There was almost a sound of youth in it. Judy suddenly
realised that Aunt Emily had once been a girl. A softer look shone in
the colourless eyes. The lips relaxed. In a hat she might have been
even pretty. No one in a bonnet could be jolly. "Signs!" she repeated;
"deep and beautiful! Whatever in the world--?"
She stopped abruptly, started by the exquisite trilling of a bird that
was perched upon a branch quite close behind her. The liquid notes
poured out in a stream of music, so rich, so lovely that it seemed as
if no bird had ever sung before and that they were the first persons
in the world who had ever heard it.
"My sign!" cried Judy, dancing round her disconcerted and bewildered
relative. "One of my signs--that!"
"Mine is rabbits and rats and badgers," Tim called out with
ungrammatical emphasis. "Anything that likes the earth are mine." He
looked about him as if to point one out to her. "They're everywhere,
all over the place," he added, seeing none at the moment. "Aunty,
what's yours? Do tell us, because then we can go and look together."
"It's _much_ more fun than looking alone," declared Judy.
No answer came.
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