Then they all talked about something else, until it was time for Pooh and Piglet to go home together. At first as they stumped along the path which edged the Hundred Acre Wood, they didn’t say much to each other, but when they came to the stream and had helped each other across the stepping stones, and were able to walk side by side again over the heather, they began to talk in a friendly way about this and that, and Piglet said, “If you see what I mean, Pooh,” and Pooh said, “It’s just what I think myself, Piglet,” and Piglet said, “But, on the other hand, Pooh, we must remember,” and Pooh said, “Quite true, Piglet, although I had forgotten it for the moment.” And then, just as they came to the Six Pine Trees, Pooh looked round to see that nobody else was listening, and said in a very solemn voice:

“Piglet, I have decided something.”

One day, when Christopher Robin and Winnie-the-Pooh and Piglet were all talking together, Christopher Robin finished the mouthful he was eating and said carelessly: “I saw a Heffalump to-day, Piglet.”

“What was it doing?” asked Piglet.

“Just lumping along,” said Christopher Robin. “I don’t think it saw me.”

“I saw one once,” said Piglet. “At least, I think I did,” he said. “Only perhaps it wasn’t.”

“So did I,” said Pooh, wondering what a Heffalump was like.

“You don’t often see them,” said Christopher Robin carelessly.

“Not now,” said Piglet.

“Not at this time of year,” said Pooh.

So with these words he unhooked it, and carried it back to Eeyore; and when Christopher Robin had nailed it on in its right place again, Eeyore frisked about the forest, waving his tail so happily that Winnie-the-Pooh came over all funny, and had to hurry home for a little snack of something to sustain him. And, wiping his mouth half an hour afterwards, he sang to himself proudly:

“I just came across it in the Forest. It was hanging over a bush, and I thought at first somebody lived there, so I rang it, and nothing happened, and then I rang it again very loudly, and it came off in my hand, and as nobody seemed to want it, I took it home, and—”

“Owl,” said Pooh solemnly, “you made a mistake. Somebody did want it.”

“Who?”

“Eeyore. My dear friend Eeyore. He was—he was fond of it.”

“Fond of it?”

“Attached to it,” said Winnie-the-Pooh sadly.