'My dear young people,' he said, holding out his hands, 'I am very glad to meet you. It has grieved me to see you all playing here on this ugly lawn, when there is a garden so much more beautiful just on the other side of the hedge. I am very fond of children, and I make it my business to amuse them. If you will just give yourselves the trouble to step through that opening in the hedge you shall see something that you never saw before.'
The three children thought this sounded very pleasant; but, after a pause, Princess Hilda, who generally took the lead, said:
'We were told not to go on the other side of the hedge.'
'Who could have been so unkind as to tell you that?' cried Rumpty-Dudget, as if he was very much shocked. 'Besides, one side of the hedge is just the same as another; and if it is wrong to go on the other side, how much more wrong it must be to stay on this!'
Hilda thought awhile before answering, for what Rumpty-Dudget had said certainly sounded reasonable. 'But why,' she asked at last, 'should there be any hedge at all?'
'It is all on account of the hole through it,' the dwarf replied, with his most charming grin. 'There could have been no hole, you see, if there hadn't been a hedge; and that is why the hedge was planted.'
Princess Hilda could not deny that this was true; and, moreover, since she had begun to talk with the dwarf she had felt a strong desire to see whether the garden on the other side of the hedge was so very much prettier than their own, as he declared. 'What do you say, boys?' she asked, turning to the two little princes. 'Shall we take just one peep?'
'That is right! Come, my dears, at once!' put in Rumpty-Dudget eagerly, taking Hilda and Harold each by the hand, and letting little Hector trot on before. 'It is already late, and I want you to see my garden before the sun goes down.' So they all came to the opening in the hedge; and, if the truth must be told, the three children were almost as anxious to get through it as Rumpty-Dudget was to have them do so. And the great red ball of the sun kept going down further and further, and now all his lower half was out of sight beneath the edge of the world.
'Now, my dear,' said Rumpty-Dudget to Princess Hilda, 'will you step through first? Ladies always go first, you know.'
