One day Mrs. No-Tail, the frog lady, looked in the pantry to see what there was to eat for dinner and there wasn’t a single thing. No, just like Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, the pantry was bare, though there was a bone in it that was being saved for some time when Peetie and Jackie Bow Wow, the puppie-dog boys, might come on a visit.
“Oh, some one will have to go to the store to get something for supper,” said Mrs. No-Tail. “Do you feel able to go, Grandpa Croaker?”
“Well, I could go,” said the old frog gentleman, in his deepest bass voice, which sounded like the rumble of thunder over the hills and far away, “but I promised I would go over and play a game of checkers with Uncle Wiggily Longears. He has just finished the playhouse for Sammie and Susie, and he wants to show me that. So I don’t see how I can go to the store very well.”
“If Bully and Bawly were here they’d go,” said their mamma. “I wish they’d come. Oh, here they are now,” she went on, as she looked out of the window and saw the two frog boys coming home from school. “Hurry!” she called to them. “I want you to go to the store.”
“All right,” they both answered, and they were so polite about it that Mrs. No-Tail gave them each a penny, though, of course, they would have gone without that, for they always liked to help their mamma.
“I want some sugar, and molasses, and bread, and butter, and some corn meal, and bacon and watercress salad,” said the mother frog, and Bully and Bawly each took a basket in which to carry the things. Then they hopped on toward the store.
“I’m going to buy marbles with my penny,” said Bully.
“And I’m going to buy a whistle with mine,” said Bawly.
Well, they got to the grocery, all right, and the cow lady who kept it gave them the things their mamma wanted. Then they went to the toy store and Bully got his marbles, and Bawly his whistle, which made a very loud noise.
Now I’m very sorry to be obliged to tell it, but something is going to happen to Bully and Bawly very soon. In fact, I think it is going to take place at once. Just excuse me a moment, will you, until I look out of the window and see if the alligator is coming. Yes, there he is. He just got off the trolley car. The conductor put him off because he had the wrong transfer.