"I know what I'm goin' to tell," whispered Prudy to Horace.
"Well," said the boy, thinking a moment, "I'll tell my story double quick, and be done with it."
"You'd ought to see my pa's horse out West, auntie; there ain't a Yankee horse can hold a candle to him; I'll leave it to Pincher. His name is Sancho, and my ma sends him to market mornings, early, with the basket, and puts some money in, and a note to the butcher, and that horse comes back, sir, just as fast as he can trot, sir, and he has the meat there all wrapped up, and just has the basket in his teeth, this way."
"Why, Horace Clifford!" cried Grace, in surprise; "why, what a story!"
"Of course it's a story. You wanted me to tell a story, didn't you? I was just a-blowin'."
"Well, there, tell something nice, can't you, please?"
"I've told all the story I'm a-goin' to," said Horace, firmly. "Now it's Susy's turn."
"You talk about something else a while," replied Susy, "and let me be a-thinkin'."
"I'll tell one," cried Prudy, "let me, now."
"Once there was goin' to be three balls, and Cindrilla didn't have no mother, and her father didn't have no wife, so he married him one. And there was goin' to be three great big balls, and Cindrilla asked her mother if she couldn't go, and her mother said, No, indeed; she hadn't nothin' to wear. And then they started off, and her grandma came,—O, I forgot, the woman was wicked, and she made her little girls sit in the parlor, all dressed up spandy clean, and she made Cindrilla sit in the coal-hod."