"I leave you in good hands, Griselda. You have friends now who will understand you—friends who will help you both to work and to play. Better friends than the mandarins, or the butterflies, or even than your faithful old cuckoo."
And when Griselda tried to speak to him, to thank him for his goodness, to beg him still sometimes to come to see her, he gently fluttered away. "Cuckoo, cuckoo, cuckoo," he warbled; but somehow the last "cuckoo" sounded like "good-bye."
In the morning, when Griselda awoke, her pillow was wet with tears. Thus many stories end. She was happy, very happy in the thought of her kind new friends; but there were tears for the one she felt she had said farewell to, even though he was only a cuckoo in a clock.
THE END.
LONDON : PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED,
STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING CROSS.
