Oswald let Denny have first go with the pistol, and when we went to bed he slept with it under his pillow, but not loaded, for fear he should have a nightmare and draw his fell weapon before he was properly awake.
Oswald let Denny have it, because Denny had toothache, and a pistol is consoling though it does not actually stop the pain of the tooth. The toothache got worse, and Albert's uncle looked at it, and said it was very loose, and Denny owned he had tried to crack a peach-stone with it. Which accounts. He had creosote and camphor, and went to bed early, with his tooth tied up in red flannel.
Oswald knows it is right to be very kind when people are ill, and he forebore to wake the sufferer next morning by buzzing a pillow at him, as he generally does. He got up and went over to shake the invalid, but the bird had flown and the nest was cold. The pistol was not in the nest either, but Oswald found it afterwards under the looking-glass on the dressing-table. He had just awakened the others (with a hair-brush because they had not got anything the matter with their teeth), when he heard wheels, and, looking out, beheld Denny and Albert's uncle being driven from the door in the farmer's high cart with the red wheels.
We dressed extra quick, so as to get down-stairs to the bottom of the mystery. And we found a note from Albert's uncle. It was addressed to Dora, and said:
"Denny's toothache got him up in the small hours. He's off to the dentist to have it out with him, man to man. Home to dinner."
Dora said, "Denny's gone to the dentist."
"I expect it's a relation," H. O. said. "Denny must be short for Dentist."
I suppose he was trying to be funny—he really does try very hard. He wants to be a clown when he grows up. The others laughed.
"I wonder," Dicky said, "whether he'll get a shilling or half-a-crown for it."
Oswald had been meditating in gloomy silence, now he cheered up and said: