Maidas Little Shop | Page 2

that she could do all the things that other little
girls did, she no longer cared to do them--not even hopping and
skipping, which she had always expected would be the greatest fun in
the world. Maida herself thought this very strange.
"But what can I find for her to do?" "Buffalo" Westabrook said.
You could tell from the way he asked this question that he was not
accustomed to take advice from other people. Indeed, he did not look it.
But he looked his name. You would know at once why the cartoonists
always represented him with the head of a buffalo; why, gradually,
people had forgotten that his first name was Jerome and referred to him
always as "Buffalo" Westabrook.
Like the buffalo, his head was big and powerful and emerged from the
midst of a shaggy mane. But it was the way in which it was set on his
tremendous shoulders that gave him his nickname. When he spoke to
you, he looked as if he were about to charge. And the glance of his eyes,
set far back of a huge nose, cut through you like a pair of knives.
It surprised Maida very much when she found that people stood in awe

of her father. It had never occurred to her to be afraid of him.
"I've racked my brains to entertain her," "Buffalo" Westabrook went on.
"I've bought her every gimcrack that's made for children--her nursery
looks like a toy factory. I've bought her prize ponies, prize dogs and
prize cats--rabbits, guinea-pigs, dancing mice, talking parrots,
marmosets--there's a young menagerie at the place in the Adirondacks.
I've had a doll-house and a little theater built for her at Pride's. She has
her own carriage, her own automobile, her own railroad car. She can
have her own flying-machine if she wants it. I've taken her off on trips.
I've taken her to the theater and the circus. I've had all kinds of nurses
and governesses and companions, but they've been mostly failures.
Granny Flynn's the best of the hired people, but of course Granny's old.
I've had other children come to stay with her. Selfish little brutes they
all turned out to be! They'd play with her toys and ignore her
completely. And this fall I brought her to Boston, hoping her cousins
would rouse her. But the Fairfaxes decided suddenly to go abroad this
winter. If she'd only express a desire for something, I'd get it for her--if
it were one of the moons of Jupiter."
"It isn't anything you can give her," Dr. Pierce said impatiently; "you
must find something for her to do."
"Say, Billy, you're an observant little duck. Can't you tell us what's the
matter?" "Buffalo" Westabrook smiled down at the third man of the
party.
"The trouble with the child," Billy Potter said promptly, "is that
everything she's had has been 'prize.' Not that it's spoiled her at all.
Petronilla is as simple as a princess in a fairy-tale."
"Petronilla" was Billy Potter's pet-name for Maida.
"Yes, she's wonderfully simple," Dr. Pierce agreed. "Poor little thing,
she's lived in a world of bottles and splints and bandages. She's never
had a chance to realize either the value or the worthlessness of things."
"And then," Billy went on, "nobody's ever used an ounce of

imagination in entertaining the poor child."
"Imagination!" "Buffalo" Westabrook growled. "What has imagination
to do with it?"
Billy grinned.
Next to her father and Granny Flynn, Maida loved Billy Potter better
than anybody in the world. He was so little that she could never decide
whether he was a boy or a man. His chubby, dimply face was the
pinkest she had ever seen. From it twinkled a pair of blue eyes the
merriest she had ever seen. And falling continually down into his eyes
was a great mass of flaxen hair, the most tousled she had ever seen.
Billy Potter lived in New York. He earned his living by writing for
newspapers and magazines. Whenever there was a fuss in Wall
Street--and the papers always blamed "Buffalo" Westabrook if this
happened--Billy Potter would have a talk with Maida's father. Then he
wrote up what Mr. Westabrook said and it was printed somewhere.
Men who wrote for the newspapers were always trying to talk with Mr.
Westabrook. Few of them ever got the chance. But "Buffalo"
Westabrook never refused to talk with Billy Potter. Indeed, the two
men were great friends.
"He's one of the few reporters who can turn out a good story and tell it
straight as I give it to him," Maida had once heard her father say. Maida
knew that Billy could turn out good stories--he had turned out a great
many for her.
"What has imagination to do with it?" Mr. Westabrook repeated.