"You can't get those out of his cheeks," said Ben, with a laugh, and giving up the sofa blanket as a bad job. "Well, we'll just let him finish them, and then I'll shake the skins out of the bath-room window."
"And you won't have any more," said Jasper, with a bob at Jocko, as he squatted on his knee. "Those peanuts are gone, sir."
Jocko, who cared very little what was said about peanuts, as long as he had his cheeks full, picked the nuts out one by one, cracked and threw away the shells, with the same impartial attention to Jasper and Ben, and leisurely ate them.
"Here's the bag, Ben," said Jasper, tossing it to him, when the monkey's cheeks began to flatten out. "Put it up on the shelf, do, for I don't want him nosing all over me for it."
So Ben caught the bag and set it up high in the place designated, Jocko's sharp little eyes following every movement.
"Oh, you needn't stare that way, you greedy little thing," said Jasper, "for you can't get that bag, I'd have you to know. Oh, you are almost through, are you?" Which was presently without doubt the case, proclaimed as it was by a loud shout for more peanuts, and the quick extension of Jocko's long arms.
"No, sir!" said Jasper, shaking his dark hair vehemently; "see what a muss you've made," pointing to the sofa blanket and to the floor and to his jacket, and Ben's as well.
Jocko, who didn't care to waste time regarding these trivial things, redoubled his cries, till the room seemed full of monkeys.
"Goodness me, what a bedlam!" cried Ben. "You can't stand this."
"Well, do put the bag somewhere else than on that shelf," said Jasper. "If he doesn't see it, he'll stop."