Just then the hand-organ man cried again, and said:
“Oh, dear! Oh, George, why did you ever run away and leave me?”
Oh, I forgot to tell you that the reason Beckie knew the crying man played a hand-organ was because there was a hand-organ standing up against a tree near him. Only he wasn’t playing it just then. You can’t very well play a hand-organ and cry at the same time. At least I never saw any one do it, though, of course, it may be done.
“What is the matter, hand-organ man?” asked Beckie, politely, making a little bow, as she stepped in front of him. “Why do you cry, and who is George? Was he a little bear?”
“Oh, no,” said the man, who could understand bear talk, and speak it, too. “No, George was not a bear. He was a monkey, and he used to do lots of tricks as I played the music. But he has run away and left me.”
Then Beckie noticed that there was no monkey with the hand-organ, as there should have been, by rights.
“So you are crying for George; is that it?” she asked the man who was wiping away his tears on the back of his cap.
“That is just why, little bear girl,” he said. “I have no monkey to do funny tricks when I play the music, and, unless I have a monkey, the people will not give me pennies. Oh, I have no money, I can’t get any, and I am so hungry.”
“Poor hand-organ man!” exclaimed Beckie. “Maybe I could be a monkey for you.”
“You!” exclaimed the man. “Why, you are too big. But I thank you just the same.”