The Pillow Inspector Calls

At ten minutes to bedtime, there was a small, polite knock on Ivy's bedroom door. It came from very low down, near the carpet. She opened the door, and there on the rug stood a man about as tall as a teaspoon, with a briefcase, a clipboard and a moustache like a very neat paintbrush.

"Good evening," he said, in a surprisingly deep voice. "Inspector Hubert Plump, Office of Pillows, Bureau of Whimsy. I am here to inspect your pillow." He showed her his badge. It had a tiny picture of a pillow on it and the words Approved for Sleeping.

She lifted him onto the bed. Inspector Plump opened his briefcase and took out his instruments: a tiny ruler, an even tinier feather, and a magnifying glass with a crack in it, which he said gave it character. "There are five tests," he said, "and a pillow must pass every one. Shall we begin?"

The first was the Sink Test. Inspector Plump climbed onto the middle of the pillow and stood very still. Slowly he began to sink, first to his ankles, then to his knees, then nearly to his middle. "Excellent sinkage," he said, writing it down. "Would sink again."

The second was the Feather Test. He held the tiny feather up high and let it go, and they watched it float down, turning and turning, until it landed on the pillow without making any sound at all. "Very good," he said. "A noisy pillow is no use to anybody."

The third was the Cool Side Test. Inspector Plump flipped over one corner of the pillow and lay down with his cheek against the cotton. "Ah," he said, "lovely and cool. Every pillow must have a cool side, for turning over in the middle of the night. It is in the regulations."

The fourth was the Tooth Test. He lifted the edge of the pillow and measured the space underneath with his tiny ruler. "Plenty of room for a tooth," he said, "should one become available. The Department of Teeth likes to know these things." Ivy wiggled a front tooth with her tongue. It was not quite ready yet, but it was thinking about it.

Then Inspector Plump turned to the last page of his clipboard and frowned. "The fifth test is the hardest," he said. "It is called the Whole Night Test. A head of the proper size must lie on the pillow until morning, and I am afraid my head is far too small to count."

He looked at her. He looked, very carefully, at her head. "Would you," he asked, "be willing to assist the Bureau?"

She said she would. She brushed her teeth, because that is in the regulations too, and climbed under the covers and laid her head right in the middle of the pillow. Her toy rabbit, Parsnip, was made Assistant Inspector and lay down beside her. Inspector Plump wrote on his clipboard: Whole Night Test, in progress.

He climbed down the bed leg like a firefighter down a pole, packed his ruler, his feather and his magnifying glass into his briefcase, and stood for a moment on the rug. "Pillow," he whispered, so as not to disturb the test, "you are doing very well."

The pillow was soft under Ivy's cheek, with a cool side waiting for later. Parsnip's ear was flopped across her hand. Her eyes were heavy, and the house was very quiet.

The last thing she heard was a tiny deep voice going out under the door, murmuring "Excellent sinkage" to nobody in particular, and the soft click of a briefcase closing, and then nothing at all but sleep.