tambola house

tambola house Download +128K “This is a lyre, very old,” said Mr. Crump, handling an ancient instrument tenderly. Moses looked up suddenly, he hoped nothing he had said called forth the remark.,Betty, not interested in intricate relationships, tiptoed into the parlor and uncovering the organ, played with one finger “Home Sweet Home.” The wool-embroidered motto on the wall almost wept.,Mrs. Wopp obligingly gave as an encore, “There were ninety and nine,” apropos of nothing whatever. Then turning to a portrait on the wall, she enlarged on the musical ability of a great-uncle from whom she reckoned she had received her gift of song.,Howard Eliot guided his charges through the mazes of the city to a restaurant. Moses with the perennial appetite of fourteen ate silently and steadily, not omitting one item on the menu. He gorged.,Jimmy had the trick ponies and the trained dogs. Teaching them was the chief joy of his life. What if there were only two ponies, and their spots were painted on? And what if the children had seen all the tricks over and over again? They were good as new each time. Besides, the ponies’ one brand-new trick, when at the crack of a whip they stood on their hind feet in unison, was so effective that it frightened May Nell. She saw it first in the barn; and when their shod hoofs came down she thought they would crash right through the floor.，Guinea pigs, pigeons, and other and larger live stock, normal or otherwise, masqueraded as marvellous creatures from foreign lands.，“O Billy, it hurts the ears of my mind to hear you say those vulgar words.” May Nell, playing “man” for the first time in her life, looked up from the “rod of grade” that she was piling deftly with a broken shingle. The color from sun and exercise added much to her beauty. She was neither blowsy nor smudged like the other children, and her lawn frock was as spotless as in the morning.，CHAPTER VII.—THE LITTLE CHURCH IN THE COULEE.“I must of looked like that Lize or the picter couldn’t of been took.” Ruefully he rubbed his bald crown.

“What new trick has Flash been up to?”,As he climbed down, reaching from branch to branch, very cautiously, he knew not why, he was suddenly halted by the sound of low voices. Carefully he crept nearer. A tiny hut came in view, with an open door, and the glint of fire within. A man was standing outside, smoking a pipe, yet wearing hat, coat, and gloves, as if about to set off. He was very large. His clothes were new and showy, too bright in color, too large of check. His watch chain was massive; the big diamond out of place with his colored shirt; and the soft silk handkerchief he drew from his pocket was a brilliant red, and the largest Billy had ever seen. Another man, in the doorway, was smaller and bareheaded. His sleeves were rolled up, and his hands were stained.,Nothing loth to keep the distance between himself and Nell at a minimum, Howard Eliot entered with zest into the boy’s plans.,“Something my mother sent yours. You mustn’t touch it,” he warned, as Billy made a reach for it. “I was to land this safe in Mrs. Bennett’s hands; and here goes!” He sprang from Billy’s outreached arms, ran into the house and out again, before Billy had time to resume his mowing.,“Please, Mith Wopp, the latht windthorm upthet our hen-houth.”,The child reared without pets was delighted with the animal life about her; the cats, old Bouncer, the white chickens, and pigeons cooing in the loft.,The first act over, a troop of black-faced comedians occupied the stage.,He smiled wanly, and her heart ached for him; but she knew sympathy was unsafe just then. “If you could see that comical, crooked eye of yours blinking at me, like a chicken asking your intentions, you’d laugh, Billy.”,“But you may have broken bones—be seriously injured.”,“Never mind grammar, or spelling, whichever it is; what did Flash do?”,At last the long-looked-for day arrived and by two o’clock eight children from the nearest ranches had ridden or had been brought by grownups to the Wopp farm, all arrayed in their best bibs and tuckers.,“I mix up words that way sometimes, too,” the child excused..