‘No, he hasn’t the make-outs, you impudent little rascal!’ said Granfer Piskey, without lifting his gaze from the poor little fellow on the edge of the ring. ‘That’s a complaint from which you apparently suffer.’
‘What has he?’ asked the Tiny Fiddler, impatiently scraping his fiddle-stick over his fiddle, as if to emphasize his words.
‘It isn’t what he has, but what he hasn’t,’ said the old Whitebeard, in the same slow, solemn voice. ‘I was going to say that our poor little brother has lost his laugh.’
‘Lost his laugh!’ cried little Fiddler Piskey and all the other little Piskeys; and their tiny faces of consternation showed what a terrible thing had befallen their poor little brother.
‘Yes, he has had the sad misfortune to lose his laugh,’ said the little old Whitebeard, winking and blinking harder than ever as he stood before the unhappy little Piskey who had lost his laugh; ‘and, worse still, he is quite done for till he finds it again.’
‘Where has my laugh gone to, Granfer Piskey?’ asked the miserable little Piskey who had met with that dreadful misfortune.
‘I don’t know more than the Little Man in the moon,’ answered the tiny old Whitebeard; ‘but if I were you I would go and look for it.’
‘Where must I go and look for my laugh?’ asked the poor little Piskey.
‘I have not the smallest idea; but I should go and search for it till I found it.’
‘Will you come with me and search for my laugh?’ asked the little Piskey, with a look of anxiety in his wee dark eyes, as Granfer Piskey was moving away.