“Stuff! That can’t be yours! Where did you get it?”
“It can be mine, it shall be mine, it is mine. It is a reward of merit, the first instalment of many I hope to receive.”
“Tell a feller!” pleaded the eight-year-old boy, who was very like Beatrice, only that his hair was a little rougher, his dark eyes even brighter, his general appearance a trifle more dilapidated.
“I have told a ‘feller,’ and if a ‘feller’ can’t believe I am not to blame.”
“Don’t bother! Tell the hull concern!”
Beatrice slipped her arm around the little chap as affectionately as if his costume were not plentifully bedaubed with street mud, and kissed his retroussé nose squarely on its tip; after which she gave him a history of the afternoon’s incident, told as only Bonny would have told it.
“Jimminy-cracky! He must be richer’n thunder!”
“Robert! Where do you learn such talk? Why will you use such words?”
“Dunno, Mother. They seem to grow somehow. Say, Bon! That basket is worth a heap of money!”
“My brother, you should not look a gift horse in the mouth!”