“Did they hurt you, Mirabell or Arnold?” asked the gardener, as he came back from chasing the boys.
“No, thank you, not much,” Arnold answered. “One bean struck me on the nose, but it didn’t hurt–hardly any.”
“And one bean knocked over one of your Soldiers, Arnold,” said Mirabell.
“He’s the drummer boy–I guess he isn’t hurt any,” returned the boy, and he set the Tin Drummer on his feet again.
“Well, well! You have a fine regiment of soldiers, there!” said Patrick. “A fine regiment. What are you going to do with ’em, Arnold?”
“We’re going to have a make-believe battle, now that the boys with the beans have gone away,” Arnold replied.
“And my Wooden Doll is going to be a Bed Cross Nurse,” added Mirabell. “And if any of the Soldiers get hurt I’ll give them a ride on the back of my Lamb.”
“Oh, sure and you’ll have dandy times!” laughed Patrick.
Then Arnold and Mirabell had fun playing on the porch with the Tin Soldiers, the wooden cannon, the Doll and the Lamb on Wheels. Back and forth Arnold marched his two companies of Soldiers, firing the make-believe guns in regular bang-bang style.
Sometimes he would pretend a Soldier was wounded, though, of course, none of them really was, and Mirabell would make the Red Cross Nurse Doll look after the injured. And when the battle was nearly over Arnold made believe that a dozen or more of his Tin Soldiers were hurt.