The Woggle-Bug Book | Page 5

quarter to the vanished dollar before
the score was finally settled; and no sooner had the tribe trooped out
restaurant than they turned into the open portals of an Ice-Cream Parlor,

where they all attacked huge stacks of pale ice-cream and consumed
several plates of lady-fingers and cream-puffs.
Again the Woggle-Bug reluctantly abandoned a dollar; but the end was
not yet. The dear children wanted candy and nuts; and then they warned
pink lemonade; and then pop-corn and chewing-gum; and always the
Woggle-Bug, after a glance at the entrancing costume, found himself
unable to resist paying for the treat.
It was nearly evening when the widow pleaded fatigue and asked to be
taken home. For none of them was able to eat another morsel, and the
Woggle-Bug wearied her with his protestations of boundless
admiration.
"Will you permit me to call upon you this evening?" asked the Insect,
pleadingly, as he bade the wearer of the gown good-bye on her
door-step.
"Sure like!" she replied, not caring to dismiss him harshly; and the
happy Woggle-Bug went home with a light heart, murmuring to
himself:
"At last the lovely plaids are to be my own! The new hat I found at the
ball has certainly brought me luck."
I am glad our friend the Woggle-Bug had those few happy moments,
for he was destined to endure severe disappointments in the near future.
That evening he carefully brushed his coat, put on a green satin necktie
and a purple embroidered waist-coat, and walked briskly towards the
house of the widow. But, alas! as he drew near to the dwelling a most
horrible stench greeted his nostrils, a sense of great depression came
over him, and upon pausing before the house his body began to tremble
and his eyes rolled wildly in their sockets.
For the wily widow, wishing to escape her admirer, had sprinkled the
door-step and the front walk with insect Exterminator, and not even the
Woggle-Bug's love for the enchanting checked gown could induce him

to linger longer in that vicinity.
Sick and discouraged, he returned home, where his first act was to
smash the luckless hat and replace it with another. But it was some time
before he recovered from the horrors of that near approach to
extermination, and he passed a very wakeful and unhappy night,
indeed.
Meantime the widow had traded with a friend of hers (who had once
been a wash-lady for General Funston) the Wagnerian costume for a
crazy quilt and a corset that was nearly as good as new and a pair of
silk stockings that were not mates. It was a good bargain for both of
them, and the wash-lady being colored--that is, she had a deep
mahogany complexion--was delighted with her gorgeous gown and put
it on the very next morning when she went to deliver the wash to the
brick-layer's wife.
Surely it must have been Fate that directed the Woggle-Bug's steps; for,
as he walked disconsolately along, an intuition caused him to raise his
eyes, and he saw just ahead of him his affinity--carrying a large
clothes-basket.
"Stop!" he called our, anxiously; "stop, my fair Grenadine, I implore
you!"
The colored lady cast one glance behind her and imagined that Satan
had at last arrived to claim her. For she had never before seen the
Woggle-Bug, and was horrified by his sudden and unusual appearance.
"Go 'way, Mars' Debbil! Go 'way an' lemme 'lone!" she screeched, and
the next minute she dropped her empty basket and sped up the street
with a swiftness that only fear could have lent her flat-bottomed feet.
Nevertheless, the Woggle-Bug might have overtaken her had he not
stepped into the clothes-basket and fallen headlong, becoming so
tangled up in the thing that he rolled over and over several times before
he could free himself. Then, when he had picked up his hat, which was
utterly ruined, and found his cane, which had flown across the street,

his mahogany charmer in the Wagnerian Plaids had disappeared from
view.
With a sigh at his latest misfortune he returned home for another hat,
and the agitated wash-lady, imagining that the devil had doubtless been
lured by her beautiful gown, made haste to sell it to a Chinaman who
lived next door.
Its bright colors pleased the Chink, who ripped it up and made it over
into a Chinese robe, with flowing draperies falling to his heels. He
dressed himself in his new costume and, being proud of possessing
such finery, sat down on a bench outside his door so that everyone
passing by could see how magnificent he looked.
It was here the wandering Woggle-Bug espied him; and, recognizing at
once the pattern and colors of his infatuating idol, he ran up and sat
beside the Chinaman, saying in agitated but