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book of magic alice hoffman a leading bookmaker in Asia, attracts players with its reputation and safety guarantee. ⭐️ “Not arf as smart as a magpie,” dissented Moses, “I’ve saw magpies that c’d think up the scheminest things.” Moses was beginning to suffer from a surfeit of information and wanted to make a break in the proceedings.,Acting on this timely suggestion, Mrs. Wopp deposited the mischievous youths on small chairs, one on each side of her table, directly under her watchful eye. Cracking nuts seemed to have been the special proposed form of amusement for the afternoon. By the end of five minutes the substitute teacher had set several large noisy paper bags on the window ledge.,Moses capitalized his bulk to effectively fill the large chair into which he sank. He surveyed with approval the new trousers presented to him by Miss Gordon, and tried to blot from his mind the ignominy that had attended the wearing of the ill-fitting pair. Those discarded checked monstrosities languished under Moses’ bed in close consultation with a pair of decrepit and muddy shoes. It was so sweet to the boy to see signs of convalescence in Betty that he took great comfort in just gazing on her pale face with its wisps of fair hair across the forehead. He summed up his general attitude to life by whispering to himself, “I don’t give a doughnut fer orl the check pants in Alberta.”,‘The antlered monarch of the waste,Bouncer barked at Billy’s heels. Geewhillikins chased an imaginary foe down the hill, and Jerusalem Crickets crept stealthily along the upper support of the side picket fence, trailing a venturesome sparrow.，CHAPTER VI.—AN EVENING IN THE WOPP PARLOR.，“She won’t do it; she said so before. She wants to be Alan-bane.”，“You must ’scuse me not goin’ to meet you, Miss Gordon,” apologized Mr. Wopp, as he held suspended a knife full of mashed potato, destined for his mouth. “But I hev a sick cow I couldn’t git away from, so I ast Howard here to drive in fer you.”It was apparent to the most casual observer that Mannel’s whole wardrobe consisted of one grey shirt, one pair of faded blue overalls and a pair of braces. To the uninitiated his occasional absences from school for an entire day would have seemed most mysterious. Leading questions as to the cause having been put to other members of the family who were present elicited only a reluctant reply that Mannel was not ill. Further than this they would not go. At last even on the most obtuse one, light would dawn. Mannel was being laundered.

“How in the world did you ever sleep through it, Billy?” his mother asked, coming in from the tank-room where she had been to investigate. “There is a small flood there. I should think the first drop would have wakened you.”,In spite of noise and heedlessness there was something fine and true about Billy; something that made old Bouncer whine when left behind; something that called the kittens to rub against his legs; that made the little children at school adore him, and men and women smile heartily when they greeted him. It was this mysterious something that brought a wan smile to the small tired face and tired eyes that looked confidingly into his blue ones. He lifted her carefully down from the carriage, and led her up the walk to where his mother and sister came to meet them.,“Had a fall, Billy?” Every one knew the boy.,but not the strong log house where——” He hesitated, and May Nell quoted on glibly,,“Who is Mr. Zalhamber?” asked Howard, as though he had forgotten his existence.,The last act exhausted the possibilities of the theatre in light effects and sylvan scenery; and the curtain rose on a gorgeous scene. But oh, horror! In the middle of the stage the scene-shifters had left the ugly truck that moved Storm King’s reservoir of ice and snow. When used in previous acts, bed and wheels had been hidden by moss, the tank had been covered by his mantle, and the entire mechanism, moving as he moved, had seemed a part of himself. Now its secret was disclosed and it was ridiculous.,“Can’t stop. It’s private anyway.” He waved his hand, ran across the foot-bridge and down the road, dodged into the brush for his wheel; and in a moment they heard his shout as he sped by toward town.,The little room was rude and bare, but Billy loved it. He thought the massive beams like the ribs of a ship, and planned to hang between them all his ship pictures. Anything relating to the sea fired his imagination. It gave him a sense of manliness to sleep there alone; and when the heavier gusts of night wind rocked the tower, and each revolution of the big wheel splashed the water against the tank, as waves lap a ship’s side, he dreamed himself on the ocean, called himself “Captain.”,Edith had quickly put her plan in execution, aided by the willing newspapers; but so far nothing had come of it, and mother and daughter feared their charge had lost more than aunt and cousin. South America, a very definite spot in the child’s mind, was still too vague a postoffice address for even Uncle Sam’s marvellous mail-carrying; and so, while encouraging May Nell, the two women tacitly adopted her into their hearts and discussed her future as if she were their own.,The Prettymans’ white cow was ingeniously shaped and caparisoned to represent “India’s Sacred White Elephant”; and Jackson was the Hindoo leader. This exhibit caused much controversy. The attendant should ride on the neck of the elephant, all agreed to that; but the cow objected; so they compromised by having Jackson walk. The matter of costume for Jackson was not so easily settled, as the differing pictures of sacred elephants presented a variation in the attendants’ garb. May Nell,—who was to be the “Fair Princess of Bombay,”—as soon as she could get a hearing, ended the dispute amicably by suggesting that Jackson be allowed his choice in the matter of dress, an alternative that permitted each disputant to withdraw from the argument with honor.,“You bet!” Pretty endorsed, inelegantly.,“And could he beat the old gentleman?” inquired Nell Gordon, vastly entertained..