He was reduced to the humiliating confession: "Yes.""Would you like me to teach you a story? But you must remember it, you know, and be able to tell it right to somebody else afterwards."He professed that it would afford him the highest mental gratification to be taught a story, and that he would humbly endeavour to retain it in his mind. Whereupon Polly, giving her hand a new little turn in his, expressive of settling down for enjoyment, commenced a long romance, of which every relishing clause began with the words: "So this," or, "And so this." As, "So this boy;" or, "So this fairy;" or, "And so this pie was four yards round, and two yards and a quarter deep." The interest of the romance was derived from the intervention of this fairy to punish this boy for having a greedy appetite. To achieve which purpose, this fairy made this pie, and this boy ate and ate and ate, and his cheeks swelled and swelled and swelled. There were many tributary circumstances, but the forcible interest culminated in the total consumption of this pie, and the bursting of this boy. Truly he was a fine sight, Barbox Brothers, with serious attentive face, and ear bent down, much jostled on the pavements of the busy town, but afraid of losing a single incident of the epic, lest he should be examined in it by-and-by, and found deficient.
Thus they arrived at the hotel. And there he had to say at the bar, and said awkwardly enough; "I have found a little girl!"The whole establishment turned out to look at the little girl.
Nobody knew her; nobody could make out her name, as she set it forth--except one chamber-maid, who said it was Constantinople--which it wasn't.
"I will dine with my young friend in a private room," said Barbox Brothers to the hotel authorities, "and perhaps you will be so good as to let the police know that the pretty baby is here. I suppose she is sure to be inquired for soon, if she has not been already.
Come along, Polly."
Perfectly at ease and peace, Polly came along, but, finding the stairs rather stiff work, was carried up by Barbox Brothers. The dinner was a most transcendant success, and the Barbox sheepishness, under Polly's directions how to mince her meat for her, and how to diffuse gravy over the plate with a liberal and equal hand, was another fine sight.
"And now," said Polly, "while we are at dinner, you be good, and tell me that story I taught you."With the tremors of a Civil Service examination upon him, and very uncertain indeed, not only as to the epoch at which the pie appeared in history, but also as to the measurements of that indispensable fact, Barbox Brothers made a shaky beginning, but under encouragement did very fairly. There was a want of breadth observable in his rendering of the cheeks, as well as the appetite, of the boy; and there was a certain tameness in his fairy, referable to an under-current of desire to account for her. Still, as the first lumbering performance of a good-humoured monster, it passed muster.
"I told you to be good," said Polly, "and you are good, ain't you?""I hope so," replied Barbox Brothers.
Such was his deference that Polly, elevated on a platform of sofa cushions in a chair at his right hand, encouraged him with a pat or two on the face from the greasy bowl of her spoon, and even with a gracious kiss. In getting on her feet upon her chair, however, to give him this last reward, she toppled forward among the dishes, and caused him to exclaim, as he effected her rescue: "Gracious Angels!
Whew! I thought we were in the fire, Polly!""What a coward you are, ain't you?" said Polly when replaced.
"Yes, I am rather nervous," he replied. "Whew! Don't, Polly!
Don't flourish your spoon, or you'll go over sideways. Don't tilt up your legs when you laugh, Polly, or you'll go over backwards.
Whew! Polly, Polly, Polly," said Barbox Brothers, nearly succumbing to despair, "we are environed with dangers!"Indeed, he could descry no security from the pitfalls that were yawning for Polly, but in proposing to her, after dinner, to sit upon a low stool. "I will, if you will," said Polly. So, as peace of mind should go before all, he begged the waiter to wheel aside the table, bring a pack of cards, a couple of footstools, and a screen, and close in Polly and himself before the fire, as it were in a snug room within the room. Then, finest sight of all, was Barbox Brothers on his footstool, with a pint decanter on the rug, contemplating Polly as she built successfully, and growing blue in the face with holding his breath, lest he should blow the house down.
"How you stare, don't you?" said Polly in a houseless pause.
Detected in the ignoble fact, he felt obliged to admit, apologetically:
"I am afraid I was looking rather hard at you, Polly.""Why do you stare?" asked Polly.
"I cannot," he murmured to himself, "recall why.--I don't know, Polly.""You must be a simpleton to do things and not know why, mustn't you?" said Polly.
In spite of which reproof, he looked at the child again intently, as she bent her head over her card structure, her rich curls shading her face. "It is impossible," he thought, "that I can ever have seen this pretty baby before. Can I have dreamed of her? In some sorrowful dream?"He could make nothing of it. So he went into the building trade as a journeyman under Polly, and they built three stories high, four stories high; even five.
"I say! Who do you think is coming?" asked Polly, rubbing her eyes after tea.
He guessed: "The waiter?"
"No," said Polly, "the dustman. I am getting sleepy."A new embarrassment for Barbox Brothers!
"I don't think I am going to be fetched to-night," said Polly.
"What do you think?"
He thought not, either. After another quarter of an hour, the dustman not merely impending, but actually arriving, recourse was had to the Constantinopolitan chamber-maid: who cheerily undertook that the child should sleep in a comfortable and wholesome room, which she herself would share.