Charlie and His Puppy Bingo

by Helen Hill; Violet Maxwell

NOW that Charlie had an automobile, you may be sure that he drove in it every single day—that is every day that the sun was shining, for, of course, he could not drive in the automobile when it was raining!

In the mornings, when his Mother and his Auntie were busy in the house, Charlie used to drive up and down the garden path; but in the afternoons, when his Mother and his Auntie went for a walk, he drove beside them in his automobile, and Bingo always came too.

Bingo was growing to be a big little puppy—he no longer drank his milk out of a bottle. Oh, dear, no! Bingo could lap up his milk as well as any grown-up dog. He had a saucer to himself just like Topsy and Jane, and Charlie gave him his breakfast every morning and his dinner and his supper at the same time that he gave Jane and Topsy theirs.

You may be sure that Charlie enjoyed driving in his automobile with Bingo prancing beside him. But though Charlie drove his automobile every morning and every afternoon, he did not really know how to drive it at all! No indeed! Charlie always wanted to pedal so fast that he paid no attention to his steering, and the automobile went wiggly, wiggly all over the place. When he was driving in the garden Charlie never could keep to the path, he would pedal so fast that the automobile would run up on the grass and into the flower beds. And when he was out on the sidewalk with his Mother and his Auntie, the automobile would zigzag from left to right and from right to left in a most pe-cul-iar way.

His Mother and his Auntie said to him again and again, “Don’t pedal so fast, Charlie. Go slower and try to steer properly, some day you will crash into a lamppost and maybe break your automobile all to pieces.” But Charlie did not listen. He just went on pedaling as fast as ever he could and paid no attention to his steering at all.

One day his Mother and his Auntie were walking along the sidewalk and Charlie was driving in front in his automobile, while Bingo pranced along, sometimes beside Charlie, and sometimes running back to see what Charlie’s Mother and his Auntie were doing. Charlie was pedaling away as fast as ever he could and his automobile was going wiggly, wiggly all over the sidewalk.

Quite a little way in front, an old gentleman was walking, and he was on the outer edge of the sidewalk, as was right and proper for him to be. He was looking at his newspaper and he did not know that Charlie was driving toward him, paying no attention to his steering and zigzagging from left to right and from right to left again—when suddenly, Charlie’s automobile went crash! Bang! straight into the old gentleman! That was dreadful!

The old gentleman stopped short, and, when he had got his breath, he said, “Don’t you know that automobiles should keep to the right? Or is it possible that you are driving an automobile and don’t know the traffic laws?”

Of course Charlie apologized very politely to the old gentleman for bumping into him, and then he had to say that he knew nothing about the traffic laws at all. This made Charlie feel very much ashamed.