“What is it, Perry?” she asked.
“I can—I can play a drum, Miss Eleanor!” he burst out.
She looked doubtful: the Imp was given to thinking that he could do most things.
“This isn’t a play drum, you know, dear; it’s a real one,” she said.
“But I can play a real one. Truly I can! Mr. Archer taught me—he was a truly drummer-boy in the war; he showed me how. He said I could hit it up like a good ’un!” the Imp exploded again.
Miss Eleanor dimly remembered that among the Imp’s amazing list of acquaintances, a one-legged Grand Army man, who kept a newspaper-stall, had been mentioned, and decided that it could do no harm to let him try.
“Well, put it on,” she said, and the Imp proudly assumed the drum, grasped the sticks loosely between his fingers, wagged his head knowingly from side to side, and began.
Brrrm!
Brrrm!