But it was very hard for Uncle Wigwag to stop playing jokes. A little later that afternoon he gave Beckie what she thought was a candy egg, and when she tried to bite into it, thinking it was nice and sweet, the egg popped open, and a little chicken inside, made of paper and feathers, crowed just like a rooster, and Beckie nearly jumped out of her hair ribbon, she was so surprised.
“Ha! Ha!” laughed Uncle Wigwag. “That was a good joke!”
“I don’t think so,” said Beckie, sort of sorrowful-like.
“Don’t you? Well, maybe it wasn’t,” spoke Uncle Wigwag. “Anyhow, here’s a penny for you to buy some real candy.” Uncle Wigwag was always that way—first he’d play a joke on you and then he’d do you a kindness. He was quite nice after all.
And a little later Neddie was looking for a pencil to write down some of his home school-work on his paper pad.
“Here’s a good pencil,” said Uncle Wigwag, taking one from his pocket. Neddie didn’t think anything, and started to write with the pencil. But, as soon as he did so, it bounced out of his paw and jumped around on the floor. For inside it was a jumping-jack. It was a trick pencil, you know, and Uncle Wigwag had played another joke.
“Excuse me while I laugh,” said the old gentleman bear. And Neddie laughed, too, for he rather liked the trick pencil.
And then Uncle Wigwag played another trick. Oh, but he was full of them that day! wasn’t he? I guess he must have been roaming around two or three five-and-ten-cent stores to find those jokes.
The last trick Uncle Wigwag played was on Mr. Whitewash, the white Polar bear gentleman. Mr. Whitewash used to have a cup of tea every afternoon, while he sat down to read in the paper about whether it was going to be cold or hot the next day.
Mr. Whitewash used to sit on a cake of ice, you know, because he liked everything cold, except his tea, and he did not like warm weather at all.