the pan had become a bed, in which he was lying, and when he tried to get out he couldn’t find the edge; he couldn’t find it—­he—­he—­couldn’t get out!  It was dreadful!

He whimpered in his sleep.  The bed had begun to go round too; it was outside him and inside him; going round and round, and getting fiery, and Mother Lee out of Cast up by the Sea was stirring it!  Oh! so horrible she looked!  Faster and faster!—­till he and the bed and Mother Lee and the moon and the cat were all one wheel going round and round and up and up—­awful—­awful—­awful!

He shrieked.

A voice saying:  “Darling, darling!” got through the wheel, and he awoke, standing on his bed, with his eyes wide open.

There was his mother, with her hair like Guinevere’s, and, clutching her, he buried his face in it.

“Oh! oh!”

“It’s all right, treasure.  You’re awake now.  There!  There!  It’s nothing!”

But little Jon continued to say:  “Oh! oh!”

Her voice went on, velvety in his ear: 

“It was the moonlight, sweetheart, coming on your face.”

Little Jon burbled into her nightgown

“You said it was beautiful.  Oh!”

“Not to sleep in, Jon.  Who let it in?  Did you draw the curtains?”