“Because my birthday is next week, Dick,� answered the little girl, whose name was Dorothy. “It’s my birthday, and maybe I’ll get a doll then, or for Christmas.�
“It isn’t my birthday until after Christmas,� said Dick. “But I don’t want a doll either of those times.�
“What do you want?� asked Mother, smiling at her two children as she left the elevator with them. “What would you like, Richard?� she asked; for that was Dick’s real name.
“A rocking horse,� he answered. “I’d like a big rocking horse, and then I could make believe I was a soldier captain going to war.�
“Yes, we’ll look through the toy department,� promised the mother, and then happy looks came over the faces of Dick and Dorothy.
On the shelves and counters where, a little while before in the half-darkness, the Sawdust Doll, the Calico Clown, and the other toys had had such fun, they now sat or stood, as stiff as the ramrod in the gun of the Tin Soldier. Not one of them moved, and the White Rocking Horse just stared straight in front of him, looking at the blackboard.
“Oh, Mother, here are the dolls!� cried Dorothy, and she pointed to a shelf back of the counter on which the Calico Clown stood near the Bold Tin Soldier. “See the dolls on the shelves! Oh, what pretty ones!�
“Would you like to look at the dolls?� asked the girl behind the counter. She worked in the store, and now she lifted down the Sawdust Doll who had, only an hour or so before, been riding on the back of the White Rocking Horse.
“Here is a very pretty doll,� said the girl clerk, who was pretty herself. “Her eyes open and shut.�
“And they’re brown, too, just like Dick’s!� whispered the little girl to her mother, as she took the doll in her arms. “Oh, please may I have her?�