“‘Oh, didn’t he?’ I exclaimed. ‘Why, I’ve been all over London, in all kinds of pockets to-day. I’ll tell you all about it.’
“Which I did; so that you and the hair-brush are now equally wise.”
And there the shilling’s story ended.
But did it ever occur to you before what a traveller a coin can be, and that it is quite possible to get again at night the same coin you parted with in the morning?
THE RING OF FORTITUDE
THE RING OF FORTITUDE
When Priscilla had been a very good girl her mother allowed her as a special treat to play with her jewel-case. Of course Priscilla had to be very careful, which, indeed, she was by nature, having for the most part a place for everything, and everything in its place. She used to sit on the floor with the jewel-case before her, and take the rings and brooches and pendants and necklaces and bracelets and pins out one by one, and hold them up to the light and make them flash, and then put them on. There were diamonds and pearls, and a large opal in which you saw deep down in its milky depths little glints of burning crimson and dancing green. But of all the jewels Priscilla liked best a turquoise-ring, which her mother had ceased to wear. Priscilla would very much have liked this ring for her own; but her mother did not care for little girls to wear rings at all, except—but that is what I am going to tell you.
One day, soon after Priscilla was eleven, she had a bad toothache. It grew no better as the time went on, although she rubbed the tooth with medicine which her mother sent for; and afterwards she held a clove in her mouth, according to the advice of a charwoman who happened to be working in the house that day; and then lay down with a piece of brown paper against her cheek, soaked in vinegar and then peppered, according to the advice of the cook; and later sat close to the fire with the heat on the toothache side, according to the advice of the housemaid; and finally sponged her cheek with almost boiling water, according to the advice of the nurse. Nothing did the tooth any good. It ached most of the night, and the next morning poor Priscilla, with very red eyes, was led away to the dentist’s by her nurse.
Of course directly she found herself on the terrible doorstep waiting for the horrible door to open, her toothache went away absolutely; but none the less she had to go into the waiting-room, and look at old Punches and old Illustrated London Newses for a long time until the dentist was ready, while fresh people came in and sat down with a sigh, including one old gentleman with a left cheek like the glass of a bull’s-eye lantern; and then Priscilla’s turn came and she went upstairs and for half an hour the dentist tortured her.