"Naturally I must make an impression some way. If my book had been published and talked about all I should do would be to offer them a cup of tea and a wafer—and they would fall all over themselves for the honor of coming."
"Meanwhile, being humble and obscure, you have to serve flesh and fowl and coffee—say, don't you reckon I'd better be scrubbing out the coffee-pot?"
"Please do," she nodded, as she went on with her work while I bearded Waterloo and demanded the glittering object of his admiration. Manlike, he had already tired of the plaything, and was ready to scamper away with Grapefruit, for she had found a dead frog out in the yard, she said, and they would have a grand funeral if he would come on.
"Take him for a little walk now and save the funeral ceremonies until afternoon," I suggested, "so he'll stay out of his mother's way during the party."
Then I poured the marbles out of the coffee-pot into his grimy little hands, the life-lines and head-lines of which constituted little streaks of whiteness, thereby proving them to be the hands of a Caucasian.
"There's one that won't come out," he informed me, as he pocketed the others and departed with Grapefruit.
I investigated and found a marble lodged firmly in the neck of the spout, a most tantalizing position it occupied, resisting coyly my efforts to remove it, yet protruding almost halfway into the body of the pot. I stood there fingering it until Cousin Eunice came to see what was the matter. I explained, and when she insisted upon trying her own hand at the marble's removal I reluctantly gave it over to her.
"Now isn't that too bad?" she finally exclaimed with a nervous impatience after she saw that it was useless to try any further. "It serves me right for giving it to him to play with—but I do hate to get him started before breakfast."
Each member of the family and the servants took turns at trying to get the marble out of the fine new coffee-pot, spending, all told, several hours of the busy morning, and when Rufe came in to luncheon the story was poured into his somewhat unsympathetic ears.
"I knew he would do the thing some damage when I saw you hand it over to him to play with this morning," he said with a fatherly air. "Doesn't he tear, or break, or chew, or sprinkle over with talcum powder everything he can get his hands on?"