The Story of a Monkey on a Stick | Page 6

face of the Cotton Doll.
"You're too mean for anything!" said the Doll to the Monkey, and she
was almost ready to cry. But she happened to think that if she shed any
tears they would wash down through the ink on her cheeks and make
her look queerer than ever. So she did not cry.
"I'm never going to speak to you again, so there!" exclaimed the Cotton
Doll, and she would have stamped her foot if there had been room for
her to stand up in the desk drawer--which there wasn't. So she just
banged her heels on the bottom of it.
"Oh, I'll be good!" promised the Monkey. "I won't put any more ink on
you, and I'll see if I can get some of it off on this piece of blotting paper.
I blotted my tail on it."
He tried to clean the Doll's face, but, by this time, the ink had dried,
and you know how hard it is to get dried ink off your fingers after you
have written a letter. Well, it was this way with the Cotton Doll. The
ink stayed on her face.
"Well, if you have ink on your face I've also got some on the end of my
tail, where I dipped it into the bottle," said the Monkey chap, thinking
to cheer up the Doll by this.
"Yes, but the ink doesn't show on your brown tail as it does on my
white face," said the Doll. "However, there is no use crying over spilled
milk, I suppose," she went on. "Only if you do such a thing again I'll
never speak to you as long as I live!"

"I'll never do it again," said the Monkey in a sorrowful voice. "Now
let's have some fun. You tell me some of your adventures and I'll tell
you some of mine. Did you ever live in a store?"
"Oh, yes, that's where I came from," answered the Doll.
"And was there a Calico Clown in your store, who was always asking
what it was that made more noise than a pig under a gate?" asked the
Monkey.
"No. But there was a Jumping Jack who was always trying to see how
high he could kick, and one day he nearly kicked my hat off," said the
Cotton Doll. "But tell me, please, some of your adventures."
The Monkey was just starting to tell how the Calico Clown's red and
yellow trousers were burned in the gas jet one day, when, all of a
sudden, there was a great noise and commotion in the schoolroom. The
Monkey and the Doll could not tell what had caused it, though the
Monkey did try to look out through the keyhole.
"Can you see anything?" asked the Doll.
"I can see some water dripping down," answered the long-tailed chap,
"and the teacher and the children are running around as fast as
anything."
"Oh, I wonder what has happened!" exclaimed the Doll. And just then
she and the Monkey on a Stick heard the teacher say:
"Run out quickly, children! Run out, all of you. A water pipe has burst
and there's a regular rain storm inside our nice schoolroom."
"Please can't I have my Monkey on a Stick before I go out?" asked
Herbert. "You put him in your desk, Teacher!"
"And I want my knife you took away, please!" called another boy.
"We have no time for those things, now," the teacher said. "The water
is coming down fast, and we'll all be wet through if we stay. The

Monkey, knife and other things will be all right in my desk. Get your
hats, and pass out quickly. More pipes may burst and flood the school.
"Go home, children, all of you," said the teacher. "To-morrow the pipes
will be mended, and, if the school is dry enough, we will go on with
our lessons. But run home now."
You may well imagine that most of the boys and girls were glad of the
holiday that had come to them so unexpectedly. But Herbert felt sorry;
that he had to leave his Monkey on a Stick in school. When he reached
home he acted so strangely that his mother wanted to know what the
matter was.
Of course Herbert had to tell that he had taken his Monkey to school,
and he also had to tell what had happened afterward.
"Of course you did wrong," said Herbert's mother, "and you must suffer
a little punishment."
"What kind of punishment?" asked Herbert.
"The punishment of not having your Monkey," was the answer.
And now we must see what happened to the Monkey on a Stick.
"What do you imagine will happen next?" asked the Doll of the
Monkey, for they had heard what had been