Arlen is entirely enchanted by all this. (He kind of forgets about Harin and Nior. Arlen has many virtues, but his attention span has never really been counted among them.)

"And of course," Tumnus mentions in an aside about one of these stories, "back then, we had Christmas."

"What's a Christmas?"

"Oh, it was a holiday perhaps a month along in each winter, with feasts and presents and good cheer decorations and - and it was lovely," sighs Tumnus, looking rather glum.

"Aw. And I guess you can't celebrate something a month into winter when it's winter forever."

"That is indeed very much the, the heart of the issue, ever since the White Witch became Queen."

"That sounds unpleasant. Was her mother a better queen, then?"

Mr. Tumnus blinks. "If the White Witch ever had a mother I doubt very much that she set foot in Narnia."

"It is principally the winter business that makes her so unpopular, but." Shrug. Tumnus stares morosely into the fire.

"Well, someone should do something. I've got my knives, but if a witch is anything like a prime that's not really going to hack it. I guess my friends and I could get an army together? They're nobles, and all. Might be able to do something like that."

"Oh, you have friends," says Tumnus faintly. "Oh how lovely. Oh I am a horrible Faun."

"Not sure how that follows, really. D'you not have friends? I can help you make some, if you like, it's not that hard."

"Oh my dear father would have been ashamed of me," sobs Tumnus, suddenly in tears. "Oh there has never been a worse Faun, not in all time!"

"Aw, hey, come on. Who cares what your dad thinks, you're alright by me. Plus, if fauns're anything like humans, there's probably been worse fauns no matter what you did. Even though I don't think you've done anything all that bad."

"Oh, but you don't know what I have done," wails the faun.

"Okay, so what've you done? I won't get mad."

"But you ought, you ought! Oh, to look at me, would you ever think," hiccups Tumnus, "that I would, that I would take payment from the White Witch, so that if I should ever find a human child such as yourself wandering about in the woods I would for the sake of that payment lure him home and there delay him all the while expecting him to ask to stay the night and thus permit me to turn him over to the Witch? I should hardly think it myself if I did not know better!"

"Oh, no, no, it's only tea," sniffles Tumnus, "and you can tell I've quite lost my nerve about the entire matter but all the same you had best get home as quick as can be. And quietly. If she heard that I had caught a human child, well, it doesn't bear thinking about what she might do. ...She would turn me into a statue, most likely, that is what she would do, I've gone and thought of it."

"Oh. That doesn't sound so bad, really. Unless you'd be conscious?"

"I haven't asked," says Tumnus, dabbing at his face with a handkerchief of stunning ineffectiveness.

"Huh. Now that'd really be awful, just sitting there unable to move or breathe or- I'm sorry, I'm being tactless again."

"Oh, it doesn't matter," sniffs Tumnus. "Only we had best hurry and get you home. I do hope you can find your own country again if I take you as far as the lamp-post."

"I think s- oh, man, I'll have been gone for hours, poor Harin! Poor Nior, even, he's probably more likely to worry... Let's go, I have to make a bunch of apologies. Thanks for the tea, and for a really lovely afternoon, really, even if you were going to betray me it was really nice while it lasted."