Then I wondered if I was very very silly, and why Dr. Brown had called
me a Michaelmas Goose. But I remembered that it must be because
to-morrow, was the 29th of September.
Then the stairs clock struck eleven.
I counted all the strokes, and then I saw that the Rushlight was
getting dim again, so I got up and snuffed it, and all the moons came
out as bright as ever; but I did not feel in the least sleepy.
I did not feel frightened any more. I only wished I knew for certain
what Sunflowers look like when they are asleep, and whether you can
wake them up with candles. And I went on wondering, and watching the
moons.
Then the stairs clock struck a quarter-past eleven, and I
thought--"Oh, Grace! If you were not such a coward, if you had jumped
up when the clock struck eleven, and slipped down the back-stairs,
with the Rushlight in your hands, and unlocked the side-door, you
might have run down the grass walk without hurting your feet, and
flashed it in the faces of the Sunflowers, and had a good look, and
got back to bed again before the clock struck a quarter-past; and then
it would have been done, and couldn't be undone, and you would have
known whether they look like the picture, and if they wake up with
candles, and you never could have unknown. But now, you'll go on
putting off, and being frightened about it, and perhaps to-morrow Jael
will tell Grandmamma you were asleep, and she won't let you have a
Rushlight any more, not even when you are a grown-up young lady; and
even when you get married and go away, you may marry a man who won't
let you have one; and so you may never never know what you want to
know, all because you're a Michaelmas Goose.
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