The Wonderful Bed | Page 7

all ready to run," he whispered, "if you don't like the looks of the person who comes. Now!" And he knocked long and loud upon the blue and white striped door.
[Illustration]

[Illustration]

CHAPTER III
A VISIT TO THE GOOSE
The door flew open almost before Rudolf had stopped knocking, but there was nothing very alarming about the person who stood on the threshold. Ann said afterward she had thought at first it was a Miss Spriggins who came sometimes to sew for her mother, but it was not; it was only a very large gray goose neatly dressed in blue and white bed-ticking, with a large white apron tied round her waist and wearing big spectacles with black rims to them.
"Nothing to-day, thank you," said the Goose.
"But please--" began Rudolf.
"No soap, no baking powder, no lightning rods, no hearth-brooms, no cake tins, no life insurance--" rattled the Goose so rapidly that the children could hardly understand her--"nothing at all to-day, thank you!"
"But we want something," Ann cried, "we want to come in!"
"I never let in peddlers," said the Goose, and she slammed the door in their faces. As she slammed it one of her broad apron-strings caught in the crack, and Rudolf seized the end of it. When the Goose opened the door an inch or so to free herself he held on firmly and said:
"Tell us, please, are you the Warming-pan's aunt?"
The Gray Goose looked immensely pleased, but shook her head.
"Nothing so simple," said she, "nor, so to speak, commonplace, since the relationship or connection if you will have it, is, though perfectly to be distinguished, not always, as it were, entirely clear, through his great-grandfather who, as I hope you are aware, was a Dutch-Oven, having run away with a cousin of my mother's uncle's stepfather, who was three times married, numbers one, two and three all having children but none of 'em resembling one another in the slightest, which, as you may have perceived, is only the beginning of the story, but if you will now come in, not forgetting to wipe your feet, and try to follow me very carefully, I'll be delighted to explain all particulars."
The children were glad to follow the Lady Goose into the house, though they thought she had been quite particular enough. They found it impossible to wipe their feet upon the mat because it was thick with snow, and when the door was closed behind them, they were surprised to feel that it was snowing even harder inside the house than it was out. For a moment they stood half blinded by the storm, unable to see clearly what kind of room they were in or to tell whose were the voices they heard so plainly. A great fluttering, cackling, and complaining was going on close to them, and a hoarse voice cried out:
"One hundred and seventeen and three-quarters feathers to be multiplied by two-sevenths of a pound. That's a sweet one! Do that if you can, Squealer."
"You can't do it yourself," a whining voice replied. "I've tried the back and the corners and the edges--there's no more room--"
Then came the sound of a sudden smack, as if some one's ears had been boxed when he least expected it, and this was followed by a loud angry squawk. Now the flakes, which had been gradually thinning, died away entirely, and the children suddenly discovered that they had not been snowflakes at all but only a cloud of white feathers sent whirling through the house, out of the windows, and up the chimney by some disturbance in the midst of a great heap in one corner of the room as high as a haystack. From the middle of this heap of feathers stuck up two very thin yellow legs with shabby boots that gave one last despairing kick and then were still. Near by at a counter a Gentleman Goose in a long apron was weighing feathers on a very small pair of scales, and at his elbow stood a little duck apprentice with the tears running down his cheeks. He was doing sums in a greasy sort of butcher's book that seemed quite full already of funny scratchy figures.
"That must be Squealer, the one who got his ears boxed," whispered Ann to Rudolf, "but what do you suppose is the matter with the other duck, the one in the heap? He will be smothered, I know he will!"
Rudolf thought so, too, yet it didn't seem polite to mention it. The Lady Goose had been busily helping the children to brush off the feathers that were sticking to them, and patting Peter on the back with her bill because he said he was sure he had swallowed at least a pound. She now brought forward chairs for them all. As the children looked around more