Half-Past Seven Stories | Page 9

the road an' all the country an' the whole world."
"Like Noah's flood, you mean?"
"Yes, just like Noah's, only he isn't here to build any ole ark for you to get on."
"I don't care," said Marmaduke stoutly.
"You don't care!" cried his brother. "Why, you'd drown, that's what you'd do!"
"No, I wouldn't either--" Marmaduke seemed very sure about this--"'cause," he started to explain.
"'Cause what?"
"'Cause the Toyman is as good as ole Noah any day," replied the little boy. "He could build an ark as big as a house, as big as the Church, an' the ducks'd get on an' the cows an' the horses an'--"
"Yes," interrupted his brother, "but don't you remember--there were only two of each kind. Now Hal an' Teddy could get on, but White Boots an' Ole Methusaleh'd have to stay off, an' Rover an' Brownie could go, but Wienerwurst couldn't--see?"
Marmaduke looked frightened at this--at the very thought of Wienerwurst, his little doggie, trying to swim around in a terrible flood.
"I'd hide him under my coat," he declared.
"You couldn't get on yourself," Jehosophat insisted, "I tell you an ark only takes two of each sort of people an' animals an' chickens and things. Now Mother and Father could go--that's two grown-ups, an' Hepzebiah an' me, but you an' Wienie would have to swim around in the water just as long as you could, then go under--way under, too," he added.
Perhaps he was only teasing, but Marmaduke didn't take it quite that way. It seemed very serious. Then suddenly he had a bright idea.
"You forgot the Toyman," he shouted, "and that makes another two, for the Toyman an' I are just alike. Didn't Mother say,--'He's nothing but a boy.' So I'd sneak Wienie under my coat--if it was ol' Noah's ark--an' if it was the Toyman's, why he'd let me in anyway."
Jehosophat had no answer at all for this, and all they could do now was to watch the rain and the Pond and the Brook, but Marmaduke was very happy picturing to himself the big Ark which the Toyman would build, and how he would help, and the fine time, too, he and all the animals would have, living together under the very same roof.
Of course, the rain had to stop some time. It always does in the end. And on the sixth day the Sun came out jolly and warm again, and the boys put on their rubber boots and went out to the Pond. They couldn't get quite as near it as usual, for the edge was almost at the Ducks' house now, and not so very far from the house of the White Wyandottes, who seemed to think the end of the world had come, and looked very sad with their draggled feathers.
For a little while the boys threw sticks in the water. When the dogs had fetched the sticks they would shake the water from their coats and over the boys, just like shower baths. It was all very jolly, and I don't know which the children enjoyed more, throwing the sticks or the nice cool showers.
But after a while they tired of this, too, and walked up the pasture to see the Brook.
There it was, racing and romping and tearing along for dear life. It wasn't clear and silvery now, but muddy and brown as if a thousand cups of coffee had been spilled in it. And on it floated many strange things,--branches of trees and a fence-rail, the roof of a pig-pen, an old shoe, and one poor drowned sheep.
"Maybe," said Jehosophat, "maybe, if we watch long enough, some pirates'll come sailin' along with big hats an' swords an'--"
"An' knives in their mouths," Marmaduke suggested.
"But that's not the best thing," Jehosophat went on, "they'll have a flag with a skull an' dead men's bones painted on it."
"Crackey!" exclaimed his brother, just like the big boys. It was a fine word, too, but only to be used on special occasions. And pirates and skulls and dead men's bones certainly made a "special occasion."
Jehosophat seemed to think so, too, for he was singing in high glee,
"Yo, ho, ho, And a bottle of bay rum."
As these last dread words died on the air, they thought they heard a sound behind them. It was something like a laugh--more, perhaps, like a chuckle. They turned and saw nothing but the high board fence of the cowyard, and, over by the barn, the Toyman, walking very swiftly towards his workshop. Now usually they would have wondered about that; tried to guess what he "would make," but this morning there were other, very grave, things taking their attention.
"Guess it was pirates--ssshhh!" whispered Jehosophat, "they may have disbarked an' be hidin' in the bushes."
But a way of escape was open. It was coming down the stream.
Jehosophat spied it.
"The very thing!" he