A SUDDEN DOWNFALL.
And here she straightway went down on her knees again. Eunice leaned against a lamppost, breathless with laughing.
“Oh, oh! don’t you see? It’s only—oh, dear! my sides ache so! it’s—” and Eunice went off again into a peal of laughter.
Cricket was up by this time, more puzzled than ever.
“Do you suppose I’ve got anything the matter with me? I declare my knees feel cracked. Do you suppose I’ve got to go all the way to the library bumping along on my knees? Something seemed to whang into my back knees, and I—oh, Johnnie-goat! was it you? Eunice, was it Johnnie-goat?”
Eunice nodded weakly. She had no breath left for words. Johnnie-goat stood placidly behind Cricket, wagging his long beard socially, and making little corner-wise motions of his solemn head, as he always did when he was playfully inclined.
“He just walked right up and bunted you under the knees, and down you went. I believe he did it for a joke,” gasped Eunice. “See! he doesn’t seem angry a bit.”
“He doesn’t seem angry?” asked Cricket, somewhat indignantly. “I should say he’d better not. I don’t know what should have spoiled his temper. I’m the one to be angry, I should say. You wretched old Johnnie-goat! breaking my knee-pans, and making everybody laugh at me,—only there isn’t anybody around.”
“Yes, there are three children up in that window, across the street,” said Eunice. “They’re laughing as if they’d kill themselves.”
“I’m glad there’s something to amuse them,” said Cricket, cheerfully. “Oh, Eunice! that’s the very house my lady came out of yesterday! Well, I laughed at her, and those children are welcome to laugh at me. Tell me how he did it.”