Why, I don’t understand it all, exclaims mother.  I didn’t put any hazel nuts in the plum pudding.  Who ever heard of such a thing!  Children, have you found any in yours?

Yes, says Gertrude.

I’ve had two, says Walter.

Mother has been looking carefully at the pudding on her plate.  I declare, you’re right, she says.  Here’s one in mine.  She eats it.  They are very good nuts, too; but how they ever got into the pudding is a mystery.

During this last speech the lid of the wood box has been pushed up, showing the two brownies, sitting up in the box, and also the top of the clothes basket, showing the fairies, looking out from the basket.

Walter happens to catch sight of the brownies in the wood box.  He starts up from his chair, and, pointing toward the wood box, cries, There they are!

What? asks father, looking in the direction to which Walter points.

The brownies, cries Walter.  See!  In the wood box.

I don’t see anything, says father, except that someone has left the lid of the wood box open.

Oh, and the fairies, cries Gertrude, pointing toward the clothes basket.  There they are.  I see them.

Mother turns around to look, and then says to Gertrude.  There’s nothing there, my dear.

Oh, but there is, Gertrude declares.  They are in the basket.

Everybody stands up.  Gertrude and Walter come around from behind the table, and look at the fairies and brownies, but they don’t go very close to them, because they are just a little bit scared.  At the same time, Father begins to act rather queerly, looking down at the floor, and keeping himself up by holding onto the table.  Now he goes down on his hands and knees near the end of the table.

Why, James, exclaims mother, what are you doing?  How queerly you are acting.

Father gets up again, as though by a great effort.  I don’t know what is the matter, he says:  But I have the funniest sort of feeling.  It seems as though I should just have to get down on the floor and crawl under the table.

Well, that’s queer, says mother.  Do you know, I begin to feel the same way myself.

So do I, says grandmother.

So do I, says grandfather.

It’s perfectly absurd the way I seem to want to crawl under the table,
father says, and his knees keep bending under him.

But you’re surely not going to do it, cries mother.

Oh, no father answers, I’m not going to do it.  But all the same he goes down on his knees again.

But you are doing it, cries mother.

Well, I can’t help it, shouts father.  Here goes.  Watch me come out at the other end.

If he goes, I’ve got to follow, says mother, and she gets down on her hands and knees behind him.