The Little Boy Who Forgot to Wash His Hands[7]
Once upon a time, so very long ago that of course there are no children like that now, there was a little boy who almost never washed his hands. He wrote with ink and got ink on his fat little fore-finger; he made pictures with his paints and daubed his thumbs with red and yellow and blue color; he made mud pies and splashed mud all over his chubby palms and he never washed off the ink or the paint or the mud.
And when anyone spoke of his dirty hands, Bobby—that was the little boy’s name—would say, “Oh, I forgot.” And then he would keep right on forgetting all about nice warm soap and soft dry towels, and pretty, clean, pink hands.
One day, Bobby decided that he wanted to play, very hard. The sun was up, there was a soft, singing wind out in the garden, and the whole world looked clean and happy. So Bobby put on his cap, and because it is always better to play with someone than to play alone, Bobby called his big white pussy cat who often loved to chase up and down the path that ran between the hedges.
“Come, pussy, pussy dear!” called Bobby, “come and play with me.”
Then, because the white cat did not seem to hear, Bobby stooped over and picked her up in his arms. But the white cat wriggled and scratched and spit at Bobby and jumped out of his arms. She ran away from him and hid beneath a chair.
“I wonder why she will not play with me,” Bobby said as he went out into the garden. There, on the door-step, stood Bobby’s white dove with the pink, pink toes. Bobby loved the white dove, who was very tame and often flew to his shoulder, cooing gently in his ear. He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a handful of grain which he scattered on the door-step for the dove—pretty yellow grain it was. But the white dove would not eat it, and when Bobby called her, she flew away from him, as far as the green gables at the very top of the house.
“I wonder why she will not play with me,” said Bobby, as he ran down the garden path to the little round pond where his six yellow gold fish lived. The six yellow gold fish were Bobby’s friends and they often played with him as well as they knew how. When he threw crumbs into the pond they would come to the top with their little mouths wide open, and would dart about in the shining water as if they wanted Bobby to jump in and swim about and enjoy the feast with them.
But today, when Bobby gave them some crumbs which he had in his pocket, they did not come up to eat them. They stayed deep, deep down in the pond.
“I wonder why—” Bobby began, and then he happened to look down at the water. The top of the pond was a shining mirror and in it Bobby saw a picture of two little black hands.