“I hope so,” said the man, and he didn’t cry any more, for he had many pennies to buy food. And he gave Beckie half of the pennies for her own self. Wasn’t he good?
And on the way home a bad old tiger from the circus chased Beckie, but she threw the bright, shining yeast cake at him, and the tiger thought it was a bullet from a bang-bang gun, and he was so frightened for fear he might get shot that he ran off and left Beckie alone.
Then she picked up the yeast cake, which was only bent sideways a little bit, and got safely home with it, and it made a nice loaf of bread.
And on the next page, if the wallpaper doesn’t jump down off the ceiling and go to sleep in the baby’s crib, I’ll tell you about Neddie playing the piano.
STORY XXIII
NEDDIE PLAYS THE PIANO
“Come, Neddie!” cried Mamma Stubtail, the lady bear, one day, as she went to the door of the cave-house and looked out in front where Neddie, the little boy bear, was playing football. “It’s time to practice your music lesson, Neddie.”
“Oh, dear!” cried the little bear boy. “I wish I was a player-piano!”
“What a funny wish!” said Beckie, who was taking her doll, Elizabeth Jane Huckleberrypie, out for a walk.
“Why do you want to be a player-piano, Neddie?”
“Then I wouldn’t have to practice my music lesson,” said the little bear boy.