"Well, he calls himself a patent-medicine man, but I'd call him a 'fakir.'"
"What's a 'fakir,' Toyman?" put in Marmaduke, very sleepily.
"Oh, a man who pretends to be something he isn't, and who sells folks something that's no good, and takes all their money for nothing. But"--and he laughed--"some folks like to be fooled."
"It's too bad!" sighed Marmaduke.
"What's too bad, sonny?"
"Why, to smash all those big bottles and waste all that lovely licorice water."
But he soon forgot all about the bottles and the licorice water, and the bad Doctor Pipp with the tall hat and the fur collar, and the Red Indian, too, for, as they rode along by the River, the Moon was up, and seemed to be riding along with them--never getting ahead or behind, just keeping even with Hal the Red Roan. And Marmaduke loved to go riding or walking with a great yellow moon. Besides, the Toyman told them a story, as he had promised--and a nice one it was--so the little boy fell asleep.
But I wouldn't say that they never dreamed about that fur collar, and the tall hat, and the Indian, and all those bottles.
It's just possible that they did.