“Oh, at last we are to have a Thanksgiving dinner!” cried Neddie. “Oh, joy!” And Beckie clapped her paws.
Then the Professor and Beckie and Neddie and George, the big bear, followed the circus man. He led them to a big barn in the woods. And, oh! all the animals that were there—elephants and tigers and good lions, and zebras and more bears and lots of monkeys, and giraffes with necks so long that they could pick an orange off a church steeple, and cunning little ponies, and a hippopotamus with a mouth like a red flannel bag—and hundreds of others.
“Welcome to our Thanksgiving dinner!” all the animals cried to Beckie and Neddie when they saw the Stubtail children. “Eat all you want!”
And such a dinner as it was! From cranberry sauce to popcorn balls and honey cakes and blueberry pie and chestnuts and cider—and, oh, dear! I mustn’t write any more about it or I’ll get the indigspepsia. Anyhow it was a grand dinner, and in the middle of it who should come back but the bad lion who had chased the circus man.
“I’m—I’m sorry I was bad,” roared the lion. “May I have a piece of pie?” Then the circus man forgave him, and the lion had a good dinner. And Beckie and Neddie stayed in the circus barn all night, feeling quite happy.
And I hope you have a good dinner on Thanksgiving—each and every one of you. But don’t eat too much. Then on the page after this, if the fishman doesn’t blow his horn in the phonograph and scare the player-piano, I’ll tell you about Neddie and the elephant.
STORY X
NEDDIE AND THE ELEPHANT
It was the day after Thanksgiving. Neddie and Beckie Stubtail, the two little bear children, awoke in the barn where the circus man kept all his animals during winter, when he was not giving a show in the big tent. Neddie and Beckie felt very nice and comfortable, for they had had a good holiday dinner when they had almost given up expecting one; they had a nice warm place to sleep, and they were happier than at any time since they had run away from home to join George, the big trained bear, and the Professor, his master, who led George around by a chain fast to a ring in his nose.
“Are you there, Neddie?” called Beckie from her bed in the nice clean sawdust. She was hugging her doll Mary Ann Puddingstick Clothespin.
“Of course I’m here,” answered Neddie, blinking both his eyes, and wiggling his little short tail. “Aren’t you glad you ran away now with me, sister, so you can become a trained bear?”