The Trout Summary

Julia always
goes running into the Dark Walk,a tunnel that is covered with bushes, and is not dry on the
pathway.  She invites her brother to come along, trying to terrify him as much as she was
terrified.  They came back home and boast that they had been through the tunnel.  Julia, age
twelve, was asked if they had seen the well.  She doesn't believe there is a well; so she said
Nonsense.  But she went back to the tunnel to look for the well.  She found a hole, scooped in
a rock, and a panting trout.  She brought her brother, Stephen, in to see it. They were so
fascinated that they no longer had any fear.  She even brought the kitchen-garden man down to
see it.  He asked how the trout could have gotten there.  She lifted the trout up because if she
found it, it must be hers.  Her mother and father made up stories as to the existence of the
trout.  

It bothered her that the trout was motionless.  She brought him
food.but he ignored it.  She heard her mother tell tall tales of the fish including fairy
godmothers and other fairy tale things.  She did not believe in that.  One night she goes down
and finds the trout and puts him in a pitcher and races to the rivers edge.  She was afraid that
he would escape from the pitcher,but she made it safely to the river. She releases him, sees him
swim away, and feels a great deal of joy in that act.   In the morning her brother comes
running, yelling that the trout was gone and demanding to know where he went.  She told him that
the fairy godmother came and got him.