Where
did you find it?"
"Oh, down there," she answered vaguely.
He handled the pipe lovingly, knocked it against the birch stump and
cleared it further with a curl of the polished, champagne-tinted
bark.
"Nice dog," he suggested, "what's his name?"
"Henry D. Thoreau," she replied, studying the green scarab in his
necktie and the heavy seal-ring on his left hand.
"For heaven's sake! Who named him?"
"My Uncle Joe," she returned simply, "because he takes to the woods
whenever he gets the chance. Was that pin a bug once?"
"Not since I ran across it," said the young man, "before that, I
can't say. Has your uncle any other animals?"
"Oh, yes," she assured him. "There's the donkey, his name is
Rose-Marie; and the baby's cat, his name is Pharaoh Meneptah, but
the baby calls him Coo-coo; and there's Miss Honey's rabbits,
they're all named Eleanor, because you can't tell them apart, and
one name does just as well; and the canary, his name is Jean and
Edouard de Reszke."
The young man burst into laughter and fell off the stump abruptly.
"Those are fine names, all of them," he declared, picking himself up
with great solicitude for the pipe, "but why did the canary get
two?"
"Because Aunt Edith likes Jean the best, but Uncle Joe says there's
more to Edouard," she explained, "so they named him both, because
Uncle Joe said anything was better than a divided family.
Pages:
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141