“Dicky might lend us his old turtle,” laughed Ethel Brown. “He’s tired of taking care of it. You could put a stick in here partly above the water, for him to sun himself on. I don’t see why he wouldn’t be quite happy here.”
Dicky’s turtle was a family joke. Dicky had found him two years before and had taken him home thinking he was a piece of stone. His excitement and terror when the stone lying on the library table stuck out first a head and then one leg after another to the number of four, had never been forgotten by the people who saw him at this thrilling moment.
“Now for your bird’s bath,” Mr. Anderson reminded his pupils. “You have to work fast, you know.”
Dorothy brought out her two shallow basins, one smaller than the other. The larger had its inside well greased and the smaller was thoroughly rubbed over on its under side. Into the larger they poured about an inch of concrete and then squeezed the smaller dish into it, but not so sharply that it cut through. They filled in the crack between the two, pushing and patting the mixture into place, and they smoothed the edge so that it turned over the rim of the larger bowl before they cut it off evenly all around with a wire.
The Bird’s Bath
“There,” said Mr. Anderson as he watched them. “We’ll see what will come from that. It might be better done—” at which the girls all pulled long faces—“but also, it might be worse, or I’m very much mistaken.”
“I wish we could make some garden furniture,” sighed Dorothy, holding up her dripping hands helplessly, but at the same time gazing with joy at their new manufacture.
“You could if you would make the forms,” said Mr. Anderson. “All you need to do is to make a bench inside of another bench and fill the space between with concrete.”
“That sounds easy, but if you were a girl, Mr. Anderson, you might find it a little hard to make the forms.”