‘Mavis has moved with her father to a new home in an unfamiliar town having recently lost her mother. While playing on the street, she is disturbed by an elderly woman in a wheelchair (who we will come to know as the mermaid of the story). The woman offers Mavis three wishes, but Mavis refuses, saying she doesn’t believe in wishes. Some time later Mavis visits the old woman at her home. The old woman tells Mavis stories of her previous life as a mer-princess. Finally she asks Mavis to visit an old fisherman, Skip, to ask him if he would return a pair of boots which the old woman says he made from her sealskin tail. Mavis returns the boots to the old woman who gives her two gifts – a hair comb decorated with shells which Mavis can use for her wishes and a metal fish for Skip. Later, the old lady rises out of her chair and staggers into the sea. She is wearing the boots Mavis returned to her. The next moment she is gone, leaving only the crashing waves and her empty wheelchair.