"You may have it, David; you may have it."
"Now it's your turn!" David would instruct him.
"Must I take something in this window?" Dr. Lavendar would plead. And
David always said firmly that he must. "Well, then, that's mine," Dr.
Lavendar would say.
"Why, that's only a teacup! We have thousands of them at our house!"
David boasted. "I should think you would rather have the toad.
I'll—I'll give you the toad, sir?"
"Oh, dear me, no," Dr. Lavendar protested; "I wouldn't rob you for the world." And so they sauntered on, hand in hand. When they came to a book-store, Dr. Lavendar apologized for breaking in upon their "game." "I'm going to play mine, in here," he said.
David was quite content to wait at the door and watch the people, and the yellow boxes full of windows, drawn by mules with bells jingling on their harness. Sometimes he looked fearfully back into the shop; but Dr. Lavendar was still playing "mine," so all was well. At last, however, he finished his game and came to the door.
"Come along, David; this is the most dangerous place in town!"
David looked at him with interest. "Why did you skip with your eye when you said that, sir?" he demanded.
At which the clerk who walked beside them laughed loudly, and David grew very red and angry.
But when Dr. Lavendar said, "David, I've got a bone in my arm; won't you carry a book for me?" he was consoled, and immediately began to ask questions. It seemed to Dr. Lavendar that he inquired about everything in heaven and earth and the waters under the earth, and at last the old gentleman was obliged, in self-defence, to resort to the formula which, according to the code of etiquette understood by these two friends, signified "stop talking."