"I'll tell the King! I'll tell the King! I'll tell the King!" and he buried his face in the road again, and simplee kicked.
But Tiny just cried back anyhow,
"Dummind if you do," for he knew he was all right: for if when you are Commander-in-Chief you disguise as a nigger-boy, you mustn't mind if you do get spanked.
Besides Tiny knew that St Jack had been growing so old of late, that even the good King had begun to notice it.
And Tiny knew that because the Queen who was a bit of a blab, honest soul, had told him in secret that morning, when he went to the Castle for the washing; which was always his little job.
For the Queen does all the washing in That Country.
A few minutes later as Baby came panting up the lane with Tiny's boat, which he was going to sail on the Pond against the Colonel's gull, she found the Commander-in-Chief sitting in the middle of the path, fiddling his nose about between his fingers, and blubbing rather.
And when she saw how muddy his nose was, and how he fiddled it, she ran up with her eyes round-wide, crying,
"O, you poor little thing!—What have they been doing to you?—Let me wipe your nose for you."
Then the Commander-in-Chief answered very brave, as he leaned back on his hands, with his nose up for Baby to do,