“O my senses!” screamed Mrs. Goodsell from the bench, where she was constantly hopping from one foot to the other in terrified distress, “here’s that boy again—ah—oof!” as the monkey stopped his work a second to fasten his little eyes on her.
Davie quickly closed the door and stood on the big flat stone, his heart beating wildly. Then he opened it again. “I’ll help you,” he said, going in.
“Davie, he’ll bite you!” screamed old Mrs. Beebe, waving her broom.
Davie shut his eyes, as he thought so, too. Then he opened them and began to climb the lowest shelf to reach the end of the dangling chain. The monkey stopped regarding the screaming woman on the bench, whom he had almost made up his mind he would leap for, and peered over at the boy, and as quick as lightning, he twitched up the chain and grinned in Davie’s face.
“Now, you’ve done it,” exclaimed the organ man, with a word that wasn’t pretty at all, and he glared at Davie.
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” said Davie, sliding to the floor. His face was very red, and his blue eyes went down in shame.
“Don’t feel bad,” old Mr. Beebe gasped out the words, and leaned, quite spent, against the counter where he did up his bundles for customers.
“Get something to eat,” the organ man growled it out at the shoemaker’s wife, “then he’ll come down and I’ll lick him ’most to death.”
“Oh, you mustn’t,” cried Davie, forgetting his shame to rush over to the organ man.
“Mustn’t, hey? You stand out of th’ way, you beggar-boy, you,” looking down contemptuously at Davie’s little patched shoes, and he pushed him roughly off.